What does it really take to fill a coaching group, retreat, program, or workshop?

I discovered that some strategies work better than others. It usually has to do with “marketing intimacy,” a term I learned from Alex Mandossian a few years ago.

The more expensive your program is, the higher intimacy you’ll need to use in your marketing.

Here are my top 5 tools for filling a group or selling a program in the order of effectiveness (also, in the order of increasing marketing intimacy):

==> #5: Emails - can be very effective, especially if you can write good copy, but not enough to fill a high-ticket coaching group.

==> #4: Videos – can be effective if you’re comfortable on camera, and works even better in combination with a sales letter approach.

==> #3: Teleseminars – extremely effective when you combine education with promotion, and build enough value on the call that people can’t wait to get more of you!

==> #2: Webinars - this is like a teleseminar on steroids because you engage your participants both, in audio and video format.

==> #1: Live speaking - the most effective tool I found that allows you to connect with your audience like nothing else, and enroll more people into your program.

So how many of these strategies do you currently use? What if you use all 5 to enroll clients – would that make a difference to your bottom line?

Most importantly, what if you had a FORMULA for designing your teleseminars, webinars, and live talks so that you enroll 20%-40% of your participants every single time?

This year I discovered a woman whose formula works for me every time I use it. Her formula allows me me to do what I love doing – teach (what some people believe kills sales) and still get clients!

Her name is Lisa Sasevich, and I am forever grateful to her for sharing her tactics with me. If you’ve tried it all – teleclasses, workshops, classes – and still struggling for cash and clients, here’s your chance to learn Lisa’s formula:

http://www.TeleclassMarketingSecrets.com

She designed a BRAND-NEW complimentary teleclass where she’s going to share exactly how she created FIVE 6-figure-plus launches in the last 18 months PLUS built a 7-figure home based business in less than 3 years…all without being “salesy!”

Summer brings relaxing days spent with family and friends, yummy barbecues and trips to new or favorite places.  It is a time when, for many people, work takes a back seat for a while to more playful and enjoyable pursuits, whether that includes, from gardening and yard work to lazing on the beach, and everything in between.  We’re definitely called to spend more time outdoors and less chained to our computer screens and telephones.

You may have found that summer can also mean a drop in coaching clients, as people in general turn to  summer sunshine and activities for their motivation, gratification or solace.  This might place a strain on your finances and leave pockets of empty hours in your work schedule.

Fortunately, with a little planning and preparation, the summer months can be particularly fruitful for the enterprising life or business coach.  Here are some ways to either boost your flagging income or fill those empty hours with business-building activity:

• Have a summer sale. Do you have ebooks or products that you’ve been selling for a while?  Why not offer them at a substantial summer discount?  Better yet, run a different special every couple of weeks, so that you bring in income at a steadier pace.  Or consider offering a summer group coaching program at a very attractive rate; perhaps you can lure clients with a six-, eight- or ten-week program that will help them make major strides or changes in some aspect of their lives by September.

• Go through your articles, blog entries and other written works to see if they can be recycled. Can you turn old blog entries you’ve written into a new book?   Go deeper on topics you’ve covered in articles and turn them into short, inexpensive, downloadable reports?  Record a book you’ve written in the past and now offer it as an audio program?  The summer months can be an ideal time to mine your past work for future gold.

• Use the coaching downtime to create a new product or program. Sure, you have every right to enjoy your summertime, too, and free space in your coaching schedule can help you restore your own energy.  But why not devote at least some of that downtime on a regular basis to creating a new high-end product or program that you’ll release in the fall?  There’s no better time to get the creative juices flowing than when they are not being sapped by your coaching clients or a too-full, hectic schedule.

• Develop a six-month marketing plan to get your business back on track for the second half of the year. This is an excellent time to study new marketing strategies and tools, research the costs of using different media for your marketing efforts, and set up a marketing game plan that will bring you phenomenal results come late summer or autumn.  If you create the plan now, you’ll be ready, willing and able to promote your products and services consistently and effectively by the time September rolls around.

As you can see, you can continue to grow your business and still have time to enjoy picnics, travelling and poolside parties.  If you use this time wisely, the “lazy” months of summer can end up being among your most productive of the year.

It’s ready, it’s here, and I’m excited to release my brand new site on multiple income streams for life and business coaches, consultants, authors, speakers, and service professionals!

This site has been 6 months in the making – no, not the design or the content or writing the free guide. All of these were put together in less than a week! What took the longest was thinking about how to communicate my ideas in the most compelling and way. There’s so much noise about information marketing, I wanted to keep it very focused and demystify what it truly takes not to just create an info product after info product, but a sustainable profitable multiple income streams business.

