Ep 204 - Revealing the Realities of Group Coaching

Have you ever been on a coaching call with hundreds of people, but nobody really had an opportunity to talk or few people did? Sounds overwhelming, right? Those big group coaching programs might've left you thinking group coaching isn't your thing. But let me tell you otherwise.

In this episode, I’ll reveal the TRUTH about group coaching inside the Business Building Boutique and how it can provide you with a complete blueprint for coaching success, rather than just a single set of directions. I'll share the magic of group coaching and insider tips on creating a thriving coaching business, based on my own experience and that of my clients within the Business Building Boutique. Learn how group coaching can help you experience a coaching approach tailored specifically to you. Join the conversation to discover the benefits of group coaching and explore coaching models that suit the current stage of your business, to finally unlock the freedom and lifestyle of your dreams.

Welcome to the Life Coach Business Building Podcast! Join me as I teach you simple (organic) strategies to gain more paid clients in your life coaching business. Plus, I’ll share strategies for designing your offer, pricing your coaching, and selling your coaching offers, I have it all covered. My goal is to inspire you to take simple, consistent action to grow your coaching business. So, if you're ready to be a well-respected life coach with paid clients, this podcast is for you!

Episode details:

01:28 Debunking myths around group coaching

04:11 The unique benefits of group coaching

08:25 Exploring different group coaching models

21:01 Unlocking the magic of group coaching

Quotes: 

21:18 - “Group coaching is hands down the best thing for me and also the best thing for our clients.”

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Transcript

Preview: If you have bought those really big coaching programs where there are hundreds and hundreds of people, look, you just like me have been disappointed. You feel like you burned up money. Even if you watched all the program, you still don't know how to implement it because human nature, we all have questions. So that is not the only way to coach. Remember, I think these small intimate group coaching that we provide that you could provide really is the best way to do it. You can help people put all the pieces together and you can support people in many different ways.

Intro: Hello, I'm Debbie Shadid, the host of the Life Coach Business Building podcast. If you are ready to have more clients in your life coach business, then you're in the right spot. Each week I'm gonna teach you super simple strategies to grow your business without feeling overwhelmed and without spending money on paid ads. If that sounds interesting. Stick around and let's get started.

Well, hello, how are you today? We're going to talk about the realities of group coaching, and we're going to do this while we're having a thunderstorm here. So chances are, you're going to hear some thunder and some lightning. I actually love rainy days. So let's get started. We're going to first talk about the myths around group coaching.

Now, many of you guys have experienced these really big group coaching programs. And I think that's actually what's sort of tainted you on thinking that group coaching is not the best place for you. I know myself, I've been a part of many big programs where there were hundreds of people, especially early in my career of coaching online. When I was trying to learn the online world, I was very attracted to some of the advertising from the big names that we would all know. And I joined those programs and I was just completely lost. I don't know if you guys can relate to that, but I came into, you know, 1,000 to 2,000 people. There was a course to watch. There were big group coaching calls where nobody really had an opportunity to talk or few people did. There was a big Facebook group, but at that point in my coaching career online, I didn't even actually know what questions to ask. So maybe you have experienced that also. 

I actually think that group coaching is the very best thing for my clients. I really do. I'll just kind of give you a quick analogy of group coaching and why I think it's so special. Let's imagine that you're going to get directions from your house to your work and you want to have the very best directions. So somebody privately tells you how to go from one place to another and they give you one set of directions, even if it's the best directions to go, maybe the shortest path. What will happen on the day when the road is under construction? And I can tell you what will happen. You won't be able to get there. That is exactly the same thing that happens in private coaching. If I give somebody directions on how to get somewhere, how to solve their problem, how to have clarity over their niche, whatever that might be. They will get stuck because something else will inevitably come up. It's just like needing to take a detour. When you are in group coaching, you actually will be able to see the full map. So we have the full perspective of where it is you are going, and then you can reroute yourself. Yes, I know. That's a crazy analogy. But hopefully that paints the picture. 

All right, before we go on, I want to invite you to our upcoming workshop. We're going to be talking about your perfect coaching niche. Head over to debbieshadid.com/workshop. I know that you guys all have questions about niche. When you get clear on your niche, then we can get clear on whether group coaching is the best fit for you.

In today's podcast, I'm going to be talking about several different types of group coaching and we'll cover the pros and cons to both. Now, obviously a couple of big benefits for clients are one, it's cost effective. Typically group coaching is cost effective for the client because you're obviously serving many more clients at one time. Also, there's this community support piece. I know I love being in a community. I love being connected with other women. And for many people, being an entrepreneur feels like a solo, lonely career. And so having community is important. 

