Ep 44 –HOW TO GET STARTED AS A BUSINESS COACH

Transcript

Below is a machine-generated transcript and therefore the transcript may contain errors.

This is episode 44 – how to get started as a business coach. If you travel a lot in your career and want to stay home more often, consider adding coaching to your repertoire. Especially in this time of possible world pandemics, causing flights to cancel and meetings to cancel, it’s always good to have a revenue source that you can generate from anywhere in the world using the Internet. In this episode it’s about how to get started or to build if you’ve already established yourself as a coach. Hi, I’m Carla Rieger, and you’re listening to the mind story speaker podcast for influencers in business who speak and to want to transform the lives of others through your expertise.

For years my business model was speaking, training, workshops which meant I lived on the road a lot of the time. When I added coaching I loved it in many ways. For example I could take everything I talk to groups and teach it to an individual, or to a small group. At first, before streaming video, I saw people face-to-face. That meant I could only build a clientele based on those who lived nearby. However, as streaming video came online, I started coaching individuals around the world, and then started coaching groups all over the world using a platform like Zoom or Skype. This meant I could live in Hawaii over the winter or Thailand or Bali, or my partner Dave and I could sometimes live in Europe and sometimes live in North America. My business grew exponentially because I could now reach anyone in the world, not just those in places I could travel to. Some people live in remote areas and could never get your expertise unless you are offering it in an online format like videoconferencing. If you already do that, you’ve positioned yourself very favorably for the world where moving into. In a world where AI, automation and technology are taking over, what’s left for humans to do our roles that require the complex human heart, and coaching is one of them. Coaching is a booming industry – there’s never been a better time to get into this, it’s reaching multi billion dollar heights only dreamed of when it was a fringe movement in eighties, and the estimate it’s going to go ballistic. It’s now mainstream, and they estimate that it will be like fitness. Fitness used to just be a fringe movement, now it’s a booming mainstream industry. It’s the same with coaching, soon a majority of people will recongnize the need to have a coach in their life on a regular basis, just like keeping active. It will be weird if you don’t have a coach. You can run an entire coaching business from home, coaching clients over the phone or videoconferencing. Allows you to make a big difference for people, unlike many other professions out there. You can coach individuals or groups so you can leverage your business where necessary. You can develop products that complement your coaching and speaking offerings for added income and value to people. So how do you get started? When I started out, I had no certification, I just winged it. I figure I’d been teaching groups, I could just teach the same thing to individuals. That worked actually quite well, until I came up against people’s inner self sabotage, which everyone seems to have. That’s when I got a certificate in a brain training process which I used to help people who had high-pressure careers, like people in the public eye a lot, or big leaders of companies, where the stakes were really high, and it caused their brain to short-circuit under the pressure. So it was a kind of brain performance coaching. Then I went on to get a business and leadership coach certification since I was mostly dealing with leaders in business. I still noticed, however, that some people I wasn’t getting any results with, something about the way they thought kept stopping them. That’s when I got a self hypnosis certification which helped me train people to reprogram their own mind in how they viewed life and themselves. That works really well for a while, but then I came up against another type of client that did well in business, but sabotaged their life in terms of relationships, weight, self-esteem, life purpose, so that’s when I got life coach certification so that I could really serve the whole person. And now I’ve combined all 4. My partner Dave has similar training, and so when we got together and combined our styles, his quite masculine, mine quite feminine, we created an integrated model called the MindStory method. After several years, we had so many people ask if they could learn how to do what we do, we started certifying people in that method. All that said, you don’t need to be certified to coach. There are lots of people coaching with no certification like I did when I first started, some people just want a system, a structure, training so they feel are comfortable moving forward, and know how to deal with tough situations. That’s what motivated all the certifications I got. They were almost always motivated by a tough customer, and really wanting to help them in a deeper way.