1. I first started with having a logo designed – this is the first time I invested some serious money into researching, conceptualizing, and designing a graphic to capture my brand. I took a course on branding and as a result was able to communicate to the graphic design company exactly what I want. This one actually allowed me to select a design from multiple designers!

2. I then hired the same company to create the web site look for the home page and the blog. I wanted the home page to look exciting, inviting, and different from the rest of the site. The blog needed to be simple and clean. You can see the difference. Once the look was designed, I had to hire a blog developer to turn it into an actual blog, not just a graphic.

3. The rest of the site was created on a Wordpress blog platform to make it easy for me to create and maintain all the pages without programming or coding of any kind. You can see that I decided to deviate from original colors as it started to look way too pink for me and for my male fan base

What do you think?

Are you ready to turn your passion, topic, or experience into a highly profitable multiple-income-stream information business?

Then I invite you to check out my brand new web site Milana.com, where I offer free tips, articles, and videos about turning what you know into a series of lifetime income streams! Plus, grab a copy of my FREE 25-page guide, “7 Secrets to Creating a Profitable Multiple-Income-Streams Business!”.

Would LOVE your comments and feedback!

Milana

So you’ve created your first infoproduct, developed a group coaching program or designed a workshop, and you’re ready to market it.   How do you go about pricing your product or program in a way that clients will find irresistible, while simultaneously providing you with maximum returns for your product development time and labor?

There are, in fact, pricing models and guidelines we coaches can use to establish rates for our various services.  The perceived value of your work in the marketplace depends on a number of factors.  These include:

• The strength of your following. If you have a loyal clientele, a healthy number of subscribers to your ezine and/or a legion of devoted blog readers, you have already established a level of credibility with potential buyers of your product.  This increases the perceived value of what you have to offer.  If, on the other hand, you are still building your reputation and visibility, you may need to set lower prices at first to make your products more attractive to buyers.

• The uniqueness of your product. How likely will your client be able to find a product or program that will provide similar benefits to the one you’re offering?  Or what expertise do you bring to your product that separates you from what other coaches might deliver? The more you can differentiate what your product does from what other products can do, or the more that it solves a specific problem or meets a unique need that is not met anywhere else, the more likely customers will be willing to pay higher fees to obtain it.

• Your product’s place in your marketing funnel. What exactly do you want the product to accomplish?  If you are primarily looking to build your customer base or brand awareness, setting a low price point to appeal to more people will better enable you to do that.  Of course, if you want to generate more income with fewer sales, set your price accordingly.

• The delivery method of your product or program. Short reports and ebooks tend to fall lowest on the pricing scale, followed by audio and video products, e-courses and monthly membership sites.  Higher priced products include group coaching programs and infoproducts that contain both audio components and accompanying workbooks or tools that clients can download.  At the very top rungs of your pricing ladder are programs such as inner circles, masterminds and one-on-one coaching.  As a general rule of thumb, the more that your program or product includes personal access or exposure to you, the more you will be able to charge customers for it.

• Using the magic number. You’ve most likely noticed that a large number of products sold on-line have prices that end in the number seven (e.g., $27, $47, $297, etc.)  Marketing studies have shown that setting prices that end in the number seven tends to make the price more attractive to potential buyers.

• Your target client’s income level. You also need to take into account your customers’ financial status when setting your program and product fees.  Female executives, for example, probably have more spending power than most stay at home moms.  Doctors, lawyers and other well-paid professionals tend to have more discretionary income than, say, front line office workers.  Keep this in mind as you consider product pricing.

Last but not at all least, what will your customers stand to lose if they don’t purchase your product?  The more costly the possible consequences, in terms of money, time and/or personal relationships, the more money people will be willing to spend to prevent the loss.

Most likely you will have to experiment with the pricing of your products and programs until you find amounts that result in optimal sales.  Using these strategies, however, should help you keep such trial-and-error pricing to a minimum, while enabling you to see maximum results.

Do you do group coaching?

Then these 2 great tools will make your life much easier and your programs – more profitable!

1. Group Coaching Calculator

This is a FREE tool that allows you determine how much to charge for your program. Just enter a few numbers, and it tells you how much you’ll be making an hour, a week, a month, and a year running your group programs – easy!

2. Group Coaching Manager

This tool allows you to organize your group programs, members, and all related information in one convenient place. It also lets you easily track the progress of your group participants and create an amazing experience for them. I am using it with ALL of my group coaching programs, and people are LOVING it!

