240. 20-Minute Client Attraction Strategy That Actually Works

What if the strategy to get your next 5 clients takes 20 minutes to take action on instead of two months?

In this episode I'm sharing the conversation I had with my daughter about marketing her babysitting business, and why the plan she came up with first sounds a lot like what most nutritionists and health coaches do when they're trying to get clients.

Spoiler: It doesn't work.

It was also the longest possible way to get to the part where she would actually make money.

And this applies to you, too, if you've been spinning your wheels trying to get more nutrition coaching clients and it's not working.

If you've been spending your time on the website, the lead magnet, the Instagram content, the blog posts, the course outline, or the automations in your practice management software before you have anyone to put through those automations, this episode is for you.

Listen now so I can give you a much shorter path forward.

NEXT STEPS:

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Hi, I’m Andrea Nordling – Nutritional Therapy Practitioner, business coach, entrepreneur, and host of The Profitable Nutritionist Podcast.

Since age 22, I’ve built 3 highly successful businesses from scratch, including my own online holistic nutrition practice. After deleting all of my social media accounts in early 2021, my business grew faster than ever — and now I teach other health professionals how to do the same.

On this pod, you’ll learn how to:

 ✅ Build a thriving online practice without relying on social media
 ✅ Consistently attract and convert clients
 ✅ Create simple systems that scale without overwhelm

💡 Subscribe or Follow so you never miss a new episode packed with practical strategies that actually work.

© 2021 - 2026 Andrea Nordling

DISCLAIMER: The podcasts available on this website have been produced for informational, educational and entertainment purposes only and do not make any representations as to the future income, sales, or potential profitability or loss of any kind that may be derived as a result of use of the content, including paid programs and all free resources. Listeners should take care to avoid program content which may not be suited to them. The contents of this podcast do not constitute medical or professional advice, No person listening to and/or viewing any podcast from this website should act or refrain from acting on the basis of the c...

Transcript

 00:00
Andrea Nordling
Hello, my friend. Welcome back to The Profitable Nutritionist Podcast. Let me tell you a story about a 20 minute client attraction strategy that actually works. Not one that takes two months, not one that takes three months. Not one that requires you to endlessly nurture and build, know like and trust with all of the strangers on the Internet until they can finally be convinced and coerced to hire you. No, none of that. 20 Minute Client. Let's talk about it. This actually is a story that happened recently with my daughter, who is 16 and it is summertime now. She is looking for making more money this summer and taking on odd jobs. And so we had a rare moment. 

 00:48
Andrea Nordling
And I say it's a rare moment because any parent will know that if it feels like a rare moment when your kid actually wants your advice and actually seeks out the knowledge and the information that we as parents so freely give as we coach them, but they actually were seeking it out. This one in particular. Again, my daughter's 16. Her name's Chloe. She came to me and she said, mom, I have decided there's a couple things I want to do this summer to make some extra money, and I kind of want your help on figuring out how to get the word out. And then she's like, this is what you help people with, right? Isn't it? This is kind of what you do, right? I laughed. I said, yeah, it's kind of what I do. It is. What are you thinking of doing? 

 01:32
Andrea Nordling
And she's like, okay, well, here's the thing. There's two things that I want to do. I want to work at some farms or at a farm and like, be a farmhand. And I also want to do some babysitting, but not just like with anybody, but, you know, with kids that are a little bit older. I don't like the babies, but I do like the, you know, elementary age kids are kind of my favorite and I'm really good with them. And so I would definitely do some babysitting for families that have kids that age. Like, okay, great side note here. And we just have to laugh because what is the saying? The cobbler's kids have no shoes. How does that go? So I had said to her a few days ago, I said, hey, I do need some help with some video editing. 

 02:16
Andrea Nordling
If you want to make some extra money, you can do some video editing. And she scoffed at it. Absolutely scoffed. She's like, ugh, I do not want to be working on a computer. I don't know how you do that. I got to be outside. I got to be doing something I don't want to be working on a computer. So just as a funny aside, we just can roll our eyes and go, oh, parenting. Parenting is so fun. Okay, so Chloe wants to babysit. She wants to work as a farmhand. Great. Wonderful. We certainly wouldn't want her to, you know, do any video editing. That's fine. I understand. I understand. So I said, all right, cool. Well, what are you thinking of doing? Like, who. Who do you babysit for? What farmers do you want to work for? 

