How to Pick The Best Marketing Strategy For Your Coaching Business

This week, Emily Merrell and Lexie Smith walk through how to pick the best marketing strategy for your coaching business. They review various common marketing strategies on the market and discuss how to choose which will ultimately work best for you and your coaching practice.

Here’s what you’ll learn: 

• Examples of different marketing strategies that exist for new coaches
• How to take inventory of what works for you as an individual in marketing
• How a strategy can only work if it aligns with your strengths
• Marketing strategies that Em & Lex have used personally - what worked, and what didn’t
• The key to activating an effective marketing strategy for your coaching business
• What to avoid when marketing your coaching practice
• And More!

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 Pick The Best Marketing Strategy For Your Coaching Business - Podcast Transcript

Lexie Smith  

Hey, Lex. Hey, Emily, you guys, another YouTube plug. Which by the way first before I talk about today, for those of you who very excitedly ran to our YouTube channel after the last interview, or what have they called podcast episode where I promised you'd see me juggling. There was a camera mix up and you couldn't see me juggling it. First off,

Emily Merrell  

how are you? I feel like I haven't seen you all week. Literally. No,

Lexie Smith  

I'm like it's been at least an hour and I'm hoping Emily withdrawals. I am like, you know what people ask you how your weekend was and you actually legitimately remember what you did the day before. It's how I think I'm fine. I'm fine, right? I'm fine. Yeah, I'm fine. How are you?

Emily Merrell  

First off, I want to shout out Lexi's birthdays coming up. It's coming up on March 14. So everyone are just mark your calendars Lexi's birthday March 14. I'm Lex. I actually I'm fine now but I yesterday and you know how obsessed I am with the SI P word. I don't want to take a shot. So I am obsessed with core power yoga. She was so obsessed with it. And I don't know if it was a workout. It wasn't a corporate workout on Monday I did. But Tuesday, Wednesday, and today, I felt like someone took a baseball bat to my body. And the way the pain that I had like really made me empathize for people who are living in pain, but my wrists were achy, my shoulders were achy, my back was achy, my ankles were achy, like I slept. Usually I sleep on my left side holding a pillow. And I could even turn to my left side, I was just on my back because it couldn't move. So I'm not an Advil person. I'm not someone who like takes I don't have much pain, so I don't usually just pop pills. So I took Advil this morning, and that helped. And then I had this this bomb that was like an AC hot kind of balm and I just rubbed it all over my body and I'm feeling better now. But I I truly felt like I was going to need to request a wheelchair when going to the airport. Like that's how bad it was feeling.

Lexie Smith  

So you're all just kidding. My trick to pain management. Because throughout sports in I've gone through some serious injuries that could have easily had me taking way too many pills. Peppermint oil is my favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite natural option for pain management.

Emily Merrell  

That's essentially what the bomb was. It's like a peppermint or like a yoga bomb. I think it's called. But yeah, I was texting my girlfriend who we met Katie, who is a doctor and I was asking her I was like So do I have rheumatoid arthritis now? Is this lupus? Is it gout? Like, is it cancer? I just went through all of it. She's like, it's probably like some sort of viral infection that you have that's just manifesting in your body. Do you feel sick? Like I don't feel sick? So anyhow, that was my fun start to the morning. Literally picking up my 23 pound child was like, it was hard. It was very, very hard.

Lexie Smith  

Okay, last squirrel guys, I promise and then we'll talk about the content. But I feel like I don't know why I didn't think to talk about this. But I have to tell them what happened to me this week regarding children and regarding.

Emily Merrell  

Oh, yeah.

Lexie Smith  

I'll give you the very quick, quick version. I'm going to start by saying Everyone is fine. Everyone is fine. Everyone is fine. But I went to my girlfriend's house this weekend to celebrate her birthday and there was just three of us moms. And then I had my husband pick up Ashlyn, but there was for four kiddos running around from the ages of two to six. And I had forgotten my long story I'm trying to like what's the Cliff Notes version? I didn't have a purse, okay. Meaning I still had my EpiPen and a wallet and keys that were free floating in the house. I put them on a shelf. We drink some wine. We were watching some bachelor, no judgment. And all of a sudden, my mom friend turns around and she sees her two year old running around with the empty shell of my epi pen. And we're like, oh, what? Then I hear another child vomiting in the bathroom. And then we're like, what? And then the other mom friend went up to go find my EpiPen needle out Having been deployed. Turns out the two year old took my epi pen stabbed the five year old. So I immediately call 911. Now the mom of these two kids is the chose moment that rematch like let's you don't call 911. I'm like, I'm sorry, but your child is puking and just got stabbed with a heavy pen. The doctor's office isn't open, I'm going to ask what to do. Literally, when they were in the city of kymriah. Within 90 seconds without me even asking. We had a knock on the door. There were seven paramedics who showed up. And the reason I'm kind of laughing is it was totally fine. We were three semi half drunk moms who irresponsibly had left an EpiPen. My friends like are they gonna call CPS anyways, everyone's fine, everyone's fine, long story long. Here's the lesson there. Don't leave your EpiPen unattended in a house of children. Because they might stab each other.

