EP 332 - YouTube for Coaches: How to Set Up Your Channel The Right Way in 2026 (Part 1 of 5)
If you’re a coach looking to get started on YouTube and use YouTube to grow your coaching business, this video is for you.
In Part 1 of this 5-part YouTube for Coaches Series, you’ll learn how to set up your YouTube channel so you look professional, get found by the right people, and start growing your coaching business, even if you are starting from zero subscribers.
If you're new to my channel, my name is Debbie Shadid. I'm a Business Growth and Life Coach and the founder of the Business Building Boutique. For over two decades, I've helped women learn how to become coaches, get clients, grow their businesses, and create meaningful income doing work they love.
YouTube isn't just content. It's the fastest way to build like, know, and trust as a coach. This series will show you how to make it work for your coaching business from the very beginning.
In this episode, we’ll walk through:
Why your channel name, profile photo, banner, and description do more than you think
How to choose a channel name that's simple, searchable, and findable
Why niching your channel down is the single biggest growth lever for new coaches
How YouTube's algorithm shows your videos to the right people - without any subscribers
What your recording setup needs to look like (hint: it's simpler than you think)
How to use Canva to build a professional channel banner that works on mobile
Grab our Free Canva Training to Build Your YouTube Banner: https://www.debbieshadid.com/canva
YouTube is not about going viral. It's about becoming a reliable, trustworthy presence for the exact people you're meant to serve.
When you set up your channel the right way from the start, you stop spinning your wheels and start building an asset that works for your business 24/7.
Ready to build your coaching business the right way? Book a free Business Blueprint Call: https://www.debbieshadid.com/schedule
Debbie's Favorite Recording Setup:
Logitech Full HD Webcam: https://amzn.to/4m2rRye
Blue Yeti Podcast Microphone: https://amzn.to/4cfd4gc
Office Lighting (no ring in glasses!): https://amzn.to/4rZ9hrZ
Phone Tripod Stand (adjustable to 62"): https://amzn.to/40Y7WqB
Descript for Video Editing: https://descript.cello.so/6xw4YgGx34a
Listen to the Podcast:
Life Coach Business Building School Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/life-coach-business-building-school-with-debbie-shadid/id1502118085
If this episode was helpful, share it with a coach who's been talking about starting their YouTube channel. Subscribe and hit the bell so you don't miss the rest of the series - we're just getting started!
Disclaimer: Some links above may be affiliate links. I only recommend products I personally use and love.
Let’s connect!
Website: https://www.debbieshadid.com
Instagram @debbieshadid
#DebbieShadid #LifeCoachBusinessBuildingSchool
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Transcript
Welcome to our five part series where we're gonna walk you through how to not only set up your channel, but we're gonna walk you all the way through editing and getting it going so you can grow a YouTube channel that will help you grow your coaching business. I'm Debbie Shadid. I've helped thousands of women not only build, but grow profitable boutique style coaching businesses today and through this entire series we're going to be joined by Nicole, our YouTube Strategist. Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to talk all things YouTube. So today I just wanna mention a couple of things that I have experienced with my YouTube growth. of all, we're at a time and place where I think trust is super important. And so you guys might've heard about the 7 11 4 rule and I wanna talk about that today because YouTube is a way for people to get to know you. With this 7 11 4 rule, you have seven hours of content that they say people need to see about you, to know you to get to like you 11 different touch points on four different locations. Well, let me tell you, YouTube is the fastest way to do that. Can you imagine getting seven hours of Instagram content versus seven hours of YouTube content? This is one of the reasons why I love YouTube. It's been super effective in my business. So, Nicole, tell us how we can get started getting our channel set up. Yeah, so I think one of the first things that people think is, when I'm first getting started, I don't have any views. So why are people gonna wanna watch me? How am I supposed to build this credibility as a coach when I'm starting from zero? So a lot of this is in this setup of your channel, from your profile image to your channel name, to the description that you choose, to even the banner that goes across the top of your channel. All of these things can help people to see that you are a professional coach, you have a professional brand, and most importantly that you're speaking to them because something that gets overlooked a lot. is niche And I know this is something that you talk about quite frequently, Debbie, and something that we've been really leaning into with the YouTube strategy and seeing great results from. a lot of the times when you're first getting started out with your channel, something really that can help your growth is to be clear at who you're speaking to, who is the audience that you're trying to call in? Right? You're just getting started, and I wanted to bring that up because that's something that we've really been leaning into with. Yeah. We help coaches. Women who are 50 plus in particular and having more and more people reach out. when I say I help coaches over 50, immediately somebody's like, oh man, she gets. Me, right? When I say exactly what we're gonna do to help women over 50, they feel like this lady's gonna really be able to help me in my situation. I just wanna encourage you, when you think about all the channels on YouTube and what you might consider competition. The way that you make yourself in a category of one is by deciding that you're willing to narrow down a niche and to really specifically know