If you wonder whether social media is a prerequisite to a business this episode is for you.

Whether it's due to a personal preference, a desire to target organisations, or simply wanting to explore alternative growth strategies, this episode is packed with insights and actionable tips that can transform the way you attract clients.

Episode Highlights:

Introduction [00:00:00]

• Jo celebrates the podcast's milestone of reaching 50 episodes, sharing her gratitude for the listeners' support and reflecting on the podcast's impact on her business and coaching community.

Leveraging Your Personal Network [00:02:00]

• Discover the power of tapping into your personal connections to grow your business. Jo discusses overcoming the fear of judgment and provides practical advice on how to clearly communicate your niche and offer to friends and family.

Speaking Engagements and Workshops [00:06:00]

• Learn how face-to-face interactions, even in a digital format, can significantly boost your visibility and credibility. Jo shares success stories and encourages exploring opportunities for speaking at events or hosting workshops.

Strategic Partnerships [00:08:00]

• Explore the benefits of collaborating with others who share your target audience. From referral agreements to guest speaking, strategic partnerships can be a game-changer in expanding your reach.

Content Marketing [00:09:00]

• Dive deep into the world of content marketing with long-form content such as blogging, podcasting, or even writing a book. Jo emphasises the importance of establishing thought leadership and nurturing relationships with your audience.

Email Marketing [00:11:00]

• Understand the unmatched value of building an email list as a direct line to your audience. Jo shares strategies for growing your list and engaging your subscribers with valuable content and offers.

Key Takeaways:

• Personal Network: Start by sharing your journey and offerings with those closest to you. It's a foundational step that can lead to unexpected opportunities.
• Engagements & Workshops: Nothing beats the personal touch. Seek out or create platforms where you can directly engage with potential clients.
• Strategic Partnerships: Collaborate with others who can introduce you to your ideal clients. It's about creating mutually beneficial relationships.
• Content Marketing: Invest in creating valuable, long-form content that resonates with your audience and establishes your expertise.
• Email Marketing: Grow and nurture your email list. It's a crucial asset for direct communication and promotion of your services.

Useful Links

How to secure more coaching clients' free training

Download the 12 ways to get clients now

Learn about The Business of Coaching programme

Connect with Jo on LinkedIn

Rate and Review the Podcast

If you found this episode of Women in the Coaching Arena helpful, please do rate and review it on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

If you’re kind enough to leave a review, please do let Jo know so she can say thank you. You can always reach her at: joanna@joannalottcoaching.com

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Hello and welcome to Women in

the Coaching Arena podcast.

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I'm so glad you are here.

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I'm Jo Lott, a business mentor

and ICF accredited coach

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Microphone (Samson Q2U Microphone):

and I help coaches to

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build brilliant businesses.

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I know that when you prepare to enter

the arena, there is fear, self doubt,

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comparison, anxiety, uncertainty.

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You can tend to armor up and

protect yourself from vulnerability.

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In this podcast, I'll be sharing

honest, not hype, practical and

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emotional tools to support you to make

the difference that you are here for.

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Dare greatly.

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You belong in this arena.

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Welcome to the 50th episode of

women in the coaching arena.

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I am so glad you are here.

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It feels like a big milestone reaching 50.

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So I must look up when I started

this podcast and celebrate

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my one year anniversary.

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It's been the best thing I ever

did in my business because it's

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enabled me to get all of my

ideas out and they are plentiful.

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And help so many more people and

share an honest version of offense

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of building a coaching business.

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And yeah, I just poured

my heart into it really.

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So thank you so much for

your time in listening.

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It's been amazing to see the podcast

recently really high in the UK marketing

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charts competing with some of the big

names out there with huge audiences.

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So I so appreciate your support.

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To celebrate this milestone.

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I wanted to cover growing your coaching

business without using social media.

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Because I know that lots of you may

want to sell to organizations or

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may have a fear of social media.

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So we will discuss today other

options that might help and that I've

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seen work for some of my clients.

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So the biggest one that I have seen work

for lots of people and worked for me

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tremendously at the start of my business

is leveraging your personal network.

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Yet, it's funny how much resistance

comes up with doing this?

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Because I think we always fear.

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What friends and family think more than

we even fear what strangers think so.

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I notice a lot of resistance when my

clients come to me and I say, have

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you told your friends and family

really clearly exactly what you do?

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And the answer is always no.

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That is the first thing I invite people

to do when they begin working with me.

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And when they get that clarity on their

niche and their offer, and then I give

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them a template to really help it be

so easy to take this first scary step.

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Because everything you want is

usually on the other side of fear.

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And you will become so much stronger

for taking steps that you are afraid

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of, and then it will encourage

you to take even more steps, which

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is how you build your business.

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It's those tiny, tiny

steps that you think.

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I can't do that.

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And then you do it and you think,

oh my God, I actually did that.

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So for example, I did a five day

challenge two and a half years ago to

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launch my business of coaching program.