*****On June 2nd Group Coaching Manager is going up from $27 to $47 a month, so be sure to sign up now and lock in your low monthly fee.

Do you ever get a “writer’s block” when it comes to writing your coaching articles, newsletters, or blog posts?  No matter how passionate you might be about your topic, you may find yourself stuck once in a while. So how do you keep your writing fresh over time?

I have 9 ideas to share with you.

1. See how other writers deal with the dreaded writer’s block syndrome. You have to love the Internet for this; do a quick Google search and you’ll come across millions of articles with tips from a wide spectrum of writers on how they cope with blocks to their creativity.  You’re bound to come across many ways to fuel your writing fire again.
2. Next, see what other coaches in your specialty are doing these days. Of course I’m not advocating pirating or plagiarizing anyone else’s work.  Just read what they’re sharing and see if you find seeds of inspiration that you can cultivate into your own articles or blog posts.
3. Pull article ideas from every coaching session with a client. Jot down words they use to describe their fears and frustration.  Perhaps even doodle around those words.  Somewhere between the words and the pictures, ideas for topics to write about will begin to emerge.
4. Keep a notebook and a small recording device with you at all times. The other day while I was on the phone with a colleague, she said something that gave me terrific idea for an article.  I quickly jotted it down and turned into an article later.  Keep that notebook handy.  For times when you are not able to write, like when you’re driving, recording your thoughts works equally well.
5. Read, read, read—but do so in an active search for things that you can use as a springboard for your writing. Newspapers and magazines, especially women’s and news magazines, contain a treasure trove of information on what people worry about, what they find important, what trends they follow and statistics they fall into.
6. Look through your past articles, newsletters, and blog posts – you may uncover some gems and write a “part 2” on the topic you already wrote about. Perhaps include your new discoveries, observations, lessons learned, or any other updates to the topic.
7. Survey your mailing list to find out what they need help with. I always have a treasure trove of ideas from running surveys – enough to last me for years of article writing! If you see a question repeated over and over again, that might be your clue to create a class or an information product about it.
8. Turn your teleclass transcripts into articles! If you’ve been consistently recording and transcribing your teleclasses and interviews, this might be a great time to turn them into new articles or blog posts. Over the last 9 years I easily have 5,000 pages of transcript material. I can either look through these to pull out an idea for an article, or hire someone to extract several articles from them.
9. When all else fails, just step away from writing for a while and do something totally different. Clean a closet, go for a walk (don’t forget that recorder!), play with your children, listen to music, or anything else that will relieve the stress that an encounter with writer’s block can cause.  Often simply letting that tension flow out of you is enough to get your creative juices flowing once more.

Keeping your blog fresh, sending your newsletter regularly and creating new products for your clients are critical components of a successful, lucrative coaching practice.  I hope these tips I’ve shared will help you do just that.

Want to get on a roller coaster of success?

If you’re relatively new to coaching, you probably realize how time-consuming and labor intensive it can be to get your name and message “out there.”  Coaching has become increasingly competitive, with a handful of well-known people in the field seemingly grabbing a lion’s share of the publicity (and business).  What’s a new coach to do?

One extremely effective way to get noticed is to hold a virtual event, or telesummit.  It consists of coordinating a handful of speakers, including you, in order to provide free or low-cost lectures or interviews on related topics via webinars or telephone conference calls over the course of a few days.  How does this get you tons of free publicity?  It works because all participants in the telesummit promote the event to their clients, on their blogs and/or in their newsletters, just as you will to yours.  It’s a win-win situation for everyone involved.

First, you need to decide on a broad topic for your telesummit, one that would appeal to your particular client niche.  For example, let’s say that you mainly work with women over age 50 who want to pursue age-old dreams.  Your topic could be “Yes, Virginia: There is Life After 50–How to Create the Life You’ve Always Dreamed Of.”  Then you can select the topic that you’ll cover during your portion of the virtual event.

Next, look for other entrepreneurs who might want to target the same niche as you, but have non-competing specialties.  If you’re a life coach, for example, you might find a book coach who’s willing to do a presentation on writing a book after fifty, a health coach who can speak to midlife wellness issues,  a relationship coach to talk about one of the many family or work relationship issues women from that age group face—you get the picture.  Look for speakers whose talks will complement yours and add value to the event as a whole.