Chances are for whatever your niche is, you will have the same sort of experience with your clients too plus you guys have a diverse perspective. When you have group clients asking various questions, they bring their own experiences. They bring their own mindset and they have their own journey. I love that shared learning experience and definitely there's an opportunity for increased motivation because just sort of naturally you want to do and achieve what your other group members are doing.

I know that happens in our group all the time. People will say, I'm so inspired by so and so, or gosh, I feel like I want to keep up with so and so. And of course, there's no race. There's no actual check in to make sure you're right at the right place, but it just naturally happens because everyone is inspired and they want to reach their goals, and they're watching each other really make progress.So there's that peer accountability. 

Now we provide accountability in our group coaching as well, but really that motivation to stay on track with your personal or professional goals is definitely key, inspired by the action of others. Then there are networking opportunities. I did a recent podcast with a client named Carissa and she was talking about the networking that she had done within our group. And I was like, that's interesting ‘because I didn't even know about that, about the relationships that she had built with some of the other clients in our group and just how meaningful that was. And she said, I just know that after we're done with our group coaching program, those relationships are going to continue.

So chances are you can find your people there and that is important. It really is. Again, you're doing this all by yourself and your people are not your family who have no idea what you're doing. They're not your actual friends because they also don't know what you're doing. They're online friends who really understand. So there's opportunities for collaboration and partnerships. So that's kind of the overall win for the clients. Actually, group coaching provides a unique and effective approach to really that personal coaching just like we do. 

We actually do one to one coaching in a group setting while offering support to everyone else. This gives everybody a chance to really learn from each other. Now, from a coaching point of view, It is of course more efficient to coach a group of people. When you coach a group of people, you can set yourself up for the time freedom that you're looking for. We actually have three different group coaching programs, three different sets of clients. And so we're able to take care of a lot of clients and everybody still gets that really personalized attention. So that's the benefit to you as a coach is that you get to work with more people at one time. And honestly, I love it. I love it. So when we work with clients in our group coaching program, which is really like no other program I've ever seen, you are there with your camera on.

Y'all know there are several groups that you come on where it's like, raise your hand and we'll bring you on camera because everybody else is off camera or maybe you're completely off camera and somebody is just teaching you and all you're doing is commenting in the chat. You've been there. That is not fun or dropping your questions in the Q and a box.

During our coaching, we're all on camera. Everybody's on camera. Their mics are open. So every single coaching call you are with me and also with our mindset coach Thais. We're both there offering that really special high level of coaching that is really personalized to you. We want to help you take action and we want to give you the feedback that you need.

All right, let's talk about group coaching rules. Here's the deal. There are no rules. Really? There's not. I mean, if you look around and you see what people are doing, there's a variation everywhere. So when we work together in the business building boutique, the first thing that we do is we map out your group coaching curriculum. This curriculum would be the same possible curriculum or the same path or process that you would use in your private coaching. When we talk about creating an offer in the business building boutique, we create your offer to get the client the result. It's not just six weeks at a certain price, but it's actually the steps to get your client a result that you promise in your marketing. So the same would go for group coaching. So first we make the path, then we can decide what group coaching format is best for them. 

Now I have something that I call hybrid. I don't know if that's actually a real term, but I think it's. The perfect combination for coaching and that is private coaching and group coaching combined. So I think the hybrid coaching model is really something that most of you do. That would mean that potentially you meet with your client, let's say for a deep dive session once a month or a 30 minute quick session once a week. But then you also have a group of clients that come together for open group coaching or even for education. With coaching that follows, that is what I call a hybrid group coaching program.

All right, let's talk about the standard models of group coaching. The first one we're most familiar with as a cohort model, where that means that we're all starting at the same time and we're all ending at the same time. So you are actually in a community for however long with the exact same people.

I'll just tell you off the bat, one disadvantage to that is if you are not in the group with the right people. And I have done that. I have spent a lot of money, thousands of dollars on coaching where I was actually not in the correct group with the right people. The right people and I had to spend six months with them when you have sort of that open enrollment like we did in the business building boutique. There are new people coming in and that really gives you an opportunity to learn and to experience and to maybe find actually your people a lot easier than you did with the cohort model. So obviously with that model where people start at the same time and they end at the same time, you can actually teach live and that is very helpful. 

Now, if you're recording a group program for the very first time, you would want to do it in this format where you record the content and then the content becomes evergreen. So having those people graduate at the same time will actually provide an opportunity for you to document, write the emails, document the process, and then also record all of the training. As you go through the program with your first set of clients, it really is a powerful experience if you have the right mix of clients to start and finish together and to watch each other's progress. And they've all been working through the same materials. They have questions and roadblocks kind of at the same time.

