EP 355 - The BEST Tools For Online Coaches in 2026 (Softwares I Actually Use Under $100)

Do you cringe when you think about having to manage the actual business part of your online coaching business? Does the tech feel overwhelming? I get it. I've been there myself! That's why I've put together the best simple online tools to start and manage your online coaching business.

These tools will help you to make the most of your time as a coach and manage your business with ease in 2026 and beyond! All you need a few simple tools, and most of them are free to start.

Grab my FREE Resource Guide for Coaches here: https://coaching.debbieshadid.com/resource-guide

If you're new to my channel, my name is Debbie Shadid. I'm a Business Growth and Life Coach and the founder of the Business Building Boutique. For over two decades, I've helped women learn how to become coaches, get clients, grow their businesses, and create meaningful income doing work they love.

When you stop overspending and overcomplicating your tech, you free up your time and your money for the actions that will actually grow your business.

00:00 Tech Overwhelm Trap
00:45 Simple AI Approach
01:53 Booking Calls With Calendly
02:51 Payments And Zoom Setup
04:04 Website And Messaging
05:22 Domain Email And Branding
06:31 Canva And Email Marketing
07:43 Avoid All In One Platforms
08:35 Editing And YouTube Tools
09:52 Keep It Simple Wrap Up

Connect with me, Debbie Shadid:
Website: https://www.debbieshadid.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/debbieshadid/

Listen to the Podcast:
Life Coach Business Building School Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/life-coach-business-building-school-with-debbie-shadid/id1502118085

Don't forget to subscribe to my channel, like, comment, and share if you found this video valuable and enjoyed it! https://www.youtube.com/@debbieshadid?sub_confirmation=1

Disclaimer: Some links above may be affiliate links. I only recommend products I personally use and love.

Let’s connect!

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• Instagram @debbieshadid
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#DebbieShadid #LifeCoachBusinessBuildingSchool 

