business lessons galore (9 to be exact)

Last week I promoted the new Coaches Accelerator signature program to my email list and on Wednesday I sent out an email to coaches who didn't purchase asking them why.

Lesson 1: finding out why people didn't buy your coaching packages is always a good thing to do. What you find out can help you in your future marketing and the offers you make.

I got back over 50 responses. And the feedback was invaluable.

With a few exceptions, the responses fit into 3 categories...

1: "I don't feel ready to (start my business, put myself out there, etc) because I need to improve my coaching skills and/or it makes me nervous to coach."

So basically feeling a little less than confident in their actual coaching abilities.

Lesson 2: Whenever you get concerns, objections, or reasons for why people didn't purchase your program(s), you want to take some time to think about how you can address it. And quickly.

In my case, since I already had a small program that addresses this concern, I just created a quick order form for it and sent out an offer on Friday. It was a simple order form. It didn't have a lot of the copywriting I would normally put in something like this. And that's because I wanted to get it out to my list while it still made sense.

Lesson 3: Getting it out there is way more important than making it perfect. No one can buy your coaching programs if you don't actually offer them for sale. My motto: Get it done, make it better later.

Let's move on to the other two types of responses I received.

2: "It's not the right time" and "I don't have the time."

These two go hand in hand. I learned that many of the women on my list are BUSY. Sometimes that looked like full-time work, plus family obligations. Other times that looked like "I'm already in 2 coaching programs, taking 3 courses, etc."

Lesson 4: Most coaches will get the time objection for why someone can't sign up for coaching. So if you can set up your coaching so that it saves people time in some way, that can go a long way.

Example 1:

The Coaches Accelerator was built to save people tremendous amounts of time, so I make sure I let people know that.

Example 2:

Let's say you work with moms who put their family first and don't really give themselves permission to be a woman and/or go after their own dreams. One objection you'll probably get is a mom who feels guilty for spending that coaching time on herself because she has so many other things she feels she should be doing.

We all know this woman. Some of us have been this woman. Some of us still are.

So your coaching could address this concern. Perhaps you make it the point of your coaching early on to save her, say, 5 hours per week. That's an hour for the coaching and 4 hours for herself.

Even with that, you will still get people who say it's not the right time.

That's okay. That's why we do some form of regular content marketing. So we can stay top of mind so when they're ready for help, they think of us.

Lesson 5: Consistent content marketing in some form allows you to stay top of mind with your community.

I've had clients get started with my coaching within a week of getting on my email list and I've had clients who were on my list for 10 months or more before reaching out.

You just never know when someone will be ready.

Ok. Final category... 

3: "I don't have the money," "I can't justify the cost," or something very similar.

This one should be no surprise. I don't think there is a working coach on the planet who hasn't heard this.

Sometimes this is about money. And sometimes it's not.

Sometimes people really are strapped for cash and can't afford your coaching. That's why I have a variety of ways I can help my community — from free weekly content, smaller priced courses, my signature course, and my higher end 1:1 coaching.

Lesson 6: Look into ways you can address taking care of ALL of your community. Because the potential client who can't afford you today, just may be able to afford you in the future.

The other two ways the money objection shows up (that aren't about money) are...