Coaching Biz Tips

Resources for Your Inner Geek

What the heck is "SEO"?

How do you add a widget to a WordPress blog?

Help! My web page is all screwed up! How do I fix the HTML code?

For some reason, I get asked these kinds of questions all the time. But I'm just a simple biz development/marketing coach who happens to be a little bit geeky (I get it from my dad, the retired engineer turned hi-tech gadget guy). So sorry, no, I don't have a clue about how to do all this techy stuff. But lucky for you, my cousin knows a guy who knows a guy…

Seriously, here are a couple of great places where you can get your techy questions answered…

Tubetorial – for those of us who spent our youth glued to the boobtube – Tubetorial is kind of like "How to" TV, only better (no commercials.)

Tech-Recipes – "Your Cookbook of Tech Tutorials" – kind of like Tubetorial, only no pictures and no sound.

Geek To English Translator - The Technology Dictionary for Non-Geeks! – a free guide by Sandy DeFreitas, the Tech Coach for Coaches.

Guru.com – for those times when you hate to admit it… but you're in over your head.

The Magic 8-Ball – when even the Tech Gods have forsaken you – ask the Magic 8-Ball.

How Much Market Research is Enough?

I'm constantly amazed at how easy it is to find information on the Internet. You can search for ANYTHING – any string of words, and you needn't even bother about proper spelling – and in a nano-second, you'll have links to more references and sources than you could ever possibly read in your whole life.

This easy access to information makes market research so much easier than it used to be. In fact, billion dollar businesses have been built on internet access to information (Google, Yahoo, etc.)

But too much of anything can be dangerous. My clients often complain about how much time it takes to do market research, not because the research itself is time-consuming, but because they get sucked into the search and one link leads to another, and before you know it, a whole hour (or a Saturday!) has passed.

It's easy to end up feeling overwhelmed by all the information and unable to synthesize it in a meaningful way.

Here's what I'm wondering today:

How much market research is "enough"? How do you organize your research? And how do you stay focused so that your research is meaningful to your business?

Post your comments and questions about market research below to join in the discussion!

3 Easy-to-Avoid Email Marketing Goofs

It's October, which means everybody and her brother is all up in your inbox with end-of-year promotions. I spent most of Sunday overhauling my Outlook inbox using Michael Linenberger's book, Total Workday Control, and found myself sifting through a bunch of promotional emails, some great (they went into my Swipe file) and some not so great… and suddenly I thought, hey, why waste all these promotional emails when I could turn a couple of them into examples of what NOT to do?

So here goes…

3 EASY-TO-AVOID EMAIL MARKETING GOOFS

Accidentally spamming an online discussion group. Here's what happens: You find an interesting online discussion group at YahooGroups, so you decide to become a member. In order to post a message to the rest of the group, you have to use the group's email address (for instance, GroupName@YahooGroups.com.) Now, that email address is kind of hard to remember, so you add it to your address book/contact database along with all the other email addresses of customers, prospects, family and friends. Here's where it gets tricky: At some point, you want to send out a promotional email to your mailing list. You're in a hurry or perhaps just not watching closely… and you end up sending it to EVERYBODY in your database, including "GroupName@YahooGroups.com".

Unfortunately, you've just spammed all the people in the discussion group, because you sent an unsolicited promotional email to a whole bunch of people who never opted in to your mailing list. You're the one who joined them – not the other way around. That's a BIG no-no.

And these days, list moderators tend to have pretty strict rules about promotional emails. If you're lucky, you'll get a warning; if you keep doing it (even inadvertently), you may find yourself not only banned from the discussion group, but blacklisted as a spammer. Not exactly what you were going for, eh?

Bottomline: Don't add discussion group email addresses to your contact database.

Forgetting that the people on your email list are individual people, not one big group of people. You might have them grouped together in your database for your own convenience, but it's not like they meet up at Starbucks to read your emails together! It's kind of weird to be sitting alone in one's office reading an email that starts off "Hi Everybody" and then proceeds to say stuff like, "I bet you guys are wondering what I'm up to these days…" It makes your customer feel like you don't really see him or her as an individual, and when customers don't feel seen, it tends to undercut your relationship with them.

Bottomline: Remember that they're only a group from your perspective. Customers don't think of themselves as "one of many."

Sending a big old honkin' sales letter that screams "I'M TRYING TO SELL YOU SOMETHING!" I'd bet money that your customers:  1) Are very busy people; 2) Are flooded with promotional emails all day long from all kinds of companies; and 3) Wish you'd just get to the point and tell them what you want them to do already. 

Personally, I hardly ever read a long email that looks like it's trying to sell me something – I'm much more likely not only to pay more attention, but also to actually click the links on short announcement-style emails that I can read quickly. Judging from the stats on my own promotions and the feedback I get from customers, I'm not the only one who prefers short, clear email announcements over long-copy promotional emails.

Bottomline: Most of the time, a brief email announcement with a compelling call to action linking back to the sales page online will generate better results than a long email.

Mission Statement Wizards

This week's coaching biz tech tip is about helping your coaching clients (or yourself) write a mission statement the easy way – with an online wizard:

Personal mission statement wizard from Nightingale Conant

Business mission statement wizard from FranklinCovey

Both are free -- enjoy!

Are You Tracking Your Results?

I've noticed a curious thing: Coaches (or perhaps self-employed service providers in general) seem oddly oblivious about what their business is actually doing with regards to results.