 02:51
Andrea Nordling
Like, what do you obviously have a plan. What are you thinking of doing? And she's like, okay, here's what I want to do. I am going to have AI make me an awesome flyer for each of these things. And I am. And it's going to say, you know, like, what I'm willing to do and what I charge and all. All of the things she told me, all of the things that this amazing AI flyer is going to be. She's like, and then I'm going to print it out, and I'm going to go. And I'm going to put the ones for my farm assistants. I'm gonna go put in, like, the. The paper box next to the mailboxes of farmers in the area. And then the other. The other ones for babysitting, I'm gonna put around the neighborhood, and people, like, buy people's mailboxes. 

 03:29
Andrea Nordling
And she had this whole plan, and she was very proud of this plan, bless her. She was very proud of this plan. So I said, okay, I mean, I get you. I understand what you're doing here. Tell me what the goal is. She's like, well, the goal is for people to reach out to me so that I can meet them, and then, you know, if they need my help, they're gonna hire me, obviously. Okay. Yeah, obviously. So we walked through the goals, made sure were aligned on the goals, made sure I understand what was the goal. What are we trying to do? Why does this make sense in your brain? And honestly, I do get why this made sense in her brain, and I understand why we all get to this place. Because the flyers were gonna look amazing. 

 04:07
Andrea Nordling
AI was going to help her. She was very excited about that. She was excited about the setup process. She was excited about the professional design that this flyer was going to be and how it was going to present her so well and how it was going to make her feel confident in charging premium prices for babysitting and farm labor. And she was very excited about it. And I, without crushing her dreams, obviously, I said, okay, so I think that would definitely work in the long term. I think you could probably find people that are interested in hiring babysitters and probably can find some people who need some farm labor. I also think so. Pause. Pause on that. I also think that's a really long way to get to the part where you're actually making money and June is almost over. 

 04:53
Andrea Nordling
So for your summer jobs that you want to be making hay while the sun shines, for all of the puns, all the cliches here, I think that there's an easier way to do this and a much more straightforward way to do that. I said, Chloe, you show animals at the county fair every year and at the state fair. You are surrounded by farmers in our community that already know you, that like you, that trust you. They know what kind of a worker you are. Your reputation precedes you already. And you know these people personally. I listed off five people that we know personally. I said, do any of them know that you're for hire and that they could hire you? She's like, no, they don't. I said, okay, so there's that. 

 05:34
Andrea Nordling
I just let that marinate for a minute and I said, all right, who are the families that we know who would vouch for you as a babysitter without hesitation, that already know that you are incredible with elementary age kids? And they would not for one second hesitate to recommend you to people that they know that needs a babysitter? And she's like, well, this person, this person. So we had five to 10 people who would in a heartbeat vouch for her. I said, okay, so now look what we just did. We just created a list of people that already know you, like you, trust you, would recommend you and who already are in front of the people who would be your ideal Client for these services? They're already there. 

 06:15
Andrea Nordling
Would it not be maybe a really efficient use of time if we spent about 10 or 20 minutes creating, like, some text and some, you know, kind of an outline of some phone calls that you could make to people and get the word out about what you're trying to do here? She was like, yeah, we could do that. So we spent 20 minutes and we did that. We made the short list of people. We worked out some really simple verbiage for what to say on a few text messages and some phone calls. And she got to work. And I said, could you just please promise me that you're not going to make an AI flyer right now that we're not going to work on that as the priority if your goal is to make money as soon as possible. 

 06:52
Andrea Nordling
Not to say that strategy couldn't work, maybe someday at some point, but the. If the goal is money quickly, people hiring you quickly, there's a much more straightforward way to do that. Okay, so this was very simple, by the way. These talking points were very simple. And she felt like it was too simple. She's like, that's it. Then she made a snide comment about people pay you for this because 16 years old, you know how that goes. So I thought to myself, with a little chuckle after this conversation, I thought, well, that is a podcast in the making right there. Because I see so many people doing the same thing in some level in their business, especially people that I'm on discovery calls before they come into the TPN program, before they come in. 