who you're talking to. That tremendously, changed our channel. I'd been on YouTube for a while talking just general to coaches about business, but once we said we help women specifically over 50, which by the way, we were already doing, I just further defined it. It dramatically changed our results. I really wanna encourage you, when you think about your niche, it's like almost go one level deeper and another level deeper. Be willing to eliminate some people, because I like to say when you cut out people, then there are gonna be people who will raise their hand and say, she's absolutely talking to me. Exactly. once you're clear on that, who am I making these videos for? Who do I want to reach? Who is going to benefit from these resources, these teachings that I'm providing on YouTube? That's when we can get into a little. It of the what? So what do we actually need to set up our channel to look professional, right? So first thing is you're gonna need to create your channel with a channel name. if you do not know what you want your channel name to be, just go with your name. What are people going to search? Likely your name. If you have a business name, you can use that or you can use a combination, but just keep it simple, searchable and findable. Don't go coming up with some great channel name that you know nobody knows yet and is likely not going to be searching for. So let me ask you a question about that, Nicole, if you have your name. And so mine is Debbie Shadid and somebody doesn't know the name, Debbie Shadid. How would they find me? What are they searching for and how does that fit together? So they can still find me, even though somebody doesn't know my name, I. This is a great question, and this is getting into the weeds of SEO, which we are also gonna dive into even deeper on one of the next videos in the series. But to give you an idea here with the channel name, you could include something in the title of your channel name. So for example, Debbie Shadid Business coach for women 50 plus, or a Debbie Shadid, business coach for women. It doesn't have to be specific to age or gender, but again, the more specific you can get, the better. Because then when somebody clicks on your channel, they can say, yes, this is for me, or also, no, it's not for me. but don't worry too much about people not searching your name, because we're going to get into the search history with other aspects of your channel, like the description of your channel, all the video titles and so forth. So, Nicole, tell us about setup. That's a key question that Yeah. asks me. Like, how do I get on this? How much does it cost? What's it gonna take for me to get my YouTube channel set up? And the good news is it's free. So what else do we need to know about getting set up? Exactly. So first thing is it's free. Second thing, all you really need is an email in order to get set up. So choose an email address probably your business email or maybe your personal email if you don't have one. all you'll need is your channel name. You'll need your description. A profile photo and a channel banner. So just to break down each of those a little bit more, your channel name is going to appear in bold, big letters at the top of your channel. This is probably the first thing that people are going to see when they come there. Your profile image is a little round image that goes on the left. Most likely it's going to be your face. Some people will use their brand logo, but I wanna encourage you to use your face. Because think about social media in general, right? YouTube is a social media channel, and in general, people on social media follow people, not brands. Even if you look at somebody like Kylie Jenner, she has multiple brands, all of which probably added together, have less followers than her personal profile. And it's not just because she's Kylie Jenner, it's just that people tend to follow people over brands. so for that photo, you wanna choose something that is friendly, smiling, welcoming, right? Really give people a feel for who you are and what your personality is, right from that first little profile image. I have to tell you, I know people don't like to hear this, but photos do matter and people want to connect with people that they relate to. So instead of judging yourself about you don't have the photo that you like, or it's not a professional photo, just pick a clean, simple photo that's well lit without a bunch of stuff in the background so people can see you. I mean, there is this natural instinct that you're drawn to people, you see their picture and you're like, I kind of like that lady. And so you're more willing to connect with them. So I really do think picture is super important and I would encourage you just as an extra step to make sure that. Whatever picture you have on YouTube, little photo is the same photo that you have in some of your other social media platforms until you get to a point like Kylie Jenner can have any picture anywhere, and we know who she is. Yeah, that's a really great point. Keep that brand consistency. So if you're already present on, LinkedIn or Instagram or something like that, you can just pull over your same profile image and people will be able to recognize you. so another really important piece here is the channel banner. So this is actually what's gonna appear right at the top of your channel. If you're familiar with Facebook, you know that image that's at the very top of your feed very similar. Now, something really important to keep in mind here is that the dimensions of the channel banner are a little bit strange. So we will put an image here so that you can see what a channel banner looks like and the dimensions that you have to follow. And what you'll notice is that the regular image is quite large, but then the part that's gonna show on the banner is small and then even smaller, more narrow on mobile. So my recommendation is keep an eye on that little tiny rectangle, put all of your details inside of there, and then the rest can sort of be in brand colors, so that if people are seeing it at a larger