As you seek partners for your telesummit, try to find business people who already have their own strong followings on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, appear to have good-sized e-mail newsletter lists and/or a number of loyal blog readers or radio listeners.  Why?  Doing so will maximize your event’s exposure, as all of the telesummit’s participants will be expected to promote it to their clients, readers and followers, just as you’ll be doing.

Other aspects to consider as you plan your telesummit include:

• Scheduling: You’ll need to coordinate times that work for all of your co-presenters as well as attract the most listeners over a period of a few days.  A good thing to keep in mind is that holding the event during the peak summer months or around major holidays might negatively impact the number of people who register for the event. You’ll also need to consider that both your speakers and those who interested in registering for the event might reside in a wide range of time zones.

• Recording and Resale Rights: Decide on how you will monetize the event.  Will you charge for it up front or package the calls into an infoproduct that you can sell?  Will the other participants be able to resell the package as well, or can they use their particular presentation as a giveaway or a bonus on their Web site?  To make sure everyone who participates is clear on what they can and cannot do with the recording, it’s a good idea to provide them with a written agreement that they need to read and sign in order to be a part of your event.

• Promotional Strategy: Where and how frequently will you promote the event?  What promotional expectations will you have of the other participants, and how will you gauge the success of their efforts?  Be clear on both so that, in the end, the telesummit will indeed provide sufficient exposure for you and the other speakers that you line up to make it worth everyone’s while.

If hosting a telesummit sounds like a lot of work, well, it is.  In terms of costs, logistics and reach, however, holding a well planned virtual event can generate a tremendous surge of new business for you. In other words, the potential benefits of a telesummit far outweigh the time and effort you’ll put into organizing it.  Your name and business get a major visibility boost, you get to broaden your professional network through joint venturing with other speakers and you end up with a product that you can sell for years to come.  Plus, you get the added feel good bonus of helping the other participants grow their businesses as well.

If you are excited about the possibilities and want to start planning your very own telesummit now, be sure to check out Leesa Barnes’  Virtual Events Boom telesummit, where she’s teaching the step-by-step process of creating, marketing, and dominating your niche with your very own telesummit!

While your ultimate goal may be to create a six-figure coaching business, what if you’re new to coaching and haven’t had your first client yet?  How does a new coach get from ground zero to building a successful and lucrative business?

I compare getting your first client to what many college graduates face when they first try to enter the job market; many employers only want to hire people with experience, but new grads can’t begin to gain experience until they land their first job.  Seems unfair, doesn’t it?  Yet the reality is, those fresh out of school do compete with applicants with a track record.  How can they get their first break on such an uneven playing field?

If this sounds like where you are in your coaching business, take heart—every successful coach before you has stood on the same threshold at one point, and eventually crossed it.  With the right mindset and preparation, you can, too.

Here are my 10 tried and true techniques for getting your very first coaching client (and many more to follow):

• Know your ideal client inside and out. What, you ask?  How can you do that if you don’t have any clients yet?  I cannot stress enough how important it is to know exactly what target clients you want to serve in your business in order for you to be successful. There are many variables to consider when deciding what kinds of clients you want to work with.  If you have not yet determined this, go back and download (or reread) my free “New Coaching Manifesto” on the right-side-bar of this web site.

• Tailor everything—and I mean everything—to demonstrate that you understand your ideal client’s problems and how you have solutions for them. From your Web site copy to how you introduce yourself at networking events, from your social media profile to every interview you give, your messaging should leave no doubt as to the kind of clients you want to work with and what you can and will do for them.

• Go where your target client goes, both online and off. When online, does she frequent a certain type of forum, or is she more likely to be checking her Facebook page daily? Offline, is she physically active, does she perform volunteer work?  What sorts of friends or colleagues does she have?  Both on and offline, does she belong to any groups or associations?  You will more likely meet your future clients if you frequent the same venues she does.

• Let your ideal client get to know you better. The old adage that people do business with people they know doesn’t necessarily apply to coaching, but if people feel they know you and believe they would be comfortable with you, they will be much more open to what you offer.  With every blog post or article you write, and in every interview or teleclass you give, let your personality and philosophies shine through.  Offer a free 15 or 30 minute introductory session.  Write a book that showcases your knowledge and highlights your passion.  You’ll inevitably attract people who like both what you have to say and how you say it.

• Make it easy to do business with you. Have a range of products and services at various price points so that people might “test drive” your coaching services at risk levels they are comfortable with. Provide payment options on your Web site. Turn the idea of a “free coaching session” into a “paid coaching strategy session” taught by successful life and business coaches. The easier you make it for a potential client to work with you, the greater the likelihood that she will.