So what I did when I first started, was tell people when I spoke to groups, that I did offer 121 help, and a certain number of people in the group wanted that. They had private issues where they needed a confidential place away from work where they could sort through complex issues, they wanted that personalized attention to their particular situation and learning style, and they wanted deeper help over time so that the learning would stick, and they wanted the accountability to take action. And you definitely can offer all those things as a coach, versus when you are a speaker or trainer or workshop leader and just give people a one off learning experience in a group. Offering your expertise to groups as well as individuals will serve more people, and round out your offerings in a better way. So, just think about the kind of questions people ask you about regularly, the things that they get stuck on, those are areas you could be coaching on. And you always need a solution to get people in the door, the thing that trips up a lot of people. Because I was coaching change leaders, their biggest issues were dealing with motivating themselves and others, sabotage of positive change, and how to deal with interpersonal communication effectively.

So those were the three issues I spoke on but also coached on. I only really got traction with people when I realize that 98% of those issues are at the mindset level. All the strategies in the world wouldn’t work if the mindset wasn’t right. That’s why, if you are going to be a coach, it really helps to get some kind of mindset training, if you don’t already have it. That’s when you can really get results for people. So just to give you an idea of what it can look like, many business or life coaches, or those who combine that approach, charge a minimum of $1000 a month for one session a week, and some charge much more than that. One coach I’ve worked with, who is highly specialized, charges $80,000 for a VIP day, which is just one day of working with him where you roll up your sleeves and get a solution for the person. Some people charge 15-50 k for a 6 or 12 month program individually and 5-30K for a small group program. So just think about that for yourself, with that extra income make a difference? I can tell you that the people I’ve coached long term I’ve made the biggest difference for, they had the greatest results, then somebody that was just in my audience for a one off engagement. I know for me, as a consumer, if I really want to learn something and become successful quickly, I will always hire a coach. It’s just the way humans learn. It’s the old apprenticeship model where you work with a master over time and have the accountability and the troubleshooting to course correct until you get the result you’re looking for.

Left their devices, most people either never get started, or make very costly mistakes that make them quit, or that make the whole process take a lot longer and cost a lot more. So even know it may seem like a big investment to hire a coach, you actually save yourself a lot of heartache, money and time by doing so. If you choose the right person to help you. So many people wonder why anyone would want to pay them that much money for that personal attention. But just think about it from the perspective of the person you’re helping, if you put your full attention on them, customize the whole process for them, teach them what you already know so that they can become successful quickly, it’s totally worth the investment of time and money. The tricky part of course is building that value in the minds of people who could hire you, and that all starts with believing in your own value ahead of time, manufacturing your own worth and confidence and value for you’ve actually proven it in the marketplace.

Of course there are strategies for reaching your ideal prospects, but if the mindset isn’t there first, no amount of strategies in the world will work. So that’s why I just want to focus on that first, and in other episodes we can talk about strategies. Anyone who started any kind of business always had to do that– believe enough in themselves first even though they hadn’t proven it to themselves yet, and so it would be the same for you with coaching, whether you’re just getting started, or you want to jump up to the next level whereby you’re valuing your offerings more, leveraging your offerings more, raising your prices, or seeing yourself having longer-term, deeper results for people than you’re getting.

The most important thing to think about when deciding to become a coach is moving away from the idea of time for money, I charge this much per our kind of thing. You need to think about it in terms of the value you give to someone. For example, when I coach people, there’s the time we spend on the session, but there’s a lot of in between time where I’m answering a person’s questions, helping them debrief a challenging situation on Facebook messenger or email, or giving them feedback on written material, but I’m also holding them in my consciousness. In other words, every good coach usually does something like that. Whether you meditate in the morning and you hold your coaching clients in your prayers, and send them healing energy, or you are helping envisioned their goals for them, because the more people envisioning their goals, coming true, the more likely they are to happen. You also have to think about all your years of wisdom from all these different environments, applied in particular to that person in their learning style and their situation, that sweet spot of all those things coming together in the right way at the right time with the right mindset, then you can asked him a certain question and their whole world changes, they all of a sudden see the world and in tiredly different way their thoughts change, their feelings change, which changes their actions and therefore their results. I certainly had that when I’ve been coach, where the person just says something in my whole world changes for the better, and I’ve certainly had that when coaching others. So what’s that moment in time worth, if it changes the entire person’s life for the better. So that’s why I think it might be useful for you to do something I call the explore your passion worksheet. You see the link in the show notes. This is a fun, creative process to find or further clarify a focus for building and authority entrepreneur business, such as coaching or consulting or further defining yourself as a speaker, author, trainer, workshop leader. Is where you share your expertise or authority in a given area. So can be much easier to build quickly if you focus on a certain solution for certain type of person. And maybe you’re wanting to transition out of a certain focus that is working for you anymore, and starting a new one, or starting new altogether. So for example and expert who helps people lose weight is up against the entire market of people trying to help others lose weight comments most crowded market in the world. But someone who coaches women after childbirth lose weight and get their figure back, is going to find it much easier to market herself. Or someone who helps others sell their business is going to have a much harder time than, if they focus on men with private financial services companies wanting to find a strategic investor. It’s much easier to get referrals when you’re that specific. You can join groups where those kind of people hang out.

