How to Find Your Perfect Coaching Niche

This week’s episode focuses on finding your perfect coaching niche. Emily Merrell and Lexie Smith discuss common mistakes, how they found their own perfect coaching niche, and how they allowed their ideal client to evolve as their businesses grew. They give real-life examples, tangle tips, and much more. 

Here’s what you’ll learn: 

• Key points to keep in mind when finding and selecting a coaching niche
• How you can marry your passion with a problem to solve
• Unique coaches and niches they’ve seen over the years
• How they selected their first coaching niche, and how it evolved over time
• How to curate your language to attract whoever your ideal client is
• Tips on how to meet your clients where they’re at
• How to identify elements that create or evolve your niche into something else 

Follow Em & Lex on Instagram at @readysetcoachprogram

Learn more about the Ready Set Coach Program at Readysetcoachprogram.com

Learn more about Six Degrees Society and THEPRBAR inc.

Transcript

How to Find Your Perfect Coaching Niche - Podcast Transcript

Lexie Smith  

Hello, my friend.

Hi, Lexie.

Lexie Smith  

How's it going?

Emily Merrell  

i What if I spoke in whispers what do you what do you like me more Facebook and MySpace? No, I'd

Lexie Smith  

be really annoyed actually. And I have to have subtitles on my TV at this point. Because I can't hear anything.

Emily Merrell  

I'm so grateful. You told me because Greg makes fun of me because they have the TV on like 72. And that's me as they speak in whispers and mumbles.

Lexie Smith  

Yeah. Yeah, they do. They do. I

Emily Merrell  

have I have the subtitles on to I'm like, Oh, hi. I didn't understand that word. Yeah. Yeah, it's crazy.

Lexie Smith  

So we need hearing aids. But beyond that. Something I'm going to try to articulate to you guys that happened. We we've recorded a couple of podcasts today in full transparency. But before we were recording the podcast, we were doing some of our back end business flow work. And something led to something you know, like how you talk about a squirrel, then all of a sudden you're talking about baking, you don't know how things connect the dots. Anyways, what I'm getting at here is I started scrolling my personal Instagram feed all the way back to when I lived and studied abroad in Italy. And I copied an Instagram that like link to a post and I'm like, Look, Emily at the art I made when I was in Italy. And she opened it and I expected her to be like, Oh my god, like see you. You're so talented. And Emily, what was your reaction?

Emily Merrell  

I said that was my face.

Lexie Smith  

Her face? I don't even know how to describe it. It was like frozen, shocked. Try not to laugh. Don't know how to react. What did you say? Looking back? You know, I guess I'm

Emily Merrell  

okay, so I II Alright, guys, before you think I'm just a terrible friend, it was beautiful. The shadow. Yet, again, that left? This is so good. The shadowing and the composition was amazing. But the image itself was a little jarring. It was a picture of a woman who I imagined there was no context. I think this is her mother, but it was just her eyes, and in front of her face was like a full picture of an angel floating inside of a cathedral. As one might expect, I was just a little taken aback. I just haven't seen many angels flooding in cathedrals recently. So I just had to, you know, get grounded and really take in the beauty that I was I'm dying.

Lexie Smith  

Okay, so the picture she's described me as my mom holding a piece of art I made while in Italy, and I had it, it was

Emily Merrell  

not seven, I just want to point that out. This was an adult dry.

Lexie Smith  

This was an adult drawing and actually something I'm very damn proud of. But the context which I didn't think like, but I would need to give the context. You know, before I ever show anyone that picture again, I'm gonna need to give the context but I was studying at an art school and the assignment was to go into a cathedral somewhere in Italy, find a portion of a mural and recreate it with a self created medium. So I did like take a picture of a painting in a church. And then I took powder and a yoke to make paint. And it took like this painting took like, two, two months because of the medium I was anyways, I digress. It is a very specific like ancient floating Angel cathedral photo and I guess now I make sense that you probably wouldn't have thought that I would paint that.

Emily Merrell  

And maybe I'm just not a very serious person. So I'm the worst art but I would like you know, this is a great homework assignment for everyone. If you have a painting that you want to share with us, please do please do. We're now opening the art critic division of ReadySet coach and if you want

Lexie Smith  

to see this painting, you're gonna have to work for it. So you're gonna have to DM DMS works got to see this Pics. Sure, and I will I'll like hold me to it. I will share with you this very specific type of painting I did, which is just so on theme, you know, being specific, because today we're talking about how to find your perfect coaching niche.

