If I Started My Business Over, Here's Exactly What I'd Do

If I lost everything and had to rebuild my health coaching business from scratch in 2026, I wouldn't do it the same way I did years ago. 

The industry has shifted, and the "hustle harder" strategies of the past no longer work.

In this episode, Valerie Feghali reveals her exact "2026 Reset" strategy. You will learn why launching with a low-ticket ebook is a mistake, why you should ignore social media growth until you have an email list, and how to use "Exit Surveys" to let your clients build your product for you. Whether you are a new coach paralyzed by perfectionism or an established entrepreneur looking to pivot, this is your blueprint for a profitable, burnout-free business.

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KEY TOPICS & CHAPTERS:

00:00 Intro
00:40 Starting From Scratch: Why the "2026 strategy" looks completely different from the traditional coaching startup model.

01:13 The "One Offer" Rule: Why focusing on a single signature program allows you to scale faster than creating multiple products.

02:47 Smart Expense Management: How to avoid "shiny object syndrome" and stop wasting cash on tools you don't need yet.

03:51 High-Ticket Validation: Why you must start with 1:1 coaching at a premium price point before ever trying to sell a course.

05:15 The Exit Survey Secret: How to ask the right questions when a client leaves to uncover the "missing link" in your offer.

07:09 Email List > Social Media: Why owning your audience is critical and how to build a list before you have a following.

09:40 Start Before You Are Ready: Overcoming the perfectionism trap and why "messy action" is the only way to grow.

12:41 The Pivot to Ads: Knowing exactly when to switch from organic marketing to paid traffic to scale your validated offer.

⭐ ABOUT VALERIE

Valerie Feghali is a physical therapist turned software CEO, helping health and wellness coaches scale their businesses without burnout. As the founder of The Wellness Vault, she provides white-label resources and strategic coaching to help you grow.

⭐ CONNECT WITH VALERIE

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/v.feghali/

The Wellness Vault: https://wellnessvault.com/

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If you enjoyed this episode, please support our podcast and give it 5 stars. Your feedback helps us reach more health coaches and fuel the flow of the wellness industry.

DISCLAIMER:

The Fuel The Flow Podcast is for educational purposes only. The information provided is not intended to replace professional medical or business advice.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

