This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Welcome to Side Hustle School. This is Chris Guillebeau, so glad you're tuning in today. Got a question from a listener. This listener is a life coach who wants to get a bit more specific in her offer. Her offer, her offering, her service, what she provides, how she's hoping to make money.
Not that everything in life is about money, but here on Side Hustle School, we are about trying to help you increase your income by using the skills you already have. So this caller, she has heard me say that there are too many life coaches out there, no disrespect to any life coaches, but the way to succeed with this kind of personal service is to choose a focus or a niche. You gotta be really specialized here. You gotta stand out somehow. So fair enough, but how do you do that?
Okay, that's what she's wondering about. Let's see if we can help her out. Her name is Sandra. Detailed question in my answer coming up after this quick shout out to our sponsor. [Music]
Hello, Chris, this is Sandra, and I've just recently found a show from a friend.
I've been doing coaching for several months, and I love it, at least when I'm able to do it. So far, I've only had two clients. In addition to several people from the mentorship program, I joined that practice together. I know I probably need to specialize to stand out, but the problem is I'm not sure how to do that. I'm helping people with positivity, making decisions, and just being more of the person they want to be.
So it's life coaching, basically. And I don't know how to define it better or focus on something specific. Any tips? Looking forward to hearing what you have to say. Sandra, you're asking exactly the right question.
Good start with understanding the importance of specialization. Just picking up on some of the things, I heard their positivity, making decisions, helping people be more of the person they want to be. So those are good things, right? But you're gonna be better served by branding around some practical outcomes. Like if you are more positive, if you make better decisions, well, what does that help you do?
Or conversely, what do you do to become more positive or to be able to make better decisions? And this is why a coach who helps you improve, let's give an example, a coach who helps you improve your negotiation skills to ask for a raise. That coach tends to do better than someone who just helps increase your self-confidence or makes that promise. It's important to increase your self-confidence, but the negotiation skills to ask for a raise is just much more specific. It's tangible.
So what I would encourage you and anybody else out there who's trying to have a coaching business, but it's not working out, or is just thinking about going in this direction, consider the ultimate outcome that you want your clients to have. Again, I know of course you want them to be more positive, but the way they'll feel that way is likely because of some specific change or improvement. So what is that improvement? And I would say get as micro as possible. Like don't just say like they're gonna have better health, right, get as micro as possible.
I am the coach that's gonna help you have 10,000 steps a day. Like you have this as your goal, but you don't always do it. I've created some system that's going to make it almost impossible to fail. I haven't actually done this. It's an example.
The point is this is where you need to devote your efforts. And as a bonus, it's actually gonna help you provide a better service in the first place. So that's my answer there. Good luck, Sandra. Good luck everybody else out there.
If you've got a question or an update for us, let us know what's going on. sidehustleschool.com/questions. We'll continue to feature them throughout the year, along with updates from listeners as they launch and grow their projects. Thank you so much for being out there. Take care of yourself.
My name's Chris Guillebeau. This is "Side Hustle School." [Music]
From the Onward Project.