 07:39
Andrea Nordling
They work with us here at the Profitable Nutritionist and with love. I usually have so much fun on those calls, showing them how simple things can be. So much simpler than they've been making it. So this comes up in a few different ways. Pick your boys in here. That's because I'm sure it's showing up for you in some ways and also with your Client. So we're going to always bring it back to your Client, too. Stay with me. I see this coming up with people who are spending a ton of time on their website. 

 08:06
Andrea Nordling
They spend two months, three months, five months getting their website perfect before they're talking to a single potential client, before they're going out and making connections with people in their community, before they're offering to host a talk or a workshop at their gym, before they're doing, you know, fill in the blank here. And I understand the thought process here. I do. I understand the desire to be professional, to have something set up, to have some infrastructure, to have a page that has your offer on it and your pricing so that you can just send people to the website and that can do all of the hard work instead of you having the conversation about what you charge and how it works. I get it. I understand. So what do people do? And al. And also we're not doing that. 

 08:45
Andrea Nordling
So I understand the desire for it, but also we're not doing that. So. So what happens is people go to AI and they say, okay, what should I put on my website? They don't actually know yet, right? They don't actually know. They don't know for sure what's working. The messaging is invalidated. The offer isn't consistently selling. So they don't exactly know what to do, but they're like, okay, best guess, what's that gonna be? And AI gives you a lot of suggestions. It gives you answers. They sound very compelling. It's like, oh my gosh, absolutely, you're amazing. Gaslights you. It's amazing. You know this. If you use AI often, it's like, oh my gosh, you're so smart. You're exactly on the right track. Here, here's exactly what we're gonna do. 

 09:19
Andrea Nordling
And it tells you everything that you want to hear and then gives you a strategy. Does that mean it is a strategy that's actually going to work? Does that mean it's something that actually is going to sell for your market, for your ideal client, for your specific offer, for your niche, for your process, for the way that you want to work with Client, for your nervous system, for your capacity, your time allotment that you have? Does that mean that any of it's going to work for that? I would say no. For most people it doesn't. And how do I know that? Because they tell me I'm getting zero client leads from my website. And I get that. I understand. 

 09:55
Andrea Nordling
Because when I help people in TPN on messaging workshops, for example, we do calls where I look at people's websites, I bring them up on the screen and I go, okay, this, this. And show them where the messaging is off. What's happening is it's really vague. It doesn't speak to the nuances of your offer and your process. And the ideal client that you are working with typically are unclear on all of those things. And so you can't really direct the ship. Okay, so this is like my daughter going, I'm gonna have AI help me make a flyer and it's going to beautiful and visually it will be stunning. 

 10:27
Andrea Nordling
But that doesn't mean that what's actually on the flyer is going to compel a stranger on the Internet or for somebody in with that flyer in their hand to take action and to call her and to reach out to her, which is a heavy lift, right? It's a heavy lift to have strangers in the world who are reaching out to you saying, yes, it sounds like you can solve my problem. I would to you about solving my problem and paying you money when we haven't done it yet. Right? It's just, it's a. It's a big ask and it's not the most efficient use of time. So just like I told my daughter, hey, there's some simpler ways to do this. There's an easier way to get this off the ground. 

 11:03
Andrea Nordling
There's much lower hanging fruit that we can pick here first before we go do it the hardest way possible, which is trying to blanket market an entire group of people who may or may not even be interested in the services that you're offering and trying to get them to take action. Hardest way possible. Can it work? Sure. Do I recommend it? Not as a starting point. That is for danger. So this is where I see a lot of people struggle, especially with their website and the desire is to have a professional presence. I understand. But what happens is their messaging gets really vague. The AI help that they are getting is well meaning and it sounds like it's, you know, it. When I say it sounds good, I don't mean that the actual copy on the website sounds good. 

 11:48
Andrea Nordling
I mean that the back and forth conversation with ChatGPT or Claude or whatever sounds compelling. It sound. It sells you on the fact that this is what you need to put on this page and here's why. But if you are not getting client leads and Client from that then doesn't matter. No, it doesn't. It's not helping. And for the majority, 99.999% of people that I talk to, they are not getting client leads from their website. So that's a huge issue. Spending a lot of time on tech, spending a lot of time on virtual anything. Lead magnets, Instagram content, TikTok content, any of that nobody is actually seeing because we haven't actually created it for your easiest Client who are asking for the thing. Creating a. A mess, a recipe, meal plan. Messipe. 