So, you brainstorm on discovering your passion where you find the sweet spot of your unique qualities, your main skills, what excites you, and then you do finding hungry prospects worksheet where you find out which communities would most benefit from your expertise, what hurts, what’s changing for those communities, and how to then benefit those specific communities with your expertise. So it’s basically combining all that with what the marketplace will bear, what people will actually pay for. And it’s a complex process if you try to do it in a linear way where you tend to have an idea and then you edit yourself and then you have an idea and then you edit yourself and then you give up thinking it’s impossible. This way you brainstorm anything and everything to get past the inner editor, and then you narrow it down to a few specific areas, and one specific community, then you create your expertise mission statement at the end. It only takes about 20 minutes and has been entirely life-changing for people, so check that out

Also, if you want to get clear on an area of expertise you want to coach people on, it helps to look and see who else is doing that, how they are marketing themselves, how they are packaging their coaching, what kind of results they are getting for people. So that process will help you get through the number one mindset issue that people come to me with which is, I’m confused and unclear about where to focus. So this will give you a focus, and just know that the thought – I can’t get clear – is often a smokescreen for something deeper, which is often just a fear of getting out of your comfort zone and putting yourself out in the world in a way that you’re not used you, that you might fail lack, that might not work out. But anytime he starts on the new you’re going to go into that place of discomfort, so the really successful people in the world just get used to being uncomfortable, so if you could train your brain to be comfortable with being uncomfortable, you’re ahead of 98% of the other people in the world, and you can’t help but be very successful, because most people backed down from discomfort. Most of us are trained to only seek out things that make us feel comfortable, that’s why people stay stuck doing things that are off purpose for years, just because of that. And that’s why having a coach, if you’re going to be a coach, is very important, because the coach can help you get out of your comfort zone and be okay there, and you need that support on a regular basis otherwise it so easy to go back to your comfort zone. The survival brain is wired for comfort, so you’re having to re-train a very instinctual part of you, which is totally possible, but it does require some handholding.

All that said, let me give you one very powerful coaching technique you can use on yourself, or with a client. It’s deceptively simple, but has proven life-changing for many people. You might be familiar with it if you ever watched a very funny YouTube clip with Bob Newhart playing a psychotherapist. Woman named Catherine comes to see him. He says, just have a seat and let me tell you a bit about our billing. I charge five dollars for the first five minutes and then absolutely nothing after that. How does that sound? That sounds great. Too good to be true as a matter of fact. Well I can almost guarantee you that our session won’t last the full five minutes. So go ahead and tell me about your problem. I have this fear of being buried alive in a box. I just start thinking about it and I begin to panic. He says has anyone ever tried to bury you alive in a box. Know, but thinking about it makes my life horrible. Okay Catherine I’m going to say two words to write now. A way to listen to them very carefully. Then I want you to take them out of the office with you and and incorporate them into your life. Shall I write them down. Know. It’s just two words. We find most people can remember them. Okay. You ready?. Yes. Okay. Here they are. Stop at. I’m sorry? Stop it. I don’t get it. You mean I should just stop it? That’s it. You don’t want to go through your whole life scared of being buried alive in a box do you? Know. Then stop it. Now the skit goes on for a while it’s very funny. And I wouldn’t talk to coaching client like that, but essentially that’s the best thing you can do for people. People get into these looping thoughts and they don’t realize that they can stop them.