Emily Merrell  

Wow, wow. Wow. Wow. Well done Lexie, I think she could be a coach on transitions, a transition coach,

Lexie Smith  

but I'm not. So I'm a business coach and PR coach and a co founder buddy site coach to with you, my friend. So let's dive into this topic today. Okay, I'm going to set the scene for you, Emily. Hi, my name is Lexi. I have an existing business or I have an existing job. And I'm really interested in dabbling, starting up a coaching side hustle, but how that what kind of coach should I be? Where should I start? Who should I serve?

Emily Merrell  

I think this is one of the hardest questions, but one of the most important questions to think about when deciding to become a coach. And in all transparency, guys, we help individuals that have successful businesses, or working at corporate jobs, and they want to launch a coaching business. So one of the things if you're at that discovery stage of your life, and you're like guys, I want to I want to become a coach, but I'm so overwhelmed by what it is. So what are the key points you should keep in mind while selecting a coaching niche? I think one of the things that you have to think about is what are you good, or what are you passionate about? So I love to use Lexie, Lexie Smith as an example, Lexie Smith was a VP at a growing telecom communications company doing PR, do I get that right

Lexie Smith  

Lex? Pretty damn close.

Emily Merrell  

Okay. And when she decided she wanted to become a coach, she wanted to take this skill of not doing PR for other people, but teaching people how to do PR. So similarly, if you are a marketing manager, and you are a badass at helping writing emails and organizing marketing systems and flows, how could you teach your clients? Or could you teach your clients to do just that?

Lexie Smith  

Yeah, really, you're wanting to find a problem to solve? Right? Where can you marry your passion? With a problem to solve? And guys we've seen, let's give them more examples, because we've seen some of the most unique coaches in the last few years. Emily, I know you specifically have a whole arsenal of really fascinating ones.

Emily Merrell  

We've seen everything from sleep coaches, to period coaches, to fertility nutritionist, coaches to

Lexie Smith  

pause what does that mean? So give me an example. give everyone an example. What the heck is a period? Coach? What problem are they solving?

Emily Merrell  

Not questions, and I'm just getting period questions. That joke. All right. Not here for that one. All right. Um, so period, go to someone if you were struggling with your period or your menstruation and you need support on figuring out why am I having these terrible cramps, or I'm not getting my period, she helps you understand what is going on on the back end, and finding a solution for your problem?

Lexie Smith  

And what is her background? How have you think she came about to solving that problem that seems so specific.

Emily Merrell  

So I know for this particular individual, she had struggled with her own period, and she had done a lot of research and ultimately was able to get her ministration back on track and heal herself. So her, she' s motivated by her own personal experience, and helping others achieve the same results.

Lexie Smith  

And I love that you just highlighted that because you don't have to coach on the same thing you do during the day, your day job, for example, you could be a marketing manager and kick ass at your job, but have no desire to bring marketing home with you. So maybe there's something personal like what Emily just shared another lived experience that you feel more fulfillment through or feel called to serve us or to help others within coaching gives you this really beautiful opportunity to be able to do that without needing to quit the day job if you don't want to.

Emily Merrell  

Yeah, I  think that's a great, that's a great point Lex that you can have this something that you are passionate about or something that is a unique skill to you that you're not using during your corporate job, or maybe you're not using it even on your business, but you want to bring it out into the world and you want to have more impact in the world in this particular area.

Lexie Smith  

Yeah, and so step one really is like just sit down. If you already know great, but if you don't bullet point out a bunch of problems that you passionately or genuinely would like to solve. I think from there, we need to go and see if there's an need in the market? Right? And how do we do that?

Emily Merrell  

You do some market research. And that is something we've talked about in other episodes. But that starts even with your own community that's asking your friends that's asking your family that's actually asking friends of friends, that's asking Facebook groups, or members of Facebook groups like, is this something that you think is needed, I also

Lexie Smith  

think a really good indicator in the coaching space. If you can find other coaches coaching on that topic, it's actually a really, really good sign that there is a need in the market. Now, when I decided to go into PR coaching, actually, kind of the opposite was the case, I didn't find a lot of peer coaches, there are now but at the time, I thought there was there was a few on the market. And so to be honest, I wasn't fully sure about the need. But I felt passionately that I could teach people and what an undertaking that has been anyways, teach people why they should learn this. So the reason I'm sharing that is while it can be a really good sign, if there is competition, if you don't see other coaches, that doesn't necessarily mean the need isn't there just do a bit more due diligence.