 12:35
Andrea Nordling
If it's going to be a meal plan and recipes put together, it came out messipe. Messipede lead magnet or a meal plan or a, you know, three tips to do XYZ thing type of a lead magnet. But are people actually asking that question? Are the people that are hiring you actually seeing that as their entry point and how to get started? Probably not. You probably don't know that yet. So it's a lot of time in creation. It's a lot of time in doing things that make us feel productive, that make us feel busy, that make us feel like we're doing something to try to get those babysitting Client or to try to get the farmhand offer. But is it the easiest way? 

 13:11
Andrea Nordling
Is it the way that's actually going to get you in front of the right people that already need the help that you offer and is just going to be straight to the point, hey, I know you need this thing. I know somebody who absolutely can help you. They're amazing. You need to talk because that's the direct path. And by the way, with my Client, that isn't always the first thing that we do in their marketing, but for most people that is some really low hanging fruit around them is just the network that they have or getting in front of the right networks at moment, the people where they can be introduced as the expert in front of their ideal client that's already there. 

 13:42
Andrea Nordling
Instead of trying to create content on Instagram and hoping that strangers on Instagram are going to find you and they're going to follow you and they're going to see your content and they're going to subscribe and they're going to engage and they're going to DM you and then you're going to have this amazing conversation and then you're going to nurture them forever and snuggle them and then they're going to finally book a call with you. And then because of this Instagram story content that they've seen for months and months, of course, then they are going to hire you. Could it happen? Yes. Does it sometimes happen? Yes. Is it the hardest way possible? Yes. Yes, it really is. For the most part. This nurture, nurture, build trust with strangers is the long game, the long strategy that you will always be working towards. 

 14:28
Andrea Nordling
But it's not where your next client is to going to come from. It's not where your first client's going to come from. It's probably not where your next 10 Client are going to come from. So a little note on some outdated strategies, by the way, because as I was thinking about what I wanted to talk about when I was relaying this story in this podcast episode, I thought of a couple things that I had touch on because these come up a lot. On discovery calls that I do. When I'm getting into the nuances of what people are doing to try to get Client and what isn't working. 

 14:55
Andrea Nordling
Because by the way, when I do a call with somebody to see if they're a good fit for what we do here at tpn, I'm always asking these questions, I'm asking, what have you tried so far? What isn't working? Why is that frustrating to you? And then I'm also asking questions about their goal business. What do you want this to look like? What is the perfect business model look like for you? And then I'm trying To align those two together and see if they're even creating that. For the most part, it isn't the case because people are building things and trying things that they don't even want to be doing six months from now or a year from now, but they think it's the only thing that they can do to get Client. So I promise you this is all gonna make sense. 

 15:33
Andrea Nordling
Couple things that I see on calls is this, people trying to create blog posts on a website to rank for SEO and get Client in an evergreen way because they are search engine optimized. Their website is. Some people give this strategy, it sounds good, it makes you feel busy, especially if you're a writer at heart. This is what I started doing, by the way, in 2015. This is the first thing I started doing in my business. It's the reason why it took me way too long to make the amount of money that I wanted to be making. Because it does make you feel busy to be creating written content for your website and blog posts and educating. And it makes you feel like you're building something. 

 16:11
Andrea Nordling
And people on the Internet will tell you that this is a great strategy and it's made them all the millions of doll hairs and it's such a great way to go. And the reality is that may or may not have been true five years ago, 10 years ago, but it is very outdated. That strategy is not working the way that it used to, if it even ever did work that well. By the way, AI is changing the way that we interface with search engines and the way that we get answers very, very quickly. So that is a super outdated strategy. It is definitely not the fastest path to getting your first client, your next paying client, your next 10 Client, if it works at all, which is very questionable at this point. That is a long term growth strategy. That's the long game. 

 16:55
Andrea Nordling
It is not how we validate your offer and we get you making money and helping people right now. Another thing that people are doing, and this is yet again another mistake that I made early in my business was creating a course or a group program. So people do this. I did this. I understand this. I wasted six months doing this for a course that I only sold one time that did not get people results. That was an absolute fake failure of epic proportions. But I didn't have somebody telling me this much simpler, easier strategy. 