So that method is one that you might think about, especially if you're just starting group coaching, all of my clients actually launch a model like that initially until they have their content prepared till they have emails written all the supporting materials done, then they'll go into what I call rolling enrollment, which I'll tell you about in a minute.

One of the advantages of having that cohort sort of model is that you can open enrollment several times a year. Maybe you will decide based on a seasonal basis when your program should open and close, or maybe you decide based on your own personal schedule, maybe you don't want to work in the summer. So you only open up in the fall and in the spring so that you have the summers off. That is a big advantage for those of you who want to have travel freedom. 

I want to talk about forever access because that's something else that people talk about getting with group coaching. And I have to tell you what is forever access. Is that even a real thing? I say no forever access to what until the coach decides to shut down the program. Yeah. I know that there is a coach who recently sold some things to somebody, to a lot of somebodies, and then she decided not to do it. And people were upset because they lost access to something that they had forever access to.

Now, lifetime access is only lifetime until the time that you decide to take the website down. So you ought to make sure that that is clearly understood because make sure you understand this. If it's lifetime access and it's on a website, you're paying to have that stuff there. Even if nobody is accessing it.

All right. Also having a cohort where people are coming in several times a year, you're going to want to have automation so that you have emails that are set and triggered to go to support the people going through the program. My favorite coaching method is called rolling enrollment. That's the group coaching that I do. I probably made that word up rolling, but I'll tell you it's open all the time and our coaching enrollment is driven by bonuses. Many of you guys have worked with me or you've been to our coaching calls and you know that when I do a workshop, I always have a really fantastic bonus available for a limited time.

So we actually have clients that come in until we're full and full is sort of based on. You know how many questions there are week after week in our group coaching so I can even be flexible with that as long as I'm providing the high level of support that I want our clients to have if there's not very many people with questions I can add somebody else to the group if I have two or three people that ask a lot of questions every week I can keep the group smaller so it really provides for lots of of flexibility.

But let me tell you one thing about open enrollment. You do have to have some funnel things in place. And I know that funnels sound awful to you, but let me just explain it. You have to have some triggers. For example, when somebody joins our program, somebody just joined like a few minutes ago. And when she paid, there was a trigger that sent her an email. The payment triggered her enrollment. Send her an email and say, Hey, welcome. Here's all the details about how you get started with us. Here's the zoom link and the schedule to join us. Here's what you need to know to get started. That funnel then keeps going as somebody works with us.

So we remind people, Hey, you should be right here. We're checking in with you on this. Y'all have received those emails. And in order for you to have open enrollment, you actually want to have something like that set up. So it's dripped out emails to anyone who joins. One of the disadvantages is that there's no urgency. So maybe you aren't great at selling and closing. And I think I'm actually pretty good at it. Maybe you're not effective with your marketing. I think we're also really good at that. We write emails that are compelling and I can tell you for sure. You want to work with us now. Why? Because you're leaving money on the table.

You're not helping people because you're wasting so much time. I have a whole list of reasons why you want to work with us today. And then I can give you the bonuses, the incentive to get going with us. So for some clients, the downside might be that there is not as much urgency to join. All right. So that is open enrollment and also rolling enrollment. All right. Are you with me? 

Now, the next model that I want to talk about is the membership model. So many clients come to me and they're like, I'm going to do a membership. And I'll tell you, they think they want to do a membership because they first think that that is going to solve all their problems. They think that if they do a membership, their price will be very low, 97 a month or 47 a month or whatever it is. They think that's actually going to get them clients. Y'all know that the only way to clients is through marketing. And the truth is in membership models, it is typical that about 2% of all the people on your email list will actually become your members in your membership program.

Now think about that, you guys, 2%. So how many people need to be on your email list to actually pay this inexpensive price of 47 or of 97? So a lot of people need to be on your email list. Also, when it comes to marketing for a membership, you want to have either consistent marketing going all the time.

That is bringing people in like an evergreen funnel. You've heard about that where you have maybe an ad running, you have a webinar running. And you're bringing people in. You either want to do that or you want to have several times a year where you do challenges or you do five day workshops. You basically do mini launches all year long so that you can get a group of people engaged, offer some bonuses and get them in. That's the way that you actually grow a membership. But the main point that I want to make here is you will not be ready for a membership, in my opinion, until you have a lot of people on your email list. 