ratio, it looks okay. But for the most part, people are gonna see that smallest little rectangle because that's the mobile view. So Nicole, let me just jump in here and say we have a great Canva training. If you will, go over to debbieshadid.com/canva, or we can also link it here below in the comments. There's a Canva training that watch Teach you how to use Canva create a brand, to decide on your fonts and use all of that to create the banner for your YouTube page. Yes, that's perfect. Canva is a great place to make that channel banner as well as all of your images. If you want to, you know, remove the background and add a pop of color in your profile image, all of that can happen inside of Canva. So, what other things do we need to know about getting our channel set up properly so that we can be found? Yeah. So the next key piece here. Now we have our banner, our profile image, and our channel name. Underneath that, you're gonna have your description. Mm-hmm. So your description is really where you're going to want to pack in some of those key words so that when people are searching, they can find you. Now, that being said, you don't want it to just be like keyword, comma, keyword, comma. Nobody wants to read that, so make it sound like you make it sound enticing and really call out that ideal client, like how we mentioned at the beginning. so we've just talked about description now. What about links, Nicole? How do you get links in there? What can you add in there? Tell me how that works. so you can add links into your description. Now, across YouTube, hyperlinks don't work, so you wanna make sure that whenever you're adding a link, in particular in your episode descriptions, that you're putting the full https slash slash, you know, www, so that it will end up being clickable. I would recommend putting the link to your website, maybe your social media, but really make it easy for somebody to take the next step with you. So make sure that your website is also optimized to helping you book calls and things like that. Okay. That's great. So what about the people who are saying, why does all of this even matter? Like I get all this set up, nobody even knows I exist. How does this help you get seen by people who are looking for this niche thing that we just talked about? YouTube is really cool in that it doesn't actually push out your videos based on the number of subscribers. It's actually showing your videos to anybody that YouTube thinks would be interested in your video. So how is it gonna know what that is? A few different places, right? The title of your episode, the description of your episode, any sort of key words, key phrases are that are in there that are going to show YouTube. This is what we're talking about. There's also categories that you can choose on, your video tags you can add. So lots of different things. Even the AI will pull from the transcript. So the transcript that you upload, the algorithm's gonna take that into consideration. the key thing here is that it really actually, you don't need any subscribers to get a ton of views. And I'm actually a really great case study of this. When I first started my YouTube channel, which is not all that active right now, I gotta starter back up, quite a few years ago now, my very first video that I posted, so keep in mind I had zero subscribers, got tens of. Thousands of views on the video, and that was simply because I hopped on at a great time. So the first video that I made was a clothing review of a clothing brand that was actually having a Black Friday sale at the time. So many people were searching reviews of that clothing brand, searching that brand. So my video came up, right? Even though I didn't have any subscribers, I didn't even have any videos, and lots of people found me that way. Were able to subscribe. So. All that to say, it might not necessarily happen in the rocket boost like that. It was a little bit of a luck thing in my end, but when you can make sure that your videos are centered around, what are my people searching like, what brands do they like? What books do they like? What shows are they watching? What is keeping them up in the middle of the night? What are they coming and typing into YouTube? Then you can show up regardless of if you have any subscribers or not. it's super exciting that you've had that result. I wanna tell you that I have not had a video that has had thousands and thousands of views, and yet it has been so effective for my business. I'm not even having a call to action that you should book a call with me and we get calls booked. We get clients from this, and I wanna tell you too, we actually have clients that join after watching one video. I think that is really the power of utilizing YouTube to build trust, to be able to educate people and just to help people get to know you as a coach. I would also say, Nicole, that you have properly set up our channel if people don't have their channel set up. What could happen or how will they know if their channel's not set up correctly? What should we know about that? Yeah, so once you're inside of YouTube studio, you'll be at studio.youtube.com. There's a button in the top left where you can actually view your channel. So I recommend viewing it from that front facing standpoint. It'll be super clear to see, oh, that image is a stock image, or you know, a blank. So then you can see what's missing. but really the key things, like I said, are the channel name. Profile image, banner, and description. Once you have those things, I'd encourage you to just get going, get some videos out there. You can figure out the playlists and the whole customized setup later. I wanna mention a couple of other things about setup, and I do think it's important for you to consider your setup wherever you're going to record. Now, while this won't be your forever setup, I do think that trust is created by having a consistent image. By you looking the same way every time. We hear this a lot on our coaching calls. In fact, one of the people that recently joined that saw me on YouTube when she came