When you run a business, you have a lot of expenses in both time and money. I would also make sure that I price that offer higher than what I thought possible. If you're creating something based on what you think people want, it's not going to hit the same way as when you build on what people are asking for and what you know that they want. Our email list is always our Welcome to the Fuel Your Flow podcast. I am your host, Valerie Figali, physical therapist, turned software CEO and business coach for health and wellness coaches. We are going to be talking about all things health and business. They might be more closely related than you think. So let's go ahead and get into it. Welcome back to another episode of Fuel the Flow. Today's episode is going to be short and spicy. We are going to talk about what I would do if I was to start my business again from scratch in 2026. There were a lot of mistakes that I made along the way, time wasted, that I would not go back and do that again, versus other things that at the time felt like I was grinding my wheels, maybe felt like I was wasting money or wasting time, but now I see the fruits of my labor and I would 100% do that again and in fact invest even more time and money in those things. So the first thing that I would do is I would have only one offer, and it would be one clear offer for a specific type of person that I want to work with. Now, when I first started, I was offering like packages of five coaching sessions for a certain price, and anybody could purchase them. There was just health, general health coaching in order to, you know, clean up your eating and that type of thing. There was no real result tied to it, and it wasn't for a specific type of person. I was also doing things like, you know, bring a sprouse or bring a friend and we could do group coaching, or we can just do one at a time and you can pay per session, right? I didn't have a clear offer. So if I were to go back in time, I would create a very specific, clear offer on what the program actually is and what they're getting out of it so that I could articulate that in a way that the potential client knew exactly what they were getting and it was either a clear yes or a clear no. And I would also be very clear on who that specific offer is geared to treat or work with, right? So when we're when our offers are all over the place and we don't know who we're working with or what exactly we're doing in those sessions, then they are less and less effective. So I would be more clear on the type of person that I'm serving and exactly what that offer entails. I would also make sure that I price that offer higher than what I thought possible. Because when I first started, I was charging what I had been initially making at my hourly job, which clearly did not result in profits for my business because when you run a business, you have a lot of expenses in both time and money. You have to spend your time on your business actually creating the things that you need in order to run a business, a successful business. And then you also have tools and softwares and different things that you need in order to run the business. So you have expenses, you have time that's allocated, allocated for working on the business and not just in the business. So the difference is when you're working on the business, you're working on things that are going to help propel the business forward, such as maybe, you know, taking a course that's going to teach you a certain strategy in order to make more revenue, or building out, you know, your sales page, right? Those are all things that are working on the business versus working in the business is when you have that client-facing time that you're actually generating revenue. And so both are very important and both are necessary. And in the beginning, you're going to be spending a lot of time working in the business, but you also have that other time allocated. And so you need to make sure that you are charging enough to make up for that. Another thing I would have started with is just one-on-one coaching, and I would collect as much feedback from those sessions as possible. So when you are doing one-on-one coaching, you are really in the thicket with that client. They're telling you or can tell you their deepest desires, their deepest pain points, what's really triggering them, what they really, really want. If you're asking. However, if you're not constantly asking the question, why do you want this? Why is this goal important to you? What do you expect to get out of this? What are your true goals and what is the meaning and the purpose of what we're doing here? If you're not constantly asking that question, not just on the first session, but throughout every single session, then you're going to start to lose touch with that and you're not going to get that deep understanding about what your client needs. And so I would be constantly asking them why, why, why, and documenting that in their words so that when I was ready to present my offer to the next client, that I was speaking in their language and I was fully showing them that I fully understood what it was they're dealing with, what their pain points are, what their struggles are, and then also what they want out of coaching. So I would make sure that I was understanding that from their language, consistently asking, consistently documenting exactly what it was that they were telling me again in their language, in their words, so that I could use that in the future. Another thing that I would do was always ask for an exit survey. So when a client was done working with me, but they had either reached their goals or maybe they were going to continue on their own for a little while, I would always have some sort of survey, detailed survey, in order to collect as much feedback from that person as possible. Remember, I said that I would be working one-on-one in the beginning. So these are clients that I've gotten to know very well. Now, when you're working in a larger group setting, it's a little bit tougher to collect detailed surveys if they take a lot of time. But if it's a client that you've gotten to know really well, it's easy to say, hey, do you mind just putting 10 minutes into this survey? It's really going to help me grow my business and understand how I can better serve you in the future. And so you want to collect as much information as possible. Now, another thing that I would do is I would not take that feedback personally. And I would use it to grow my and improve my products and make sure that I'm refining my coaching, refining my offers in a way that resonates in a way that my ideal client wants. Because in the beginning, I took things very personally. When somebody didn't like a certain way that I coached or a certain thing that I offered to them, I decided it didn't work for them because of XYZ, it would hit me hard. Versus now when somebody says that, I'm like, thank you, thank you for telling us your honest opinion, so that now we can go back to the drawing board and make this even better for the next time around. Hey, sorry to interrupt, but if you are a health or wellness professional and you haven't yet checked out the wellness vault, you're missing out. The wellness vault is a content hub for coaches who create their own plans and programs for their clients, run workshops, create digital guides, and so much more. You can now do all of this in a fraction of the time so you can focus on your clients and grow your business faster than ever with more UTime. The link to the Wellness Vault is in the show notes. So go sign up for your free trial today. The next thing that I would do is start growing my email list immediately and get used to nurturing that email list, even if I only had five people on it, right? So you can start growing an email list just by simply taking the emails from your clients who have worked with you and sending them a weekly or a monthly newsletter. Um, you can also collect emails from free workshops that you might do. I would be getting myself out there. I