Emily Merrell  

I think there's another lesson there too. It's less intimidating. And it's easier to deploy an epi pen than you think. And so if you ever do feel anxious about deploying an epi pen, it's so easy. A two year old can do it.

Lexie Smith  

And you're the best you just served it up on a silver platter. You know, there's so many options that could have been done in that moment, couldn't call 911 could have gone to the Google rabbit hole could have done a lot of things. It's sometimes hard to know the right thing. And you know what, it's also sometimes hard to know the right thing about choosing a marketing strategy that works for you and your coaching business, which is today's topic, how to pick the best marketing strategy for your coaching business.

Emily Merrell  

Wow, we just took it from epi pens to best marketing strategy for your coaching business. Let me let me just make a mental note that I need to make an Instagram of all of your best transitions. Because if people aren't listening to this podcast, they should get curious at least how we can go from it as far as marketing.

Lexie Smith  

Well this to that if you don't see it, slide into our DMS. So let's kick this off 20 minutes into our squirrel conversation. And that's okay, Emily, I'm going to toss it over to you because I just talked a long time. Do you want to kick us off?

Emily Merrell  

Not really, but I will. So I'm happy to know. Just kidding. Yeah. So I think I think this is a great conversation, because as you can see, I'm going to just use I'm going to speak in examples today. I'm thinking of having Well, if you have a coaching business, there's many ways that you can market yourself. You can market yourself on social media, you could be on Tik Tok dancing up a storm, you could be speaking on big stages, you could be speaking at little stages, you could be starting a podcast or on other people's podcasts. There's many different ways to get the message across of what you were doing and what you were coaching on. Lex and I started our podcast, I'm going to use us as an example. We started our podcast, gosh, in the fall sometime like summer, no July maybe? What year is it?

Lexie Smith  

I don't know. I think we started

Emily Merrell  

it last year. We started in July of 2022. And then we started it on a whim. But one of the things that we both recognized is a were hilarious BS. We know we needed to be able to, we needed to talk through our ideas, and we're much better. We're great writers, but we're much better being able to articulate and speak things through and it also gives people our listeners you an opportunity to get to know our personalities. So when thinking about as you were seen through all the different options for marketing, your coaching business, take some time to reflect on where your strong your strength lies. Are you a phenomenal writer and you think that you could really commit to writing a blog or contributing to other blogs? Or do you think speaking is is your wheelhouse? Perfect.

Lexie Smith  

So I think this is one of the biggest misconceptions or comments or or comments challenges are yours. When you enter the coaching space or this actually works across the board for any business, you're gonna see a lot of people preaching at you for certain strategies, you need to do a paid ad into a webinar. In order to have a volume based coaching practice, you need to have a Instagram you need to there's a lot of neat tools, a lot of shoulds a lot of this is the one strategy that works. And we're here to say that the strategy only works if it's in alignment with you and your strengths for a multitude of reasons. So to piggyback off em Step one is to get really honest with yourself about your strengths and also where you're currently at with your commitment level of showing up meaning You could be a phenomenal speaker. But the reality is, you aren't going to commit to being able to make time in your schedule, to go on a speaking tour and show up on stages. So it's one part knowing what you're good at two part knowing what you're willing to commit to another example, let's say you're someone who hates social media, but, and you hate being on podcasts and you hate being on TV, how do you work it right? Do you have to be super super present, this is an opportunity where maybe then writing maybe writing is an angle you go after maybe it is the blog route, maybe it is using and going after by lines or guest posts. A part two to that, though, is then you have to be able to commit the time to do that consistently. So it's part recognition part choice.