All right, let's talk about recurring revenue. Now, in all of the models that I just talked to you about, whether the hybrid that I started with, the open enrollment, the rolling enrollment, or the membership in all of those models, and actually private coaching included, you can create recurring revenue. Now, how you do that is by offering payments, and I actually love this too for my clients. I let him make payments. We offer bonuses for paying in full, but when people make payments, it actually sets me up to have income I can count on. So it almost creates a salary for you. Now that is a pretty amazing thing, particularly in group coaching.

If they are making payments towards a full program, that is really probably the best way because you can guarantee your income for like six months at a time. If you have a six month coaching program. Now when it comes to memberships, that's a little bit different. And this is again one of the disadvantages of memberships. You actually have to really keep your people engaged so that when they get the credit card statement and they see that bill, They can cancel at any time so that they don't drop out. So you want to have interesting ways to engage your client. You want to have a Facebook community that's really active. You actually want to be in the Facebook community, really connecting with people.

The way I like to think about it is that you actually want to resell people every single month. Now, to me, a membership model at this point in my career does not sound fun because I love having my clients come in. They work with me for six months. I can't imagine having to sell those same clients. Month after month after month after month, that's really what happens in a membership model and the other deal that I just want to mention is just the pure math of it.

If you're able to sell a coaching program for, you know, 3, 000 and your monthly membership is 30, that means you have to get 100 people. to be members. Now, again, if you think about 2 percent of your email list becoming members, that's a huge amount of people to do it. So you will hear when we talk about memberships, passive income, and let me tell you, nothing is passive. It does not matter if you have a course or not, nothing is passive. You can create it once and deliver it always. But that is not passive because again, you have to keep people in there. You have to continually nurture people. So the advantage is you can take care of a lot of people in the membership program.

Maybe the advantage for those of you who love to learn and create content is that you have lots of opportunity to continue to create content. On the other hand, I think that we're all here to create freedom in our life. And so the less new content you can create, the better. All right. That is what you need to know about group coaching.

Again, I just want you to leave here today with an open mind about how incredible group coaching can be. Because for us, as I share the details of what we offer in the business building boutique, I can promise you that group coaching is hands down the best thing for me and also the best thing for our clients.

So in our group coaching, we are not another program or not another course. In fact, we don't even talk about course materials. I provide education that will support you. And I want you to listen to the way I talk about this. I provide education that will support you as you work through our process so that when you come to open coaching calls, you will be able to ask quality questions.

So many people are selling a program and a course and you are sitting there with questions that go unanswered, which means you're stuck. So our coaching is not a program that you do at your own pace. In fact, when you work with us, we want you to take consistent action. You come to the coaching calls to understand your next steps.

And if you get stuck. We're there to say, Hey, what is going on? So I hit you from a strategy point of view and say, tell me what's happening. Where are you stuck? How do you need to know your next steps or how do we get you out of the rut? And then our mindset coach hops in and she's like, look, here's what I hear you saying, and here's what I think is going on. Let's figure out what is happening. So with our group coaching in the business building boutique, I actually think that it is exactly what all of you guys are missing. 

If you have bought those really big coaching programs where there are hundreds and hundreds of people, look, you just like me have been disappointed. You feel like you burned up money. Even if you watched all the program, you still don't know how to implement it because human nature, we all have questions. So that is not the only way to coach. Remember, I think these small intimate group coaching that we provide that you could provide really is the best way to do it.

You can help people put all the pieces together and you can support people in many different ways. So in the Business Building Boutique, we support you with mindset, with marketing, with tech. Yeah, we teach tech too. And all things business. Related to having a profitable coaching business. We literally give you the road map or my playbook to building your boutique style coaching business. We give you the exact steps to have a profitable coaching business. We answer all of your questions. Every single week. Again, the power of group coaching week after week. In fact, with group coaching, you can have more than one session a week in our VIP coaching. We actually have four opportunities for you to come get coached.

So you come and you learn. And again, my mindset coach is there. I'm there and a lot of times we have guest coaches come in in the business building boutique in our group coaching program. You also utilize all of our Canva graphics. We teach you the tools, you swipe our email copy, you use our website copy formula. We have processes for everything to simplify. All of that is possible because I coach in a group. I can hear what people's needs are and if somebody says, I don't know how to write a social media post, then I can go to work and say, okay, I'm going to write a three step formula for writing any social media post, which is one of the things that we offer you.

Somebody can come to me with a question about Zoom. How do I use Zoom? And what do I share? And how does this all work? And what should my settings be? And I bet you guys have never thought about that. We actually open up our screen during our group coaching time. We share the screen and we show you what your settings should be in Zoom to do your group coaching or to do your private coaching.