Emily Merrell  

And for me, and my, when I started coaching, I focused on helping people build their business, through events, partnerships, and communities. So that was really creating some sort of event series or creating partnerships getting really good at cross collaborating with other individuals to grow and over to amplify the the messaging of their business.

Lexie Smith  

And what I want to highlight about Emily is she was about a business coach who specialized in a very specific way of growing your business. Now, actually, in our last episode, if you guys are regular listeners, we talked about this a little bit. But one of the things that we see commonly is people fearing niching down because they think if they niche down or if they commit to something, either one, they're going to be leaving money on the table. Or two, I think honestly, sometimes they just they feel like they don't want to limit themselves. Yeah,

Emily Merrell  

and, you know, I'm not gonna lie lacks, I'm one of those people. I feel like it can be hard sometimes when I'm like, This is my niche. And truly my niche started out with events, partnerships and community. I have since served people who don't necessarily take advantage of that area of expertise. And I help focus them on different ways. But I always market to events, partnerships and community.

Lexie Smith  

And I think there's there's something to be learned there that you know, in the last episode, we talked about the four M's, the fourth m being messaging, and there's a lot of strategic advantages to picking a niche to picking the lane to stick into becoming known for something specific. But then on the other side, you're going to evolve, you're human, you're allowed to evolve. So if you are feeling really, really hung up on needing to perfect however you enter the world of coaching that you need to have your niche 100% nailed down right now. Give yourself grace and know that's going to evolve. Yes, pick and commit to one now, but know that you're allowed to change your mind down the line. Yeah,

Emily Merrell  

I mean, thinking about you, Lex and even thinking about ReadySet. Coach, we support women in such bigger ways than what we just both mentioned about our niches. Hey, Lex? Yes. Did you know that we're starting our fourth cohort are ready set coach in February.

Lexie Smith  

Obviously, I knew that Emily, but if you didn't know that you can head online to learn more at ReadySet. Coach program.com. The link is in our show notes. I don't want everyone listening to be confused and think we're saying Okay, pick a niche. But wait, you also don't have to here's I want to very clearly articulate what we're saying. There is a lot of strategy to picking a niche from a business standpoint, from standing out in the market. But on the personal side of the coin, we just want you to know that you're human and you're allowed to evolve. So that's, I love

Emily Merrell  

I love that clarification. I think that is so important. So I want to recap so you're listening to us. You're like okay, guys, yeah, I'm I want to be a coach. I know I want to be a coach. But during the day, I'm a marketing manager, but I don't want to be a marketing coach. But I'm really kind of struggling to decide what I want to be a coach, but I had a great experience at working with a coach. So I know it's my life's passion. People always come to me asking me questions like, this is something I want to do. So back to reiterate what we were saying, you know, what are you good at or what are you passionate about? Did you just have a baby and you're so flippin passionate. What about breastfeeding? Are you so passionate about making their own baby food from scratch? Or are you passionate about trying to think of something else people are passionate about? Getting into shape postpartum, whatever it is that you're passionate about, and you know that you're good at, like when people say to you, good, here. Oh, he's so good at fill in the blank. Write that down. And then what are your other unique, unique skills? Like, are you someone, I just saw this Instagram actually this gal the other day, who keeps a spreadsheet of responsibilities with her partner, and who does what with the house. And so maybe you're like an insanely amazing project manager for families, and you want to help other people become like a super organized family, Rockstar relationship thing. So me your expertise, you could be a coach on like family management?

Lexie Smith  

Yeah, really, the sky's the limit when you come to picking that category. Now, once you have your category and your problem to solve, we actually want to challenge you to niche down even more. And here's an example what niching down even more means. So let's use the example just this is a good one of business coach, cool category chosen, the problem you want to solve? High level is helping small businesses grow? Great, how can we niche down further, here's some things to think about. What type of business owners? Are you helping female business owners? And then men? What stage of business? Is it a pre startup company? Is it a newly launched Mom and Pop? Or is it? You know, in the tech industry? Are you going to niche down by industry? Beyond that? psychographics what's the current mindset of a given client that you want to work with? So it could be I'm working with female entrepreneurs in the startup space? Who really, really love to learn? Now, what are some other examples

Emily Merrell  

understanding the values of, of the individuals that the clients have? Or is this is this something that you want to do you want to work with people who are starting businesses that they want to support their their family as like a side hustle, or this is their vacation fund, just understanding who these people are and what they what they want.