Emily Merrell  

And I have to say to, you can have a strength that can be it can be drawn across multiple, or it could be streamed across multiple platforms. So like your point about writing, you're like, Oh, my God, I love writing. Yeah, that's a great idea lacks, and you're like, Oh, but I hate social media, You'll never catch me dancing. You don't have to dance on social media to be you could be able to capitalize on your writing strengths and create carousel posts, explaining X, Y, and Z about your whatever you coach on. And so just because there are the people or the coaches that are talking to the camera every single day and have the captions on, there are also ways to still leverage this free platform that is available to you, but works for your strengths. Max, how can people find out how to

Lexie Smith  

work with us? Super simple, go to ReadySet, Coach program.com, you can show notes. Yeah, and part two to that is also looking at the platforms out there. And what natively does well, so there's two sides of the coin. So the first side is being aware of what your strengths are, we also want to show up where our people are at. But if let's say you generally decided that you are a career coach, for example. So you're looking for people who are stuck in their career, there might be an audience on Instagram. Maybe though you go to LinkedIn, and LinkedIn more natively is pro writing. You don't necessarily have to be a graphics genius or do any video. So that's strategic in the sense that you're showing up where your potential clients are. But it's also playing into your strengths and what you are going to realistically commit and be able to do

Emily Merrell  

consistently. A min to that, and so lacks when you think about you like let's go back to Lexie Lexie, a few years ago, when Lexie was starting out with the PR bar, how did you pick the best marketing strategy for you?

Lexie Smith  

Yeah, so there's a few few ways to go about this. But I do believe that when you're very, very, very in the beginning stages your business in a new form of business, you don't necessarily know what does or doesn't work. I was in a position where being in marketing and PR, I was open to all the all the places, meaning I didn't have the natural weaning, meaning I didn't hate camera, I didn't hate audio. So there was a lot of options still on my table. So I went into the mindset of treating my business as a lab experiment. And I tried a little bit of everything. I went into it knowing trial and error is part of the process. So I tried speaking, I tried social, I tried podcasts, I tried writing, I tried coke campaigns, I tried X, Y, and Z. I did all of them with the intention of learning what was going to work for my business, once I knew what worked, then I could scale back my efforts and get a lot more specific, which is what I did now tossing over that exact same question for you, Emily.

Emily Merrell  

And I just want to I want to let everyone know that Lexi has some beautiful YouTube videos that she made when she first began with tutorials on how to do certain PR things. So I appreciate the effort of, of experimenting with all the different angles and all of the different ways. For me, since I had I had been creating the networking community it was it made the most sense to do things in collaboration with others. So for marketing, that meant doing giveaways. I was also I would say my strategy was generous marketing, like reverse psychology marketing, where I started a blog. And my obligation with the blog was to interview people who I thought were amazing. And what was awesome. This was before people were doing like career profiles. This is the olden days. This is when TV was in black and white. And I was interviewing these people. And then they were showing them they were sharing those interviews on their platforms. I would try to also interview people that had put decent followings, and had people who were like actively consuming whatever they put out. So by interviewing them I was building like no interest. And then when the time came, often they then created a podcast and then I would be invited back onto the, onto the podcast, or I would be interviewed in their blog series. So it was very, like mutually beneficial marketing. I don't know if there's a word for it, but cross pollinating with other people,

Lexie Smith  

which is brilliant. And if you peel back the layer, right, it's also really conducive or complementary to your personality, like you're a natural networker, you're someone who naturally does these things. So it's not only strategic, it's really, really smart and going to allow you to shine where people mess up is when they try to force themselves into a fit. An example I have here is a quick like, I think it was two weeks ago, one of my friends who's not in the entrepreneurial space at all, she's actually a stay at home mom, but bless her follows me on all my business accounts. So she sent me a voice note. And she was like, Wow, it's so funny how you literally are exactly who you are on your Instagram stories. She sent me that she's like, I appreciate that. The thing is, is if I were to show up on my Instagram Stories, being super polished, or trained to be super, super vulnerable, or x y&z fitting into trend of the moment, it wouldn't be me and that energy would be felt it just wouldn't come off authentically. And so yeah, find me on my stories, because I know that is me, is me. No, but that's also smart, because I'm playing into who I am. And that's gonna be felt in today's modern modern landscape where there is so much emphasis put on authenticity. Do you get what I'm saying? I feel like that was a lot of words. But

Emily Merrell  

do you get when I get we showing up authentically as you and expressing and communicating what the value that you provide, but not changing and deviating from? You're not like a persona? You are? You're Alexei through and through both in your business and in real life?