 17:22
Andrea Nordling
And the truth of it, which is this, a course or a group program is a great idea later in your business, but not until you have a like such a well oiled niche and client delivery process and you know exactly who you are serving, what their problems are, the exact objections that they have, and how to get them results in a group setting, which is no small feat. You also have to be a really great Internet marketer to be able to fill a group program on a timeline like where there's a start date and everybody needs to enroll and everybody needs to pay before a start date of the group. These are advanced skills, both of these things, advanced skills. 

 18:06
Andrea Nordling
And so it is very fun for those of us who love the backend work, especially different softwares and setting up automations and making things look beautiful. It is so tempting to get into practice better or get into Kajabi or get into any software and go set up these automations and these group programs in this amazing way that you're going to serve the Client without having actually brought enough people through the process yet to know what the heck to automate in the first place. And people get really caught up here and they get really stuck here and they feel like, oh my gosh, I don't know if I can even actually help the amount of Client that I want to help because they're so unclear on it and it feels so overwhelming. 

 18:45
Andrea Nordling
And so their brain starts to brain and starts to convince them that they aren't ready yet, that there's other things that they need to get situated first. They need to change their niche, they need to have a more specific niche, they need to un niche, they need to do this, they need to do that. I get it. I understand the temptation to be building and to not be doing the easiest thing in the world, which is just getting Client today imperfectly. But that's what I'm here to tell you and that's why you're listening to this episode. Because there is some version of what you're doing right now. If you're not signing Client consistently, that is the hard way, it is the complicated way, and it could be simplified. 

 19:21
Andrea Nordling
And we know that this is the case because this is also why your Client hire you, because you are giving them a personalized path and plan that is way simpler than what they're going to do if left to their own devices. Think about the Client that you work with. Think about the really complicated ways that they try to solve the problems that they have. And you have a much simpler path. The way that you are going to bring them very simply to the results that they want, I'm sure, is going to be leveraging these skills and the resources and the habits that they already have and tweaking them a little bit. I do the same thing with my Client. It's all very personalized. 

 20:02
Andrea Nordling
And the very first thing we do, by the way, when you come and work at TPN and is my team and I get to work creating a custom 90 day roadmap for you so that the first 90 days in your program or in the program, your first three months are fully fleshed out with exactly what you need to do each week, action item by action item in a checklist format of what you need to do so that you are only doing the needle moving activities. You're not wasting your time on stuff that isn't even getting results. But first we need to see what those results are and then we need to take an inventory of what are your skills and what are your goals. Like what does that even look like. So it's a different strategy for everyone. 

 20:41
Andrea Nordling
All that to say as I'm talking about, you know, putting out flyers and tucking them in mailboxes. I do have to say that for some people that is a strategy for them. I actually do have Client and I'm kind of laughing as I'm even recording this because I do have one client in particular I'm thinking of that has some really good flyers posted at her local grocery co op that has got her a lot of Client. However, it wasn't the first thing she did to get Client and she knew what to put on those flyers based on the conversation that she had with her Client and how to talk about her offer. So I will say that there's a time and a place for a good old fashioned flyer. 

 21:14
Andrea Nordling
But I, you know, I think you can see where I'm going here, that I didn't think that was my 16 year old's best course of action to get some babysitting Client in the next week. It's probably not for you either. And you're doing the same thing for your Client. So always bringing it back to how you are helping them in a really personalized way. Looking at their body, their bio, individuals, their habits, their timeline, their lifestyle, all of that is a factor in what is going to be the simplest strategy to get them results. And I know that's a calculation you're always making with your Client, but I wonder, are you doing the same thing for yourself? 

 21:49
Andrea Nordling
Are you making it really simple to grow your business, to consistently make 5 to 10k per month, at least in your practice and without burning yourself out? And if not, I'm sure it's because you're making it too complicated. That's what I see all the time. I see people that are trying to emulate businesses that are way further ahead than them, that already know what messaging and sales systems work for them because they've already validated that they've done it behind the scenes where nobody can see. And then they have a fancier website, then they have automations working, then they have corporate courses and upsells and an entirely different structure than what needs to happen to consistently make 5 to 10k per month in your business. Does that make sense? I hope it does. 