Transcript

0:00

The fastest way to stall out your coaching business and maybe even make you wanna quit is by getting tangled up with the tech. Today we're gonna talk about the tech and the software, all the tools that you need for your coaching business, and I'm gonna talk about all the tools that you don't actually need for your coaching business. I'm Debbie Shadid. I help women build profitable boutique-style coaching businesses. If you're a woman over 50, you're gonna love this episode because I'm gonna talk about how simple the software can actually be for your coaching business. The software I'm gonna talk about today, I believe you can use in your business until you've earned at least$100,000, and it should cost you about $100 a month, and when you get started, probably much less than that. So let's get into it. Today I'm gonna talk about AI first. Now I wanna encourage you to use very little AI. I'm gonna save you so much time by telling you to stop using Claude or ChatGPT or all of the other ones because you're actually wasting time right now. You don't even have a business to figure out all of those extra advanced strategies. All the prompts that you're seeing and the Claude Cowork and the skills and all that, you don't need any of it. So I'm gonna talk about the software that you need for a business where you're getting your first clients. Someday you can use the complicated tech, but for today, let's keep it simple. So right now, I would suggest that you use the free version of ChatGPT and maybe the next level up. That's it, okay?'Cause I want you to build your business from your brain, not from ChatGPT's brain. I love Claude. You've heard me talk about it, but I think you should wait on that because it's very easy to use. There's lots of data over there. I actually use the Max plan, and I don't think you need that yet, okay? I wanna get you making money in your business, and I wanna keep as many distractions from you as possible. Okay, let's get into the software that you actually do need to run your business. Number one, Calendly. That is the calendar that we recommend. If you're using something else, use it, okay? Just keep in mind that you do need a calendar because we want people to schedule consultations. That's actually how you get your first clients. So if you're telling people to just shoot you an email, no, no. That's not the way we do it. We are professionals. We put our calendar out there, and we say, "Schedule a time for a consultation." This is one thing I really wanna make sure you do, but you can use the free version. We recommend Calendly. Keep using whatever you are already using. Remember, software does not get you clients. Talking to people and marketing people does, okay? So let's keep it simple. Calendly, the free version, has one link with it, one calendar link, and so that means you can use the same link for your appointments, the same link for your consultations. At some point, when you wanna have, like, packages and group coaching and all that, you can upgrade. For now, keep to the free version. I also wanna tell you about taking payments. You should take your payments through Stripe. That is what we recommend, and you can get a link for an invoice from Stripe for free. At some point, you can link up your Calendly and your Stripe together once you have a paid Calendly account, and then you can take your payment. When somebody schedules their call, you can get the payment at that time. But for now, keeping it simple, Use free invoicing from Stripe and the free calendar version. Zoom. Yeah, you gotta have Zoom, okay? You probably already have it. I would recommend just keep the free version until you need the paid version. If you're not having consultation calls yet, then just keep the free version. If you're not coaching for more than 40 minutes, keep the free version. At some point, you'll upgrade, and I really wanna encourage you to upgrade to the most basic plan. What you'll have to do is download and delete things off of your Zoom. Otherwise, you'll need to have extra storage and a bigger plan on Zoom, which is not necessary. It's just one extra step to delete those things. Can you see a theme here? I'm wanting you to not spend a bunch of money that's unnecessary until you are making a bunch of money, okay? The next piece of software I wanna talk about is what it takes to build a website. That would either be Squarespace or Wix. Those are the two that we recommend. Now, a lot of people will tell you, you don't need a website, and I'm gonna tell you I think you do. I know you as a woman over 50, you want to look like professional, you want to be respected, you wanna look like you really have it together, and having a website is one of the ways that you do that. Now, I know that you might have a website and you might say to me,"Debbie, nobody is visiting it." I actually had a client who just said, "14 people visited my website. Only 14." And I was like, "Okay, let me explain this to you. 14 people out of the millions of websites in the world, 14 people found your website and visited." Can you see what a different way of thinking about it is? Your website, your social media presence, all of the ways that you market your business, they're just one of the ways that people connect with you. In today's marketplace, people are looking at you in multiple places, and if you don't have a website, you don't look like you're professional. So I recommend a website. We actually have a custom GPT that writes all of the marketing message. Please make sure that your website message is not all about you, but it is about the person that you are going to help. I'll get into marketing messages in an upcoming episode. Next, you need a domain-based email. Now, I recommend that your business domain be your first and last name. If your first and last name is taken, then add the word coach at the beginning or at the end. The reason why I want it to be that is because, number one, you are the personal brand, so people are going to be talking to you only, and they know your name, okay? They won't remember your clever business name. Just pick your name with the word coach with it if you need to, because then your business can evolve. As you change your niche, you can keep your website, you can keep the following, you can keep all your social platforms. Get everything under one name, okay? If it is Debbie Shadid Coaching, then have Debbie Shadid Coaching everywhere. All right, So your domain-based email is necessary because if you wanna do any email marketing, and if you wanna look like professional, you do not email from your Gmail or your Yahoo or whatever it is. You email from debbie@debbieshadid.com. That's the way your email would be. That is necessary. That's about seven bucks a month, okay? Everything I'm talking to you about is not very much money. So make sure you get a domain-based email and do that sooner than later. The next piece of software I'm gonna talk about is Canva. A lot of you are already using Canva. You do need to have the Pro account. Now, you can start with a free account, and why not? But eventually you're going to want the Pro account because it will save you a lot of time. You'll want to add your brand kit in there with your brand colors, your logos, your fonts, so that you can create that consistent professional brand image that I know that you want. And with that professional brand image, people take you more seriously, and honestly, you'll get paid more. The next piece of software that you need is Flodesk. Flodesk is an email marketing tool. You can have signup forms for workshops. You can have emails that will deliver the confirmation email when somebody signs up, and the Zoom link and the workshop reminder. You can also have your weekly newsletter that goes out through there. So email marketing is going to be a critical part of your business, and I recommend Flodesk. I do have some affiliate links that do provide some savings for you. I will leave all of those linked below. Flodesk is one of those that I have some savings, link for as well. So I have covered the basics, Calendly, Stripe, Zoom, your website, domain-based email, Canva, and Flodesk. So one word of caution I want to say is you do not need an all-inclusive platform for your coaching business. I know that many of you already have that. If you already have it, go ahead and use it. But what I find is that the coaches who come to me that already have those, they do not know how to use them. They need to get virtual assistants to help them, which just means money that you're spending when you're not making money, and honestly, it's just way more than what they need. Now, you might argue and say, "But where am I going to host my videos?" I'll tell you, you can host your videos on free, on YouTube, with an unlisted link. You don't need that either. You don't need a place to hold your videos because you don't even have clients yet. You don't have a course yet. Please get started with the most basic things. You don't need a client management system until you have a whole bunch of clients. Just use the basic software that I'm talking about. Now, once we get to just a little bit further, I want to talk to you about two other things that I really like to use, and we do teach our clients to use. One is called Descript. Descript is editing software. You might have heard of CapCut, CapCut is another one. Both of those are video editing software that you can use to edit your social media and to edit YouTube, whatever video you are doing. But I want to tell you, you can also do that for free on Instagram and TikTok, and I highly encourage that you learn how to do it there. And you can edit one video, like on TikTok, you can download it, and you can share it everywhere else. I also want to encourage you to use those platforms to schedule all of your social media. You do not need a paid platform for that either. Okay, so that's Descript. We love Descript for editing software. I'll be editing this video with it as well. The last tool that I'll tell you about that I really love, that I also use with my YouTube channel, is called vidIQ. This is something that helps us decide on the titles. It does the research on how we should write the notes that go, you know, the show notes that go underneath the video. It helps with all the SEO. And again, this is something that's down the road that you might consider, but that is for someday. The basic pieces of software that I talked to you about, and I will even add on ChatGPT in the lowest level paid version. All that together is $100 a month or less. And if you start with all the free versions until you have clients, that is the way to do it. And then as I mentioned, you can add on Descript or CapCut, and then you can add on vidIQ once you get on YouTube. That is it. That's all you need for your coaching business. Please keep it simple. Make sure you have your focus on what matters most. That is talking to people about your coaching, and that is making a difference through your coaching. Right below this video are links for everything I've talked about. Some of those are affiliate links. You can find them in our resource guide, plus all of the technology that I use in my own business and that I recommend are also listed there. I have our YouTube guide, our Profitable Niche Blueprint, our Canva graphics, and several other things to help you get started. Have a beautiful day. Subscribe and follow along, and I will see you in an upcoming episode. Bye-bye.