Literally at any second you can snap your fingers and and just switch off negative thoughts. You can just stop it and then you’re in life. What I mean by life? You know that state of mind when you’re relaxed, peaceful, here looking out into Vista, on a beach, feeling centered okay, content, creative, happy, loving. That’s what I mean by life. That is the natural state of a human being when they are connected to true life. When they are stuck in a lot of looping negative thoughts, those are just subconscious programs that art the real you, that aren’t real life. and the way to get back to that often is just getting back into the present moment. Most looping thoughts are about regrets from the past or worrying about the future, you are outside the present mind. But if you were to just focus on the here and now noticing what you see, hear, feel, experience right here and now, it’s very hard to stay in the negative looping thoughts. So you can help your clients do that. I often have them do that for one minute, what you hear, what you see, what you physically feel. If you go very deeply into life, into the present moment then you’ll realize you’re with a higher kind of presence that can solve all kinds of issues, it allows you access to the most creative part of your body mind system where you can either be okay with what’s happening, or you can see a solution that you can see before.

You can’t get there, however, if you stick in the looping thoughts and don’t choose to stop them. And once you make contact with that presence, that higher mind it will communicate with you and then it will start giving you this abundance. Once I discovered that, and many of my clients discovered that, they wouldn’t dream of living in bad thoughts . Yes they might go there once in a while, but they wouldn’t live in that state, they would just keep dropping it until eventually you don’t even go there. You can train your brain to get into what’s called the perfect mental climate whereby you’re in a very high-frequency brain state, where you are accessing higher brain waves of deep intuition and creativity. As soon as you get a client into that state, you’re worth your weight in gold. But of course you have to get yourself into that state, to help them get there. So that’s one of the upside to becoming a coach, is it requires you to be coached on a regular basis which means you tend to grow personally and professionally much more quickly than those who don’t get coach regularly.

I would go so far as to say, There’s nothing more important than to do this, to connect into this higher mine, this life force energy. Cause that’s the reason I think we are all here. This may surprise you because people think they are here to make a lot of money, take care of their kids, contribute to the economy, – and all those are fine, but by far this is the most important thing, because you can’t really do any of those things in a way that really serves others if you’re not connected to this higher mind. So you have to stop the bad thoughts in order to get there, it’s really that simple. Because then, magic shows up, synchronicity, great opportunities, life starts to take care of you, and you become a living bridge for others to start doing the same thing so you become incredibly invaluable to your audiences, your listeners, your prospects, your clients. They literally pick up on what you’re doing subconsciously and start doing it themselves.

Let’s try it right now, think of a thought you have been looping on, you know the one you wake up thinking about, the worry or the regret, or the thing you’re being a bit obsessive about, perfectionistic about, fearful about, irritated about, resentful about, any negative emotion attached to it. So think about that circumstance or person, or way of being within yourself that you’re not happy about. Now just practice saying that to yourself – stop it. Stop the thought. Picture it like a backpack on your back that’s really heavy. You’re climbing up a mountain with this big heavy burden of negative thoughts, and it just occurs to you that you don’t actually need anything in the bag. That everything you need will be provided for you along the way, so you can let it all go. So you feel yourself taking off the bat pack and leaving it on the ground and continuing your climb of the mountain feeling a lot more light, more easily able to move, and trusting that everything you need will be given to you as you go. That metaphor really works for a lot of people, anytime you find yourself looping in the negative thoughts. So give it a try and let me know how it works for you. So again check out the explore your passion worksheet in the show notes, you can also go to mind story Academy.com to find out about our certification program in the mind story method. You can see when the next one starts, and you can fill out a questionnaire to see if it’s the right fit, and then we do a free demo session and discuss your needs to save it’s the right fit. In the meantime to consider building your income and your impact in the world through coaching in a much bigger way as we move into uncertain times, people are going to need that more than ever, and it frees you up to live anywhere and stay home if you need to. Until next time I’m Carla Rieger thanks for listening.

Ep 44 –HOW TO GET STARTED AS A BUSINESS COACH

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Below is a machine-generated transcript and therefore the transcript may contain errors.

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