If you’re feeling overwhelmed, de-motivated and unsure how to kick start your coaching business growth – especially as we head into September then you’re not alone.

Here’s what I’ve been noticing with my clients and my community over the last couple of weeks. We’re all falling into one of two camps.

Camp one: “Yes. Let’s get shit done. Let’s lock in.” Full motivation, ready to go.
Camp two: feeling like you should be motivated, and instead feeling a bit overwhelmed, a bit flat, and not really sure where to start. You know you want to grow your coaching business. You’ve got a list as long as your arm. But every time you sit down to actually do something, you freeze, because which thing? Which one actually matters?

If you’re in camp two, this one is very much for you. And if you’re in camp one, stick with me anyway, because getting focused on the right things in the right order is what turns all that lovely September motivation into actual clients.

Listen to this episode on The Wholehearted Business Show Podcast: Listen on Apple Podcasts / Listen on Spotify

A quick recap on where we’ve been

The last couple of blog posts I’ve shared have had a bit of a theme.

We’ve talked a lot about consistency, and about how so many of us believe we need to be more consistent in order to build a successful coaching business. But what we actually want from all that consistency is a business that is steady. Those are two very different things.

We’ve talked about capacity, and how most of us who are highly sensitive, heart centred and often neurodivergent simply do not have the same capacity on a constant basis. Which means we need to build a business with the right strategies and foundations underneath it, so we can be our full, messy, human selves and still have things tick along.

And I’ve shared a bit about what that looks like in my own business, where most of my clients actually come from, and why I don’t have to be super consistent day to day because of the foundations I’ve built underneath it all.

So today let’s get practical. What do you need to let go of, what do you need to look at honestly, and what do you need to build first?

Step one: let go of the stuff that isn’t serving you

This is the first step and probably the hardest one, because it means giving up on things we’ve been quietly hoping would fix everything.

We hold onto concepts, ideas and strategies because we think they’re the solve-all. If I just do this thing, everything will click. It’s shiny object syndrome, and hands up, I am absolutely one of those people. I love a new strategy. I love a new concept. I love learning.

But if you’re feeling overwhelmed, chasing all of those shiny things is a problem. It takes your focus and scatters it into twelve directions at once.

So you need to be willing to look honestly at what you’ve got going on, where you think you should be putting your energy, and simplify it down. You need to be okay with letting things go.

And I’ll say the thing I say to almost every highly sensitive, heart centred coach I work with: unless you genuinely love showing up there, let go of social media.

I know that might bring up some resistance. But in over ten years of working with coaches wired like us, the return on investment for the time, the energy and the emotional effort that social media demands just isn’t worth it. Not when you’re already overwhelmed. We’ll talk about what to do instead in a minute.

Now, a big caveat here. When you’re highly sensitive, sometimes nothing feels particularly good, because building a business means pushing out of your comfort zone in some way no matter what you choose to do. That’s a genuinely tricky thing to sit with, and I don’t want you using “it doesn’t feel aligned” as a reason to never do anything at all.

So instead of waiting for the thing that feels amazing, look for the path of least resistance. You might not be leaping out of bed at 6am to record a long form video for YouTube. That’s fine. Is it still the easiest path forward for you? Then that’s your answer.

Let go of the shiny objects, because they are keeping you overwhelmed and stuck. And know that letting go creates space for the things that will actually work.

Step two: audit where you’re actually at

Next, I want you to do a quick fire audit. You can journal on this if you like, but honestly you can just score yourself out of ten as you read, gut reaction, no overthinking.

How confident do you feel about each of these?

• Your messaging. Your niche, how you talk to people, what you’re about as a coach. Do you feel like you’ve nailed that?
• Your offers. How confident are you that people actually want to buy and invest in what you’re selling?
• Your marketing. The ways new people find you. And note, marketing is not the same as community building.
• Your nurturing and community building. Your email list, your funnel, the relationships you’re building with potential clients. This is the bridge between people finding you and people buying from you.
• Your sales processes. Do you have any? Do you think about sales at all?
• Your mindset. How you think about your business, how you feel about your own chances of success.
• Your back end. Admin, systems, client onboarding, insurance, all of it. Do you feel organised and supported?

Seven areas. Score each one out of ten.

You don’t need to be at a ten to move forward, so don’t get precious about it. What you’re looking for is the gut reaction. The ones where you thought “oof, that’s a two, that’s not good.” Anything sitting below a four is where your focus needs to go.

Step three: build in this order

Right, here’s the bit you actually came for. This is general, because there are thousands of you listening and I can’t tailor it to every single one of you, but it will give you a starting point.

If you’re a newer coach:

1. One simple thing to sell, and one simple free thing. These are the linchpins. If you don’t have something to sell, you’re not making money and you’re not getting clients. And have something genuinely good for free that people will happily join your email list for. Focus on the paid offer first, then the free thing.
2. A really simple email list setup. Head to Kit or MailerLite, set up an account, create an opt-in page for your free thing. That’s it. Once you’ve got it going it shouldn’t take long, but you need that piece in place.
3. Some long form organic content. This does not have to be a show like mine. But long form content on a search based platform gives you discoverability and visibility, and it also builds trust, authority and people actually liking you. It hits a lot of the buttons we need hitting in a coaching business, all at once. YouTube, your blog, Substack, a podcast, wherever suits you.

If you’re further on and you’ve already got a fairly steady flow of 1:1 clients:

The conversation shifts a bit, but I’d still start with the offer. Is it working not just for your clients but for you? How is the delivery affecting you? This is often where scaled options start to make sense.

Then look at what you’re using to build your audience and bring people into your community. Does your free thing need improving or tweaking? Is it still serving the right audience for the offer you’re selling now?

Then your funnel. Have you got one? If not, build one. If you have, look at it properly. That’s something I’m working on in my own business at the moment.

And then, assuming you’ve got organic content marketing already in place, this is the point where I’d absolutely be looking at paid ads.

Where to go from here

That’s the quick and dirty version of what to focus on and in what order.

If you’re fed up of feeling like your business isn’t going anywhere, if you haven’t got an actual plan to follow, if you feel like you’re chucking spaghetti at the wall and hoping something sticks, I’ve got something for you.

I’m running a brand new masterclass called Steady, and it covers the complete framework: all of those areas we looked at in the audit, what you need in each one, and the order to build them in. My hope is that everyone who comes along walks away with an actual plan.

It’s specifically for you if you’re highly sensitive, heart centred or neurodivergent, because what’s typically taught in the online business space genuinely isn’t applicable for us, or it asks us to show up in ways we simply can’t sustain. Come and join me for Steady here. If you can’t make it live, you’ll get the replay.

And if you want ongoing support with all of this rather than doing it on your own, Wholehearted Business® is my 12 month group programme for coaches in the first couple of years of business, and 1:1 Mentoring is there if you’re ready to scale and want that closer level of support.

Laura 💖

↓Pin for later ↓