Inspiring your audience to enroll in private coaching isn’t at all like selling a gadget, clothing or makeup on Instagram.
Because coaching is intimate, pricey and hopefully long-term, your prospects need to TRUST YOU before they hire you.
Nurturing future ideal coaching clients is the #1 goal of all messaging, whether in podcast episodes, social posts or emails.
Emails are a strategic part of generosity marketing, which is about creating content that relates, entertains, educates and inspires your most ideal prospects to follow you and then some, to hire you.
But no single message is a one-hit-wonder. The trust building process is coordinated and meant to take time.
You will benefit from a slower sales arc because it attracts clients who are pre-sold to work with YOU, will commit to the process and won’t regret the investment.
Coach, Show That You Know Who You’re Emailing
You can imagine that to relate, inspire, entertain and educate in emails or any message, first you have to understand your audience well.
What makes them tick? What solutions are they seeking? What will grab their attention and engage them?
Knowing that begins by knowing the BIG problems you help them solve that are in the way to big goals they are struggling to achieve. Check out Episode 288 called What Inspires People to Invest in Your Coaching.
A big problem coaches face is failing to speak to a BIG ENOUGH PROBLEM. If a coach is focusing their messages on selling coaching, that’s not going to attract many clients.
Instead, connect the dots between your audience’s big problems in the way of big goals to your coaching program as a solution. Do that over time.
Emails are one of the mediums you can use to connect the dots.
But you won’t just send out emails pushing coaching or talking about typical coaching topics like limiting beliefs, values and self care. Contextualize every message you create to the world of your specific target audience and their big problems.
Contextualizing messages is how you grab attention, get followers and nurture them over time. It’s how you SHOW THAT YOU KNOW THEM.
If you haven’t yet chosen a viable target audience to serve and discovered why they would seek out help and hire you, let’s fix that in a single Nail Your Niche session with me. I’ll send you a pre-session questionnaire to draw out clues about your ideal audience and their big problems that you can help them solve through coaching. Then, we’ll brainstorm ideas in session.
Your niche is the cornerstone of everything you’ll do for your coaching business and becomes your guiding star for:
- How you write copy on your website
- How you’ll design your high-ticket Signature Program and other offers
- How you’ll attract clients who will invest and close the sale through various messaging
Show Them Who You Are, Coach
In addition to showing your audience that you know who they are and the specific problems in the way of what they want, also show them WHO YOU ARE.
I’m not just talking about touting your credentials and work experience (although do relay those details now and then too.)
I’m talking about being vulnerable and real. A bit at a time, reveal your own philosophy, life lessons, twists and turns in your journey as those things relate to your audience. Show them that you understand their big problems and goals in a personal way.
Listen to Episode 164 called Why Your Personal Story is Valuable to Coaching Clients.
Emails are Part of a Strategic Customer Journey
I’m not a huge fan of email marketing as a primary selling strategy. I tried that tactic for a few years and truly hated it.
In 2008 I got caught up in a joint venture marketing group, whose goal was to make a lot of money selling online programs. I reached for it because I’d been selling 1:1 coaching at low pricing. Little did I understand that I could have just increased my pricing and avoided all this highfalutin stuff.
I developed and sold 3 online training programs to coaches including a year-long membership program called The Coaches Power Path, which was pretty amazing. However, it required crafting a lengthy set of email campaigns and producing cyclical enrollment events.
Most of my time was spent on the super brain straining work of writing high response sales pages and email copy then roping in other marketers to market for me. In 2010, exhausted and disheartened I abandoned all that and went back to 1:1 offers where I could get to know my clients and serve them in a high-touch way.
So, I don’t teach coaches email marketing. But learning to use emails as part of generosity marketing is something I do advocate.
Generosity marketing works without all the pushing and convincing present in most email marketing campaigns.
So, for many coaches, the only email campaign they’ll have will be part of a follow up process to offering a free Lead Magnet. This is where the prospects opts-in on your website to receive a free downloadable guide or something that offers a bit of value without “giving away the farm.”
I did a whole series of podcast episodes about creating meaningful lead magnets that you can check out starting with Episode 124 through Episode 129. The last episode has a free download for you called How to Make Your Free Offer Irresistible. Creating a valuable freebie and enticing opt-in will help you frame the follow up series of emails that goes out afterwards.
If you really want to build trust with your subscriber and inspire them to stay subscribed as a follower, deliver real value and not just another coachey concept they can find elsewhere.
Your lead magnet should provide UNIQUE insights that strike a resonant chord with your target audience around their specific big problems.
Your lead magnet and the emails that follow are part of your customer journey ‑ the gentle path you strategically create for your audience that leads them to following you. It includes everything you put out into the world to your target audience – your website, emails, social posts and content.
That customer journey is how you attract a steady stream of new clients who are ready to hire you.
7 Tips to Inspire Potential Coaching Clients to Read Your Emails
Learning how to write effective emails that get opened, read and inspire click throughs is an art form.
Write emails or a series of emails with the end result in mind. Think strategically.
Personalize your subscriber’s first name at the beginning of the subject line and salutation. If you have hundreds of emails staring you in the face, which are the ones that will grab attention most? Those with your name that follow with something relevant to you.
Ace the subject line! Boring subject lines will land your email in the trash unread. Be sure that your subject lines raise curiosity and use keywords for your audience. Which one of these emails would you open?
Curiosity is Key
or
Capture the Curiosity of Your Future Coaching Clients
Keep to no more than 3-line paragraphs and have many one line or one sentence paragraphs. Most people read on their phones and 3 lines will become 15 lines.
Name a problem you’ll solve. If an email doesn’t mention a problem or point to a solution, it’s not likely to be fully read. But that doesn’t mean the email is a tome. Keep it simple and tease the solution rather than spelling out.
Avoid over-design. Put your company logo or branding header at the top. Use an easy-to-read font. I recommend black 18-point type for most fonts. Include only one call to action in an email with one link. Add only one image that illustrates the main point of the email if possible.
Email your audience at least once per week, after the initial email campaign related to your Lead Magnet. I know, that seems like a lot. But the most common mistake of new marketers is inconsistency. If you’re connecting less than once a week, your subscriber will unsubscribe because they will forget who you are.
Hard selling by email feels skeevy. You don’t like this and neither will your audience. So, resist the temptation to sell to people who do not already know, like and trust you well. That causes unsubscribes.
By the way, unsubscribes aren’t all bad. Part of what’s happening with unsubscribes is natural selection. Your IDEAL clients are staying with you and those who don’t connect to your message are moving on.