to the consultation call Nicole, she said to me, oh my gosh, you look exactly like you do on YouTube. She was so impressed with the fact that I wasn't, somebody on YouTube, on camera one way. and Operating my business a different way. So I do think it's important that you have an image that you intentionally decide how you want to present yourself, and that you show up that way all the time. and I wanna say like, be yourself, whatever that is, be yourself, but decide how am I gonna show up in my business and what will they expect from me on YouTube, because I think there's some comfort in that and there's trust built that way. I agree. I think it's so important that you're being yourself completely authentic to yourself, because otherwise people are gonna feel it. It's just gonna feel scripted and like what are they even talking about or do. She just learned this last week on a workshop, right? So, definitely that authenticity is gonna build like, know and trust faster than just about anything.. And I think another piece here is like, as we're talking about this, you know, it can start to feel like, oh my gosh, okay, so I need the description, I need the name, I need all these things. I'm gonna have to show up, looking polished and professional. It doesn't have to be necessarily Debbie's look, but what's your version of that? stage presence that you like to carry. And then how am I gonna get all this done? Right. This is starting to seem like a lot of time. I can almost hear your thoughts coming through, maybe watching this video. So I wanted to just add in here that what I've noticed is that. Being on YouTube as a coach actually saves you time in two big ways. So while it can take a little bit to sit down and record the video, it's actually going to compress time and expand time simultaneously. So stick with me for a second when we're compressing time. As Debbie said, a few videos watched one call, somebody's ready to sign up for the program, right? That is compressing that time that it takes to build like, know, and trust. Now it's not seeing maybe 70 of your videos if we're going by that, you know, 7, 4 11 metric that. Debbie mentioned at the beginning, it's really just maybe one or two videos, maybe seeing a playlist of yours, wanting to get on a call and feeling like they already know you. So in that way, it really compresses the time to a sale. And it can also expand your time, right? So you're sitting down to create one piece of long form content. Do you know how much content that you can make from one long form piece of content? You could make a whole month? Worth of content at least a week. And we're gonna get into the weeds on how to do that in a different video. But I did just wanna bring that up here because as you're thinking about getting started and this setup, it can feel like daunting in a lot. But I do wanna encourage you that once you get this ball rolling, you're gonna find that it's actually gonna save you time in your business. That is absolutely true and I would encourage you to do it in the easiest way possible to get started. Now, Nicole just mentioned that like, you don't have to look like me, and what came to my mind was. guy that I'm watching on YouTube that is in his mid seventies, and he records on his phone outside on his patio, so he doesn't even get ready for it. But the thing is, every single one of his videos looks like that. that's what I'm talking about. Like I want to go look for this guy and I know what to expect from him. Find a way to make an impression that speaks to your ideal client. Your niche client. so that they know what they can expect from you, and you become a reliable source for them. Yeah, that's a great point. You know, it doesn't take professional footage or a professional setup in order to do it. Just put yourself out there. I know a guy actually who is monetizing his YouTube. he's a trucker. He drives his truck and he sets up his camera, records himself talking and listening to the radio for hours Per day and gets thousands of views on his videos, has built this community of people who just love to listen to him. there's a niche for you out there, just showing up in that way that's authentic, to find those right people. That is so true. Let me wrap this up, Nicole, and kind of tie this together. So I recommend if you're a coach, that you definitely should move forward on YouTube. I think do it in the simplest way, Nicole's walkthrough, what it takes to set up your account, to set up the description. We've talked about the banner. Don't forget, I'm linking the training below that you can utilize to learn how to use Canva. That's what we recommend. And then just getting started is. goal, right? Just start any way you can. Don't worry so much about those first videos. We are gonna talk in the rest of the series about how to script your videos, about how to edit your videos, how to promote your videos and all those. But I just wanna encourage you to get started to not overthink this. Just make that next step. If you know YouTube is for you, today is the day to start. And I also wanna just wrap up by saying, the goal here is not to monetize your YouTube The goal is to grow your coaching business. So, so many people get fixed on the idea of like, oh my gosh, I'm gonna make money from YouTube. That's not what I want you to do. I actually want you to make money from your coaching business. So think about that when you consider growing this channel that you're actually building an opportunity for people to get to know you because there is nothing more fun than getting on a call with somebody and they actually already know you because they have watched your videos. They know what to expect, they know what you teach on, they know what you coach on. it just makes for an incredible conversation. By the end of this series. You'll be able to launch your YouTube channel. And you'll be on your way to growing your coaching business by utilizing YouTube as a way for people to get to know you. So we'll see you next time. Make sure you subscribe. Hit the bell and we'll see you soon.