• Look For Strategic Partnerships – If you are actively pursuing a coaching business, I am sure you already have a network of peers, mentors, educational and resource contacts. Use them wisely to create projects, events and programs you can work on together – remember, you bring your own unique talents to the table that benefit their clients and help you build your own – all the while creating great promotion for everyone involved. Joint ventures have always been my favorite strategy to move my coaching business forward.

• Write Write Write – get your message out where people can see it – publish articles, blog posts, Ezines, Tweet, use social networking sites like Facebook, etc. There are so many forums where you can easily publish content and where people can see a true glimpse of what you can do.  These venues can be a great basis for your marketing materials. These are all great ways to stay in touch with current clients and warm potential clients to your message.

• Get Out There – Network, talk to people, go to events, workshops, join in on live and tele-seminars, etc.  Just make a point of being present where potential clients are present. When you are in these situations, do try to listen more and talk less about you – focus on what you think potential clients need and what you can do for them. This will do more for attracting clients than you might think.

• Have Clear Marketing Strategies – Plan your action. Make a goals calendar. Clearly define what you want to achieve and put tactics for getting there in your plan.  Outline the next steps for potential clients once they read your newsletter, marketing materials, attend your seminar, etc. The more you plan – the more stress free and automatic your recruitment techniques will become.

• Master of Your Domain – you must have your own web site and you can build one in as few as fifteen minutes.  It’s your address, your house – the shingle you hang out that you’re open for business, that you’re an expert that clients need. Your site is where you have free reign to market your ideas and communicate your message. There is really no better vehicle for selling yourself, your products and conduct your coaching programs.

Here’s one more – a BONUS  tactic or rather a mindset that will help you get your first clients faster than you can ever imagine:

• Focus on a specific solution – instead of telling people you’re coach and you offer coaching, tell them about the results they’ll get from you. Will they lose 10 pounds in 1 month? Will they get a promotion at work? Will they be able to select the best care for their loved one? Will their teenager increase their GPA by 1 point or more? Solutions sell!

It does not have to be a struggle to fill your coaching business with clients.  Keep in mind, there are plenty of people who can benefit from coaching, people who need what you have to offer – you just need to take the appropriate steps to educate yourself first – acquire the necessary skills and then build the necessary relationships in turning these people into trusted clients.  You need to make it easy for them to find you and get enthusiastic about what you offer. Master these things – and then signing up with you is a simple decision – one that almost makes itself!

Implement these tips and, with persistent and consistent effort, you will attract the very first client to your coaching business…followed by your second client…and then your third.  Before you know it, you’ll see that you’ve crossed that coaching threshold and left ground zero far, far behind you.

Business development is also something that should be part of your daily schedule with no exceptions. Think each day about how you can demonstrate to prospects that you are a credible and qualified professional. Provide sincere results – tangible evidence on how you are uniquely positioned to help them.  Stay true to what will make them excited about working with you – don’t try to do everything or be something you are not just to sign them.  Above all, work to build trust with your clients. Deliver for them and they will help you build a growing business that you love.

Did you know that if you treat coaching like a product, you’ll get a lot more clients?

A product is much easier to sell than a service, and here are just a few reasons why:

• A product is much more tangible: people know exactly what they’ll be getting when they buy it.

• A product has specific benefits and outcomes, which are a lot easier to explain to a prospect. A service is more like a concept.

• When you sell a service you are selling something that doesn’t exist yet. You can’t try out the service before you buy it. You pay for it and then you get it.

So how do you make coaching more tangible? You package it!

Here’s my 5 simple ideas for effectively packaging your coaching services for more clients, AND to increase your income:

#1. Create a coaching program, give it a name, schedule the dates you’ll be holding it, and create a web page, where you list its benefits.

#2. Include tangible items clients will receive when they enroll into your program: CDs, books, special reports, DVDs, coaching tools, or any other “grounding materials”

#3. Show as many testimonials about the value you bring as possible. Ideally, each testimonial should focus on a specific result your client received.

#4. Offer educational products on your web site, which makes prospects more confident about the value you can bring to them. And, even if they do not invest with you personally, they will buy your products.

#5. Use a graphic to represent your program, perhaps including images of audio CDs or special reports, a logo, or a combination of different media.

For other ways to package coaching and create new income streams in your business, join me in “Passive Income Unleashed”, where I will take you through creating 10-12 income streams from your existing coaching business.

Resource: here’s a great article that explores the differences between selling a service vs. selling a product:

5 Ways Service Professionals Are Different than Those Who Sell Products