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And I had no idea how challenging

a five day challenge is to run.

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So it's taken me two and a half years

to now decide to run another one.

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So I mid preparation now.

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Again, I completely underestimated

how much work there is to do behind

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the scenes to get this up and running.

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But I am committed and

I have one week to go.

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So I am going for it.

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And I'm excited to reach the other

side of this and know that I will

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look back and think, wow, I did that.

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So have a thing about what you are afraid

of, but could make all of the difference.

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Is there one person who wants

said to you, oh, when you get your

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business set up, do get in touch

that you haven't got in touch with?

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Have you got a personal Facebook

that you could put something out

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with your family and friends and

say, this is what I'm doing now.

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I'd really appreciate your support.

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Do you use LinkedIn?

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And if so, have you put that first

post out, ideally with a photo

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telling people what you are doing now?

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Sharing that personal story

really does make a difference.

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How I've seen people fail at

this is by being really official.

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And I think when you've worked in an

organization a really long time, That

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kind of is how you write and how you

speak and you wouldn't dream of being

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more casual or asking for people's help

or adding a photo or anything personal.

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And those posts of like, Hey, here

are my services are just really

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boring and no one's going to respond.

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What they really want to hear

is why this matters to you.

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So do be brave and go all

in when you take this step.

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And, this might sound like a step

just for newbies, but it really isn't.

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Has your niche changed since

you started your business.

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There is always an opportunity to continue

growing those relationships because it

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is relationships that grow your business.

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So if you can put the other person at

the heart of it, rather than going,

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like, I need your help, which great.

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You do need to do.

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But also it can be like,

how can I help you?

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And

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the most successful networkers,

as I know are so thoughtful.

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I mean, I would love to be as

thoughtful as this one person that

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I met maybe four years ago now.

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And somehow he got my phone number.

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I have no idea how so now, every now

and then he sends me PDFs of the ICF

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coaching studies and things like that.

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Literally via WhatsApp.

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So he has done such a good job and he

must have such a good system that he

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thinks, what is this person interested in?

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And he sends me useful

information all of the time.

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So what happened when someone

said, I need a coach in India.

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This guy lives in India.

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I immediately put him in touch

with this person and got him

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an associate role set up.

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So it really does help to think

about some sort of strategic ways

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to keep in touch with people.

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So you are top of mind when

that opportunity comes up.

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Okay.

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Our second point is speaking

engagements and workshops.

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nothing beats the power of face-to-face

interaction, whether that is genuinely

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face-to-face or whether that is online.

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It's so much more powerful than

social media when you actually

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go and speak at an event.

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One of my clients Sara has got to 100K

in her business with no social media.

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So she is a real inspiration.

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And how she did that is through

the BNI, so you can look that up.

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I think it's worldwide as far as I know.

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But she really did go all in and

she networked a lot and she really

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got known for what she was great at.

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Something I've been doing recently,

which I'm like, why have I not

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prioritize this in my business, is

talking at other people's groups.

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So on Friday, for example, I'm talking

for a coach training organization

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on niching and how to get clients.

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And a couple of weeks ago,

I talked to an NLP training

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organization on a similar topic.

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And every single time I've had something

like a 60% conversion rate of people

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contact me afterwards from those events.

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So compared to social media,

when you could have thousands of

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followers and one person perhaps

message you, or like your post.

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It really does create a far quicker,

know, like, and trust when people

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can really get to know who you are.

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So have a think about where you can

go ideally in person, but online

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is also fine to really get to know

people more because you will get so

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much better opportunities than just

putting out that one social media post.

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My third point is strategic partnerships.

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How can you pair up with people who might

have your ideal client and do a talk in

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their group or agree a 10% referral fee or

something to send people each other's way.

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My copywriter who wrote my website

recently went full time, self employed.

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Previously, he was working and he was

doing that on the side, but he went

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full-time self-employed recently.

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So he did a talk in my group, which

was absolutely amazing because he's

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a magician as well as a copywriter.

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So he did tricks and all

sorts that we could not get.

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And I immediately messaged the masterminds

I was in saying, if anyone's looking

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for a guest speaker, here is someone

and he's had now so many clients just

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from doing those guest expert spots.

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So, yeah, it's a really quick,

easy way to build your business.

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If you can think who else has my ideal

client, where can I gain opportunity to

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talk and get in front of those people?

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So let's talk about content marketing

next so fourth point content marketing.

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You can still create valuable

content through blogging

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articles, a book, a podcast.

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Other ways to establish your thought

leadership and attract clients

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who resonate with your message.

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Long form content I feel is so much

better than short form content.

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I like to think about as shallow

content, which is social media and

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yes if you are using social media

with your strategy, you do need to

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put posts out so you're top of mind.

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But often just that social

media post is not enough.

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You need to have a deep nurture strategy

for people to really get to know you.

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And you do that through long form content

or through things like masterclasses.

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And I actually don't think you can really

build a successful business without that

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deep nurture strategy also in place.