would be asking gyms, hey, can I present this free workshop for your client just to get in front of their audience? Can we set up some sort of day where I can present something to them that is meaningful and value without expectation of anything in return, right? I'm not asking that gym or that chiropractor or that physical therapist, whoever it is that I'm trying to collaborate with, I'm not asking anything in return. I'm simply getting experience. I'm getting in front of their audience, telling them exactly about how I work and the things that I do, not just a sale in a sales pitch way, but in a way that's going to help them take action on solving some of their problems. So I would put together action-based workshops and start collecting emails that way and grow my email list. And then once I do some of those collaborations, and again, asking nothing in return, you're simply doing free workshops for these people in order to get people onto your email list. I would start to nurture that email list. Getting into the habit and routine of creating those emails and being able to grow and expand and create connection on your email list is so incredibly valuable. Our email list is by far always our best return on an investment. Anytime we send out an email, the cost it sends to send that bulk email, we always get money back from that. So it is very important to start growing and nurturing your email list and start getting used to writing those newsletters. At first, they're gonna feel weird and you're not going to know exactly what your format is, and it's gonna be a little bit uncomfortable sending them out. But as time goes along, you're going to start to refine that and come up with a great format that your clients love and that you know that they're responding to. You're going to be paying attention to who's opening the email, who's responding. Again, if you don't have a software set up yet and you're not able to track your click-through rates and your open rates, at least talk to people who are on your email list and say, hey, what did you think of that last one? Did you like it? Did you not? Right? There's ways to do it even without fancy tech when you're first getting started. The next thing is that I would start before I was ready. So what I see a lot of people do is they're trying to perfect their offers. So say they're they offer um, you know, a six-month program and they want a certain amount of content inside of that program before they get started, and it takes them six months to build out. Well, now you've just lost out on all of that time. Instead, start enrolling people in, asking them what they want and build on the fly. Yes, you might need some structure, some content in there or some idea of what you're doing with that one-on-one program, if it's one-on-one that you're offering, but it doesn't need to be perfect. You're going to build as you go along. And when you build based on what people are asking for, the content that you create is much, much more valuable. If you're creating something based on what you think people want, it's not going to hit the same way as when you build on what people are asking for and what you know that they want. And not just what they need, but what they want, because that is super important. You need to be able to match those expectations. And then you can also add in those things that you know that they need that maybe they don't know they need because they don't have the same history or background as you with the way that you coach with your coaching certification. And so make sure you're building what they want, adding in what you they need, but on the go. It doesn't need to be fully built out before you start bringing people into your offers. So I would start right away. I would get people in immediately before I even had anything prepared, and I would build on the fly. Lastly, I would start making connections. I would be the first person to be reaching out to people. So if I saw people either in my industry that did something similar but slightly different, maybe, or maybe somebody who's offering a different service but serving the same audience as I do, I would be reaching out to those people online. So sending DMs, you know, commenting on their posts, maybe joining their email newsletter and replying, but starting to build some network and some connection with people. Even though it seems like a drag in the beginning and it feels like nobody's paying attention, in the long run, that comes back to serve you well. I've had people reach out to me a year or two ago that I, you know, it was a loose conversation that I didn't really think much of. But then a year later, they've responded back or gotten back to me and reconnected with me. And I realized, wow, this person has really been growing their business. We talked a year ago and they were just starting. And look what they've done now. And now I'm interested and now I want to know more. And now maybe I want to do a collaboration potentially with that person. So just start reaching out, tell people, you know, what it is that you're doing, but then also just commenting on their stuff, providing value for them. If you feel like they um, you know, if you see that they're traveling somewhere, maybe you say, Hey, I've I've been to that city, this restaurant was amazing. You should check it out while you're there, right? Those types of connections are very, very meaningful. So I would be reaching out to people and starting to build that network. Now, though I said that I would start with one-on-one coaching in the very, very beginning, that doesn't necessarily have to last long. Once you get that core messaging, the core understanding of what it is your client needs, then you can start to move into more group coaching or maybe memberships. And that is more of a way to build a stable, sustainable business. But that might come a little bit later. And once you get those products honed in, that's when I would start running ads to those products, which I would start ads earlier than you think. I'm not saying in the very, very beginning, get that experience, get some of that one-on-one coaching, that messaging down. But then once you build out that product that you know people love, I would not wait long before I start running ads to it. Running ads early on in my business was the thing that helped propel me to where I am today. Without that, I would not have had the same visibility. I would not have had the same income and revenue. And so that has been a game changer for my business. But again, that came after I refined my messaging, after I improved my programs. I did start running ads before I really had a good program and I they tanked completely. Now, would I say that I regret that and I completely wouldn't do that again? No, not necessarily. I probably, if I'm looking back, I probably would still would still have done that and wasted that, you know, quote unquote wasted that money, but it wasn't a true waste. It was a learning experience. And I learned so much from those initial days of running ads. No matter what, with ads, you're going to have a learning curve. There's going to be a time where you, you know, put money into ads where you're figuring out what's working, what's not, what does my messaging need to be like? Do I need to tweak things on my sales page? But again, once you hone in on that, getting that program locked in, it does not have to be perfect, but you have to know who it is that you're offering to, be very, very clear on that, and have a hyper-specific outcome for that offer. And then really just be clear on your messaging, which all comes in those beginning stages of starting to help people. I hope you got a lot out of this episode, and I'll see you on the next one. I hope you enjoyed our conversation from today. Any links we discussed will be in the show notes below. Also, we would be incredibly grateful if you would leave us a five star review. This helps us keep the podcast going so that we can continue to provide value for all of you. I hope we see you on the next one.