Lexie Smith  

Yes, I think

Emily Merrell  

simply putting that that together. I do. And I agree with that, too. I think that Gone are the days of the perfectly polished, professional. And, you know, I know that it does exist on LinkedIn. But even there, I'm seeing so much more vulnerability in the last the last few years especially think about like the tech layoffs, all these people who are like kind of just pulling back the onion, and they're showing this version of themselves. That's not everything is perfect and hunky dory, and I so appreciate that and infusing more of their personal life and personality into something that might be deemed professional.

Lexie Smith  

On the flip side of that coin to play devil's advocate, I actually feel there's a lot of pressure to only show or overplay the message. Yeah. Yeah. And so ways Yeah. And an example I have here is my husband, he's an engineer and the liquefied gas industry fun. Space and his customers like they are not showing up for vulnerability. So when he sees a post on LinkedIn, that's vulnerable. He's like, what, wtf is this doing here? It is such a turn off for him. So I think there is also when we talk strategy, knowing as a coach, what type of person are you going after? Who is your ideal client? Is it someone that is open to the vulnerability? Or is it maybe someone in a older I'm stereotyping here, but like an older generation in a very rigid industry who might not really be receptive to this new wave of being messy? So it's something to think about too.

Emily Merrell  

Yeah, no, it's definitely it is fascinating to think about also, like who's consuming your, your information, and I think I've mentioned this before, but we have a family friend, every time I see him and he said, like CEO of a very big company. He's like, Oh, I love your your Instagram, Emily, and I'm like, oh my god, I was in my underwear with a picture of my child, you know, breastfeeding, like leaking. This is not the person I am speaking to. So knowing that you will, you might have people who are following you that are not your ideal audience. And you have to kind of get over that comfort level of like, I'm not trying to appeal to him, but good good on him for consuming it.

Lexie Smith  

It's such a great point. Um, I do want to share a example of a co one on one client Emily and I have because I just had a session with her yesterday and the topic we were we were focusing on was narrowing and on her strategy for thought leadership, and to give you a bit more color, she's at a point in her business where now she's I don't know part is She is like eight months a month. Yeah, tremendously doing tremendously well in the If you're looking on YouTube, the fire is lighting in her business, and she's starting to get traction. And she's starting to move a little bit more out of the first trial and error phase into understanding where what's working, she has clients. So she we're able to reflect back on Where did those clients come from. And this speaks back to kind of what I was saying about my journey where sometimes you have to try a lot of things. But once you start seeing what works, then you can narrow in. So we narrowed in on two very specific strategies for her. Because we saw that's where her clients were coming on coming from. So why reinvent the wheel? Let's just turn fire on what we know is

Emily Merrell  

working. And you just want to these fire pens. I see that I just really

Lexie Smith  

did. Yeah.

Emily Merrell  

She was fired up guys. Yeah, well, we should do a stand up episode where we just do comedy back and forth and see we could do a pun off Thunderdome or version,

Lexie Smith  

let's someone submit us for a Netflix comedy special, please, though.

Emily Merrell  

Or not, we'll save our egos for something else. So in conclusion, how to pick the best marketing strategy for your coaching business. It's taking a lot of inventory of who you are. It's experimenting, it's experimenting and then taking it reflecting and looking at the data where clients coming from, and then focusing your energies in those particular areas and potentially expanding and seeing what are synchronistic or, or symbiotic with that. And Lex, what is your homework going to be for our wonderful listeners today?

Lexie Smith  

On that note, step one, take out some pen and paper and write down where do you shine, and evaluate also not where you shine, but what you are willing to realistically show up for consistently. So if you're going to say you want to lean into writing, then you need to make an agreement with yourself that you're going to really lean into that, that channel. Step two of that is to make sure within that medium, so if it's social or writing or speaking, then identifying a platform where your people are at. So if I want to be a writer and I'm going after female entrepreneurs, then the platform may be I try to write for as create and cultivate, for example. So that's really where we marry being realistic, and acknowledging who we are as an individual as a coach with the strategy side of things.

Emily Merrell  

And with that, we will see you in the next text

Lexie Smith  

on the red coat comedy channel I mean podcast

Emily Merrell  

by 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