Let Them SHOP! How To Improve Your Coaching Offers

Let Them Shop… How to improve your coaching offers.

To “Let them shop.” What am I getting at here? Well, there are a couple of caveats to this. First, this is less about what I learned in 2016 and more about projecting out to 2017 and beyond. It’s my speculation about what will come in the transformation space and coaching offers.



I’ll speak to the trend as I see it from 2016, then talk about where I see this going. So what have I noticed? There was a time not too long ago when transformation leaders had different pain points in their business. They wanted to adjust their mindset to allow abundance or ask for money. They didn’t have clarity about their message, audience, or niche (what we call a Specific Audience). And they had pain points around not knowing how to package their offers to make it obvious they were solving a very specific need or desire. And they had a pain point about not getting their message out to enough people. They needed help building their list or getting a bigger audience for live events and speaking engagements. These are only a few examples.

Transformation-based or service-based businesses were built to solve these different issues or problems. A lot of us jumped in and started to provide solutions, including my business partner Callan Rush and me. We founded a company to serve that market, and so did many others. There are many people providing solutions, and for the last while it’s been like the Wild West.

It’s like anyone can come in, put up a website and say, “Hey, good news, I help coaches who coach coaches to coach coaches. I help them to be more successful, make more money, or get more clients or holistic practitioners.” Anyone who claims to help transformation leaders can make a go of it.

And you know, it’s been relatively easy. You don’t even need to be an expert or achieve any level of mastery in your topic. You can still make a six figure income with ease because you say you serve these people. I’m not trying to doom and gloom the space, or say there’s anything wrong with this, or even point fingers. My point is this: I see this trend discontinuing.

It appears to me we’ve reached, or are about to reach, a saturation point where the market will correct. I don’t profess to have a crystal ball or some magical strategic mind. I look at how other industries grew and evolved over time and see this industry doing the same things. Then I speculate what’s likely coming next.” This period is probably discontinuing, and a correction of sorts will happen. This change could happen as early as 2017, but I could be wrong. It might take a bit longer. We’ll see … or it may have already started.

Because of this Wild West phase, transformation leaders have a new problem. The new issue is Overwhelm, overwhelm of choice. So many claims and so many offers are out there. There are so many options to serve such a small marketplace. It’s a problem, especially for people exposed to different potential mentors who support each other and seem to be friends. One teaches something one way, and another shows it slightly differently. Well, which is it? It’s causing a different layer of problem.

And I’ve observed an extra frustration in the marketplace. Transformation leaders feel frustrated. Most haven’t quite caught on to why they feel anxiety or frustration, though. They may want to take us up on our offers, yet we present them on our timeline, not on theirs.

Let me give an example. Earlier this year, Callan and I did a big launch for our program called “Maximize Your Impact: The Optimized Webinar Sequence.” In it, we teach people how to build evergreen campaigns. That launch was the window we exposed them to this opportunity. It was on our schedule, not theirs. It had nothing to do with whether they needed it at that moment. Maybe they needed it a 5, 6 or 7 months ago? They may speculate and say, “Here’s a fantastic offer! These videos are so well done, and the price point is fantastic!” And there’s all the urgency and bonuses. But then they think, “Well, I don’t need it right now, but I might need it a few months down the road.”

So now we have an interesting dilemma. It’d be fine if this happened every so often, but the constant inundation of it causes frustration and anxiety. So what do we do? This question isn’t about being right or wrong. It’s about the maturity of the space. We’re still in that Wild West phase. That’s how the Wild West works. I see this hitting a saturation point, which will cause the context to change. So what do we do about this? Where are we going from here? Well, I see this happening or changing in a couple of different ways.

As a side note, sometimes I hate saying things like this . I worry about how people will misconstrue my narrative to support a belief or fear they have. I’m NOT trying to be doom and gloom, nor shame the idea of launches and promotional calendars. It’s powerful to offer something into a marketplace when there’s a pent-up demand for it. I’ll continue to create them and leverage it in my business. I’m not trying to say there’s anything wrong with how we’re doing it, or that those things won’t work in the future. Most of it will still work.

But, we’ve got a couple of very real problems. People have overwhelming choices, and they can’t always get what they need in the order (or on the timeline) they need them. Most markets, if not all markets, are in the end consumer driven. I’m predicting these changes because it better serves the customer. It just makes sense.

So here’s how I see it going. You’ve probably been taught from us, or someone else, to make sure your offers are very, very specific. Have one problem to one audience. Well, that’s been misconstrued. People interpreted, and even taught, that it means your Business has to do that. It does not. Rather, your Offer needs to.

There’s a concept that will become more and more appealing in this marketplace of serving transformation leaders (and likely in other markets you’re serving too). It’s this: let people find a home or community where they can get all their needs met within an area of their life or their business. Meaning, it’ll still work to bring them in with a very specific offer, yet once they’re in introduce them to more. Give them a breadth of offerings they can get a la carte on their terms. I see this practice becoming more appealing.

Once they come into your fold, have a relationship with you, are an active client, and know your culture … then give them a wider breadth of offerings. You could have a catalog of different solutions. They can pick and choose what’s going to be ideal for them on a timeline that works for them. “One-Stop Shop” will become more appealing in the future. In our space, this type of offer hasn’t appealed to people, yet I see it becoming more and more attractive.

There’s another thing to consider. Tony Pennells (www.mindshift.money) shared this observation with me. Different markets (such as the medical and investing industries) reach a point in their maturity where people must pass through a point of entry before getting access to all the solutions. You have a personal session or an assessment of some kind, and someone gets to know your specific needs. Then you get a prescription or a diagnosis and get sent off to specialists. I’m not sure exactly how it’s going to look in our space, but I see something like this potentially being a part of it.

So, if you want to move forward and go wider with your offerings, consider how to find out the specific, unique needs of each buyer (or potential buyer). Find out on their way into your program so you can give them direction. Don’t overwhelm them with your whole catalog of offerings over time. Give them guidance and recommendations based on your diagnosis. What is it you prescribe for them? This concept ties in with the #1 learning from 2016!

So that’s my prediction for where our little industry is going in the next little bit. Provide a breadth of offerings to let them shop. Serve them exactly how they want you to serve them. Customize to meet their unique and specific goals.  Start to widen out in any area of their life or business where you’re serving them.

Some people in our space of transformation leaders “coaching coaches to coach more coaches,” are well set up to take advantage of this. Yet, a lot aren’t. For those who either don’t believe me or believe it isn’t a big deal, the coming years will show evidence of ignoring this trend in their businesses. In other words, I think they’ll have to work a lot harder and do a lot more just to maintain what they have … never mind growing their business.

So, that’s my take. I don’t have a crystal ball here. It’s not so just because I said it. However, it’s how I see the next little bit going, and it’s how we’ll be modifying and building our business as we move forward.

I’d love to hear your thoughts. Did this provoke you in any way, shape or form, either positively or negatively? Please leave a comment below with any ideas you think can add to your business and start to widen out the scope. I’d love to hear from you.

Watch for tomorrow’s video. It’ll be number five. I’m going to have a guest: a lovely, talented, beautiful, young woman you’ve likely never met before. It’s unlikely you’ll know who she is until I introduce her to you. She’s doing a fantastic job at adding value to a big learning I’m excited to share with you. So watch for it tomorrow.

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Thanks so much for watching again. Please leave any questions, comments, or ideas that provoked you in any way in a comment below. I’ll be going through them and responding throughout the day. And if this was of any value to you, please give me a like, a heart, or a wow on Facebook. That’d be awesome.

Thanks so much for watching! I’ll be on here again tomorrow.

Until Next Time … Be Brilliant.