So you get to participate with the women who are all learning how to build their business, who are all growing the business, even if they already have clients. Some of our people come and they have lots of clients, maybe they're in the 50,000 range and they are trying to get to the next level. So they're all working to achieve the same outcomes. This would be the same as you doing group coaching. If you are working with women who are looking to optimize their health, who are looking to shift their mindset so they can finally have the transformation, who are looking for hacks to manage their ADHD better. All of that happens better in a group setting.

With us, you actually receive feedback on emails, on offers, on your camera graphics, on your social media posts. You actually receive social media support in our VIP program. So it is personalized feedback every single time we meet and your group coaching could be exactly the same. That is how group coaching is so magical. That's what makes our group coaching and your future group coaching so different from anything else out there. So what's the benefit? I'll just tell you, there's power. Like I said, there is magic in group coaching. Today is Monday as I record this and I cannot tell you, Mondays are such a fun day for me because we actually coach two different groups of women in our fast track.

We have one that's in the morning and one that's at lunchtime and oh my goodness. What happens in that group coaching is always so incredible. Week after week, clients come to us. They share their progress, which encourages everyone else. They tell us that they're following our steps because they have our playbook.

And here's the deal. They're all in different niches. And yet every single person comes with a question. And the question they ask is an eye opening experience for all the other people listening. They're like, Oh my gosh, I would have never thought to ask that. Thank you for asking that. Today we had clients that were talking about where they were stuck and I was able to say, all right, tell me where you are.

Tell me what your questions are. What drama do you have coming up? Let's coach around that so I can tell you what to do next. We have people today who shared their screen and said, Hey, I'm stuck on this one thing. I don't even get it. Can you help me? We direct them on how to move their mouse so that they know how to fix the Canva problem themselves or the flow desk problem or whatever technology they're using.

We actually reviewed content today. Somebody shared their screen. We went through their marketing message and we gave them feedback live. Somebody asked about their offer. Somebody had some mindset block around selling and asking for money. These are questions that happen week after week. Okay. And many other questions, but what happened today, just like every other week is that somebody will have follow up questions.

They're like, Oh, my gosh. Okay. So if you told her this, how does that apply to me? Then we give them that personalized feedback. So each week I also do training based on the questions that people have. So in today's fast track, our morning group, somebody asked about marketing. And I said, look, we're going to be here for 90 minutes.

And if we don't fill the time with questions, I will come back at the end of this session and I will teach you guys how to do a marketing plan for your business so that you can leave here today and you will know exactly where to market your coaching, exactly how often, what tools to use. So we did that.

That was the teaching that I did in my morning coaching group. In my afternoon coaching group. I talked about quarter two planning. Yeah. So somebody had a question about a goal. And so I immediately dove in and said, look, it's the beginning of the second quarter. Let's talk about how you do your planning by the quarter so that you can stay on track to meet your annual goal. 

Now, look, when we do quarter planning, we talk about a lot of other things besides what are you going to sell? How are you going to sell it? We talk about this lifestyle that you're creating. We talk about the tasks and the skills that you need to have to reach your goal. So that happened in our afternoon session. That's how you personalize group coaching. And that's what it looks like when you work with us in the business building boutique. 

So there you have it, my dear. I hope this was useful for you. Sign up for our niche workshop on April 23rd, Tuesday at 1pm Central Standard Time. Make sure you head over to debbieshadid.com/workshop. Now hold tight just a minute because I want to tell you about one more opportunity. Every Monday, you can join us at 2pm Central Standard Time to get open coaching. That's right. Every Monday, we give complimentary business coaching. So if you are stuck and if you are not working with a coach and you want to find out what this magical coaching is, I just talked about the group coaching that I think is so unique that we offer that I think is really unlike anyone else. Then come to our open coaching, see what it's all about. We will walk you through all of what you need to know to solve the question that you bring.

We're all on camera together. You'll hear how it works when other people have different questions than yours. You will get so much value out of one hour of open coaching. It's incredible. Then you can stay. And if you want to have a consultation without having a consultation, join us because we will literally tell you everything about the opportunities to work with us. We'll talk about our pricing. We'll talk about every detail and answer all of your questions. And again, you don't have to have a consultation. So that is debbieshadid.com/opencoaching.

You guys, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate you. Thanks for doing the work that you do for making a difference in the world. I will see you next time. Bye bye.

Outro: Okay, ladies, that is it for today. Before we go, I want to invite you to head over to debbieshadid.com. I have this incredible Canva training, specifically designed for life coaches where I'm gonna teach you how to use Canva to create beautiful graphics to market your life coaching. All right. Have an amazing week. I'll talk to you very soon. Bye bye.