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And lots of people just think, oh,

I'm putting out posts nothing's

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happening, but it's like, yeah.

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Cause we need to take

people on that next step.

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I talk about the staircase analogy a lot.

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So if they're at the bottom of

the staircase and you were at

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the top, Social media is probably

not even getting one step up.

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We need to bring them to the next phase.

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If you can create some sort of binge

worthy content, like a podcast or

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a blog then people will like that.

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YouTube is another great one.

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Yes.

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It's a long-term strategy, but the most

exciting thing is it's out there forever.

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Not like social media where it's

kind of gone within 24 hours.

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A lot of my clients, for example,

are targeting organizations.

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So they write white papers or do

interviews with the ideal clients.

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How can you bring people together and

you be the facilitator of that event.

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Next up is email marketing.

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I teach this in my program.

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So your email list is a direct line

to your network and your audience.

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Whenever you are launching something

like I know that is my main way I'm

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going to fill my five day challenge is

by emailing my and saying, come join.

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Because they are people who have

put their hand up to be on my list.

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So they're warmer than social media

when somehow we might've got connected,

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but they didn't particularly take

a huge action to connect with me.

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They might've hit accept.

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Whereas the best thing about email list is

they've had to go to a landing page, fill

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in their name and their email and hit yes.

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So they have taken that bigger action.

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Therefore, they are more

committed to what you're doing.

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You do need to have a way of

getting people on your list though.

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So often you do still need social

media or some sort of networking

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or some place where you say

here's my lead magnet com sign up.

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So if you don't know what a lead magnet

is, it's a valuable piece of information,

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like a PDF or something that is targeted

specifically towards a problem that

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they have and a really quick, easy way

that you can help them to fix that.

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And if you can help them solve that

one small problem, they then have

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trust that you may be able to help them

solve bigger problems going forward.

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You may just wish to pay

for the problem to go away.

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So one of my coaches solely uses

Facebook ads to grow her email list,

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and that is how she builds her business.

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So you usually pay for

things in time or money.

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So you need to make a decision.

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Are you going to go to networking

groups to grow your list,

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or what are you going to do?

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And that's putting your time in, or

are you going to pay for adverts?

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I'm currently doing a bit

of a combination of both.

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So I am running Facebook ads.

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And I also post regularly on LinkedIn.

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So they're generally my two main

ways of growing my audience.

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And actually holding events is an

amazing way of growing your list.

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And creating that know like, and trust.

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So again, I have this five day

challenge coming up, depending

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on whether you are listening.

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It starts on February the 26th.

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So do join.

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If you are interested in creating

an online course or group

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coaching or group coaching.

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program.

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And I will take you through those steps.

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So you can start to turn your

expertise into a leveraged model.

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So holding events is a really,

really brilliant list builder.

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And I've grown my list massively through

advertising this five day challenge.

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So let's summarize today's episode.

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So firstly, we talked about leveraging

your personal network, whether you

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are starting out and haven't told

people really clearly what you do

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and why tell them, and if you are

established, tell them again, your niche

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and offer a likely to have changed.

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So do you get in touch with

people that you know and make

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sure that they know what you do.

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Think about ways that you can

help them and keep in touch?

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So you are top of mind when those

opportunities come their way.

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I love thinking about the fact that

we all genuinely know 250 people.

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So you are likely to be able to get in

touch with anyone in the whole world.

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If each person can then tell their people.

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So it's just an amazing concept

that through your own network,

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you can make such huge progress.

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Our, second point was speaking

engagements and workshops.

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Where can you get in front of people

either face-to-face or on zoom?

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Third up was strategic partnerships,

who else has your ideal client

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and how could you partner up

to refer people to each other?

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Next was content marketing.

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So what deep nurture strategies could you

put in place like blogging guest articles

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or a book or a podcast or YouTube channel,

which aren't that quick social media.

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They are deep, longstanding

nurture strategies.

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And finally email marketing.

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So how can you start to

grow your email list?

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So you have people that have raised

their hand to hearing from you

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when you have important events

and offers to put out there.

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I hope today's episode was helpful.

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And thank you for leaving me

reviews and rating the podcast.

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It means so much to me, and it

makes a big difference to the

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ratings so thank you so much.

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Your kindness is appreciated.

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And like I say, at the end of every

episode, trust yourself, believe

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in yourself and be the wise Gardner

who keeps on watering the seed.

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Thank you so much for listening to this

episode of Women in the Coaching Arena.

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I have a mess of free resources on

my website joannalottcoaching.com.

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That's Joanna with an A

and Lott with two T's.

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joannalottcoaching.com.

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And I'll also put links in the show notes.

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Let me know if you found

this episode useful.

263

Share it with a friend and

leave me a review, and I will

264

personally thank you for that.

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Remember to trust yourself, believe

in yourself and be the wise Gardner

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who keeps on watering the seed.

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Get into the arena dare, greatly and try.