Magazine: How Much Marketing Do You Need to Do?

This is a question I was asked on a recent webinar for coaches.

What many coaches don’t know is that Pareto’s 80/20 principle applies to marketing which means that 80% of your clients will typically come from 20% of your marketing.

This means it is very important to get clear on what really works, otherwise it can be a total waste of your time.

Most coaches don’t need, or want, hundreds of clients.  Sometimes I see people vastly overestimating the amount they need to do.  You don’t need to be on social media constantly if you really know what marketing works for a coaching business. There are often far more effective methods.

What Marketing Works?

Coaches often ask me what they should do each week to feel that they have completed some useful marketing.

My answer to that is to focus specifically on income producing activities.  

What are Income Producing Activities?

These are actions that lead directly to more clients wanting to work with you.  A few examples of Income Producing Activities:

• Talking to potential clients about the types of problems and challenges you can help them with
• Speaking with people who can refer you to others
• Having a follow up meeting with someone who has expressed interest in working with you

When much of our time is taken up with delivering to clients, it can leave us with little time for either developing or growing our business. 

Remember, we don’t get paid directly for the time we spend doing marketing, so it becomes crucial to know which activities are going to work to attract clients. 

The Income Rollercoaster

In conversations with coaches I often hear how they have been experiencing a rollercoaster ride with huge ups and downs in their monthly income. What happens is they get very busy with client delivery and don’t have any time for marketing.  

Then, when the client work is near to completion, they realise too late that they have no new clients coming on board to replace the existing which provides a consistent income stream going forwards.

When Less Is More

What may surprise you is that a small amount of marketing done regularly can actually achieve more than a larger one-off effort. 

In my work with hundreds of coaches I’ve seen how regular time spent connecting with potential clients which get into the right type of conversations, can be far more effective in gaining you a consistent flow of new clients compared with a big marketing campaign e.g. using email or LinkedIn.

15-20 Minutes Can Be Enough

Often getting into the habit of regular client communication is more important and beneficial than carving out specific days in the quest for new clients.

If you get into the habit of doing 15-20 minutes a day as a minimum (doing the right thing) it can turn your business around and you should be able to avoid the dread of a blank diary in front of you.

Lisa Farr - Marketing Consultant and Coach

Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing

Inspired Business Academy

T: 01903 357117     

E: lisa@InspiredBusinessAcademy.co.uk          

W: www.InspiredBusinessAcademy.co.uk

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