Lexie Smith  

Okay, so once you, you know, really dug deep and gone into the demographics and the psychographics of the person you want to work with as a coach and the industry you want to play in. The next key is to be able to market and talk to them effectively. And something that Emily and I talk with our group about a lot and ReadySet coach, is you have to meet them where they're at today. And then paint a picture of where they can go. So do you want to give a couple examples of that em, and I'll set you up with the the new mom who gained Lexi who gained like 10 pounds during pregnancy and wants to put off the wait, what do I mean by meeting me where, where I'm at. But you want to

Emily Merrell  

talk about the pain points of the of the current situation. So current situation is you might be feeling self conscious, or maybe a little depressed, Steven, or feeling not as sexual or not feeling as motivated to start working out because you're a failure? And why would I work out because I can't lose the weight and you might be in spiral mode, should I be a coach for this. And you want to be able to talk to them about that current problem and really see them, you want to be able to relate to them. But you also want to let them know about the future Lexi who will be frolicking on the beach, and who will, sipping margaritas following your time working together.

Lexie Smith  

And I think something you're highlighting so beautifully is that a niche can be as simple as niching down on a very specific pain point or problem, right, you could work with new moms who are really struggling with confidence issues. That's where they're at today. And it's something to think about in your language to an example, a mistake I made when I first launched, the PR bar was using all this language in the PR industry and my marketing like get do press releases and get your boiler plate. And the reality was the people I wanted to work with they didn't know PR yet. They didn't know those words. They didn't know what that meant. And so I had to meet them where they're at in speaking away in a language and address current pain points that they could understand now. And just know that over time, by the end of working with me, they'll have the acumen to learn the language at that point. Yeah,

Emily Merrell  

I think that's a really great point to call out is like speaking, kind of speaking to a 10 year old speaking to something that's digestible and also easy to replicate and to regurgitate. If, for whatever reason this person meets you or stumbles upon your website, and you're not the right fit for them, they can regurgitate it for another person, that you might be the solution to their problem.

Lexie Smith  

And not to get too ahead of ourselves here, but something we want to paint to you. Because this is inevitably what ends up happening is you're gonna start with one niche, when you start this side, hustle, this business, whatever form of coaching, and you're going to start going after a specific type of person. And as you actually start coaching, really pay attention to the types of clients you're really jiving with. And the ones that, you know, you could pass on, and you might even discover within the coaching, active coaching process, you can identify elements that create or evolve your niche into something else.

Emily Merrell  

Yeah, I think that's a really a great point to make. So lax in conclusion of our soapbox for today, what is an example of an evolution of coaching?

Lexie Smith  

Yeah, so I actually have seen this within ReadySet coach. And so when we first launched ReadySet, coach, we really, really went after people who were fully committed to coaching full time, and they really just wanted to craft a coaching business to support their lifestyle. And by all means, we still have people who fit that archetype to this day. But as we look back, after graduating, each cohort, on the woman we really liked to work with the most and who saw the most success in our programs, we identified a very specific niche, and the fact that these people usually were already business owners, or professionals, and they were getting into coaching as an additional revenue stream. So that ended up becoming a niche we decided to double down on and while the values were still the same, you know, it has become really to our advantage. And it's allowed us to stand out in a very saturated market to to lean in to that, that niche that did inevitably evolve through active coaching.

Emily Merrell  

I think that's a beautiful example, and a beautiful real life applicable example. And Lexie, my homework giver of humans, what homework Do you wanna give to our listeners today?

Lexie Smith  

Yeah, I think, you know, you guys are gonna be at different points. When you're listening to this, some of you might already be doing the damn thing you might already know your niche. What I challenge you to do is just to think a little bit, you know, outside of the box in what niche can mean start brainstorming more of the intangibles like what is the current mindset level of someone you want to work with? What are some of the psychographics? What are their values? What are some of their pain points, go beyond the male, female, they're living in this city, they make this amount of income and start to get creative. What are their their passions on the side? And if you have current clients, great, you can look back and start to pull components out if not dream a little,

Emily Merrell  

huh, great, great, great homework. And as always, thank you so much for listening to the podcast. Next. If you're enjoying the ReadySet coach podcast, please leave a review wherever you are listening. For more information about Ready Set, coach, Visit Ready Set coach program.com