I'm not talking about client results here (that's a whole 'nother subject) – I'm talking about BUSINESS results. Ask a coach, "How's business?" and they'll usually say something like, "Well, I just got a new client the other day…" or "I was pretty busy for a stretch there, but now I've got several contracts that are ending at the same time…"

The problem is, they don't really know what their business is actually doing, because 1) they haven't established a benchmark; 2) they haven't set goals; and/or 3) they don't measure or monitor results on a regular basis (or, in some cases, at all.)

My clients often tell me they're not tracking results because they aren't sure what they should be tracking. So here are a couple of examples of key performance indicators to monitor on a monthly or (better yet) weekly basis:

    * Number of prospects you're reaching (new subscribers)
    * Percent of sales you're closing (conversion rate)
    * Average amount of sale
    * Total inflow (revenue)
    * Total outflow (expenses)
    * Profits (difference between revenue and expenses)

Here's what I'm wondering today:

Is your business growing, slowing or plateauing?  Are you tracking actual data – or are you "just guessing?" And if you're not tracking results… what's stopping you?

Post your comments and questions about tracking results below to join in the discussion!

3 Tips for Breaking the Gremlin’s Death Grip on Your Coaching Client’s Brain

Every so often, a client shows up for a coaching call with their gremlin in tow. Your gremlin is that little voice in the back of your head that never shuts up; it's the down-side of your non-stop stream of consciousness. It pokes it's nose into everything to make sure you never forget that it's the gremlin who's in charge.

The little buggers are sneaky and relentless, and they can be so distracting that a client feels unable to make a move. What can you do when a client drags their gremlin into the session and says, "Here…YOU deal with it!?"

Three tips for breaking the gremlin's death grip:

Make sure your client reads the one book their gremlin doesn't want them to read. Taming Your Gremlin by Rick Carson is like an owner's manual for gremlins, providing simple, fun and effective ways to disarm your inner critic. Carson, founder and director of the Gremlin Taming Institute™, has trained thousands of people to tame their gremlins over the last twenty years .

One of my clients reported that he actually caught his gremlin trying to talk him out of paying full price for the book. (And it's not even that expensive – just $14!) Simply noticing what his gremlin was doing was all it took to get it to shut up.

Keep an eye out for your own gremlin. Gremlins love to feed off each other, so when your client shows up with their gremlin, be alert – your gremlin is likely to pop up with some scary thoughts and judgments.

If your gremlin does try to get in on the action, don't struggle with it; just notice it and stay detached.  Imagine that your gremlin has a volume knob in the middle of it's forehead, and turn the volume waaaaaaaay down.

Gremlins are profoundly uncoachable. When I was getting started in coaching, I used to try and work with the gremlin. It didn't take too long to figure out that gremlins are not coachable! There's no point in trying to reason with, sooth or challenge a gremlin. They're only interested in one thing: self preservation. They aren't interested in changing; in fact, they're designed to resist change. So don't even try to coach a gremlin—it's a waste of time and energy.

Instead, educate your client about gremlins. Then you can ask, "Is that YOU or your gremlin talking?" That's often all it takes to bring a client out from behind the gremlin.

(Does your gremlin have you in a head-lock? All you need is one life-changing conversation and in just 90 minutes, you can be unstuck, laser-focused and confidently taking the right steps to grow your coaching business – 100% guaranteed, or your money back. Strike fear in the heart of your gremlin today – schedule a Stuck-Buster Strategy Session!)

Myth: My Subscribers Will Get Pissed if I Promote Myself

Imagine it: Your list is finally starting to gain momentum. You're pouring your heart into your newsletter or blog. You're going out of your way to give 5-star value to your list. You've been working night and day to make sure your sales funnel is positively stuffed with goodies…

But nobody's buying.

What's going on? Why aren't you getting clients and making sales?

There are a number of possible reasons, but the most likely is that you're not getting business because you're not promoting your coaching products and services. And you're not promoting because you're afraid of pissing off your subscribers.

See, there's this wackadoodle idea floating around that you're supposed to get coaching customers without… well, without marketing, promoting or selling. There, I said it.

MARKETING. PROMOTING. SELLING.

How rude! You're hoping people will take the hint and buy something without having to be asked in a direct way. 'Cuz if you're direct about it, they might get pissed and unsubscribe.

Warning: Radical Idea Alert

To that, I say, "I WANT them to unsubscribe."

Huh?!? Why on earth would I want people to unsubscribe from my list?

Simple: My list is part of my prospecting system, and the whole point of the prospecting system is to convert qualified prospects to customers. Key word: QUALIFIED. And if someone doesn't want to receive promotional offers from me, that's a pretty good indication that they are not qualified to be a customer.

Qualified prospects:

• Are seeking a solution to a need
• Are motivated to make a purchase
• Have the financial resources to make the purchase
• Have the authority to make the buying decision

I want my list to be 100% qualified, so when an unqualified prospect unsubscribes, it's a GOOD THING. It means the system is working!

Qualified prospects WANT what you're offering

If you let the fear of losing subscribers keep you from serving your customers, you won't be in business very long.

Of course, you want to make sure to give subscribers whatever free information or value you promised when they joined your list; you don't want to bombard them with nothing but offers – just don't be afraid to promote your products and services when it's appropriate.

Qualified prospects will thank you by saying yes or asking questions; unqualified prospects will either ignore the offer or leave the list. And if they're not a qualified prospect for you, they probably belong on someone else's list, right?

Bottom line: Don't be afraid to promote to your list; it's an essential step in the customer qualification process.