 22:34
Andrea Nordling
Because what's really happening is people are building infrastructure for a business that they don't even have yet. Which is why it feels so overwhelming and just why it is so dang complicated. Again, this is the core problem that we solve in the TPN program by bringing you through step, stage by stage, exactly what you need to be doing in each stage of your business, hyper customized and personalized to your strengths and your goals. Because it is a little bit different person by person. Somebody who is hugely extroverted and would love nothing more than going to networking meetings day in, day out is going to have a different marketing and sales strategy than the introvert that I work with that would rather die than go to a BNI meeting. 

 23:19
Andrea Nordling
We have different strategies for both of those Client just like you have different strategies for your Client depending on what's going on with their body and what their goals are and what their lifestyle is. You see what I'm saying here? I'm sure. So instead of trying to do things the hardest way with setting up intricate systems for long term nurture, long term lead generation, long term everything, we gotta look at what is the simplest path to your next goal. For most of the Client that I work with, they want consistent Client every month. They want to be consistently bringing in 5 to 10k or more per month without burning themselves out. So if that's the goal, that's our North Star. There's usually a much simpler way to do it than they are currently using. 

 24:01
Andrea Nordling
Otherwise they wouldn't be coming into the TPN program, they wouldn't be having a sales call with me, they wouldn't be listening to this podcast. So we have to always be thinking simplify, simple, simplify. Where do you already have no like and trust? Where do you already have an existing network that you could activate to send referrals on your behalf? Where do you have existing relationships? Where do you have people in your life that you can talk to without trying to sell them to get feedback on the type of problem that they're having and try to figure out how do we need to talk about this? How do we need to position your offer to solve a very specific problem? There is a method to the madness here, but it starts small. It starts with the simplest version. Just like for my daughter. 

 24:43
Andrea Nordling
I said, look in your phone right now. Who are the five people you know right now that either have a farm or know somebody close to them that does and can ask if they're hiring? And when I asked that question, she immediately said this one, this one and this one, like okay, right there. So it doesn't have to be so hard, it doesn't need to be so complicated. It can be really simple. And to that point, this is why people will hire you. Because it isn't evident to ourselves how we can simplify our own solutions. That's why somebody will hire you because you know more than they do. You've seen things that they haven't seen. You have tools and expertise and training and I mean just experience, life experience in working with other Client or your own story. 

 25:26
Andrea Nordling
So you can see, this is where we're really complicating it unnecessarily. But that's why they're hiring you and that's why you'll hire me as well, because I know where my Client, which would be you, if you're still listening to this episode, is complicating things unnecessarily. And I also know how we can simplify it immensely. So like I said, this is exactly what we do in tpn. If you are not currently in the TPN program, I have no idea what you're waiting for. But we need to fix that. We need to activate your lowest hanging fruit. We need to get those Client coming in consistently with a very personalized, simple path to do it. 

 26:03
Andrea Nordling
So somewhere in the description of this episode you are going to see a link or you can also go to andreanordling.com book which will have you filling out a short application with a few questions if we can help you. You're going to be redirected to a booking page to grab a call slot where we're going to talk through your situation, your goals, and we're going to identify what that low hanging fruit is for you to quickly get to your goals. Again, for most of my Client that is consistent 5 to 10k months without burning themselves out. And I think it goes without saying if you're listening to this podcast, but I will reiterate that I never ever recommend posting on social media as a client attraction strategy. 

 26:44
Andrea Nordling
So you are never gonna get on a call with me and have me tell you that you need to go create more reels on Instagram. It's never gonna happen. In fact, I have seen so much evidence that my Client, when they stop posting on social media, sign a lot more Client. Again, that is something we'll talk about on your call. If you decide to book a one one call with me. Again, go to andreanordling.com book and we can talk through what your goals are and the simplest path to get you there. If I can help you in the TPN program, I will tell you what that looks like and explain exactly how you get started. And if not, I am happy to just help you establish your simplest plan and send you on your way. So no obligation. 

 27:24
Andrea Nordling
But again, go to the profitable nutritionist.com book if you want to talk through this strategy for you. I also will not tell you to have AI create for you a beautiful flyer. That's another thing that we are not going to have in your short term marketing strategy my friend. But anything else is pretty much on the table. Again, I would love to help you create it. Have a wonderful rest of your day.