184 - The Truth About Courses

Here's an unpopular opinion: I'm not a fan of the word 'course.' Let's face it—most people don't finish courses, and you probably have a few unfinished ones too. But you know what I do love? It’s the power of education.

In this episode, we’re delving into the hidden realities of offering courses that many people don't talk about.

Discover how a hybrid of education and coaching, combined with building genuine connections with your clients, can work wonders for your business. Remember, coaching is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor—it's a personalized experience.

If there's one key takeaway from this episode, it's that courses alone are not the answer. So, don’t miss out on this eye-opening episode to help you level up your coaching game and provide what it is that your clients really need!

👉 Create a profitable business that looks good and sets you up to be respected through the Fast Track Business Building Boutique Program 

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Transcript

Preview: Picture this, you purchased the course and you watch all the videos and I know that you've done this. But when a question arises, where do you turn? This is why I'm saying courses are not the solution. A course is really a fantastic way to deliver the information, but they lack that personal connection where people can really understand what it is you're talking about, where they can get clarity, and I think that's where true growth happens.

Intro: Hello, I'm Debbie Shadid, the host of the Life Coach Business Building podcast. If you are ready to have more clients in your life coach business, then you're in the right spot. Each week I'm gonna teach you super simple strategies to grow your business without feeling overwhelmed and without spending money on paid ads. If that sounds interesting. Stick around and let's get started.

Welcome to today's podcast. Today I'm going to talk about another probably unpopular topic. I'm going to talk about the truth about courses. So one of the things that I find really frustrating is that I feel like there's a lot of misleading information in the online space. Maybe you feel that way too. I agree that courses maybe are a great thing for some people. But if you are a coach that is new to business, or kind of new to business, maybe your business is filled with a few clients, but it's not fully booked, then a course is definitely not the right direction for you to go. So let's talk about that today.

Courses are not the magic formula to success. Let's quickly discuss a couple of the problems that I see with spending time on a course. First of all, it could take hours and hours to develop a course. A lot of times people will have a course already created, already developed, when they come to have a consultation call with me. And they have just spent countless hours trying to figure it out. And what I want to say is you don't actually know what will benefit your client. So if you have done that, there's a very high chance that the course that you have created is not exactly what people want. I know it's what you think people want, but one of the things that I recommend and that, of course, just makes sense is that you create a course and you take people through the course.

What I recommend is that you create two weeks ahead, right? You map out the whole process, but you only actually record two weeks ahead and you start taking people through it live so that you can get the feedback so you can make the adjustments so often as coaches. We are really developed. We're really much further along than our clients, and we forget how much time it might take them to work through some very basic things, some things that we just take for granted might take them more time. So when you have a course that you're doing live with clients that is not completed, then you can make the adjustments along the way. That is how you create a course that's probably gonna be more effective.

One thing I really believe to be true is that right now, this is an air that's dominated by the Internet. And I really think that in a post covid air, you cannot underestimate the power of true connection. I think people want to see us and they want to talk to us because so many people are now working at home. They're now much more disconnected. Coaching, as you know, is not a one size fits all endeavor. It's a personalized experience. When I help coaches write their marketing message for their website, I talk about you if you're doing private coaching as doing personalized individualized coaching, right? It really is personal for them. So when you get sort of tangled up in creating a course, you forget to consider all of the things that your client might need, which is probably you, right? Your client really wants to be connected with you. They want to be able to ask questions. They want to be able to have validation. They want to be able to have extra explanations.

So let's dive into what connection really looks like. So picture this, you purchased the course and you watch all the videos and I know that you've done this. But when a question arises, where do you turn? This is why I'm saying courses are not the solution. A course is really a fantastic way to deliver the information, but they lack that personal connection where people can really understand what it is you're talking about, where they can get clarity, and I think that's where true growth happens.

Your clients crave more than just a transformation. They really crave connection. They want to have the ability again to ask their questions. They want to be able to share. You guys know that even if every one of your clients really has the same story, most people think their story is unique. Most people think, yeah, but you don't understand my mother. You don't understand my boss or you don't know my problem, right? They really do want to share it and they want to feel like their coach personally understands their unique journey. Our ability to connect with people on a personal level, really is what distinguishes us from all of the other courses that are online.

Let's talk about really prioritizing building relationships that will stand the test of time. When you connect with a client personally, first of all, the transformation that you can provide is just dramatically different versus a course. Second of all, that person that you build a relationship with could become a long-term client. That person could become somebody who really knows you and can also refer you. Referral business is so, so significant. When somebody refers you, it's virtually like a done deal.

All right. Now, here's something I really want you to know about courses that people are not telling you. They're selling you software to host your course. They are teaching you how to do the course. People are selling you templates on how to do the presentations. They're selling you the software to do all of it. But they're not talking to you about building an audience. You cannot sell a course unless you have a very big audience. Now there are also people who sell email marketing courses, but unless you know how to communicate really well in an email marketing course, it's difficult to market your coaching course, right? You have to have all the pieces together. So you've got to build a big audience and that takes time. I recommend in my business when I work with coaches that you do it organically. So I want you to build a quality list, a much smaller quality list.

All right. So let's talk about the marketing that is required to do that. Now, y'all know I don't like paid ads. At the stage you are in your business, yes, I run them, but it's not what I recommend for you. What I want you to do is really learn how to market well. That means that you learn how to talk about what it is you do. You want to build your ideal audience, so you have to find out where they are. You want to find out what it is that they want. So again, a small list of your ideal clients will create more revenue for you. I promise you that, right? When you get that small list, if they are not converting to paid clients, then the work becomes, what is it that I need to be saying to him differently? What do they need to learn from me? So they can convert into clients.

So why do people become your clients? Why do they join your emailing list? Well, they do it because what you do resonates with them. Your style, your values, you guys know that if you have watched the Canva training where I talk about creating a professional coaching brand, you know that that will attract more of your ideal clients. Your message, your core marketing message will attract your ideal clients. What you see, the pictures that you present about yourself will attract your ideal clients. Those people who connect with you connect authentically to you. And that is a much more solid connection. So it's not about casting this wide net, which is by the way, what ads do.

Yes, it's true. Ads can be targeted to your demographic. But if you guys have come to me through the Canva training, what happens is anybody who's interested in Canva, whether they're a coach or not, they click on the link and they watch the Canva training because it's a free Canva training. So that wide net brings in people that are actually not my ideal clients, but when you work on individualized, really personal marketing, whether that be, you know, list building strategies that include workshop, whether that be offering free coaching, doing some networking, whatever it is, that is probably more of a slow path to building your list. Those people that come in, they are really connected to you. Chances are they're willing to invest time to come to your workshops which means they're invested in you. They haven't just clicked on a button and signed up for one more thing.

So I want to talk to you about what I think the perfect combo is. I don't, again, love the word course, but I do love the power of education. I think education and coaching, that is the combo that really is magic. So let's imagine the role of education in your coaching business. For a lot of you, you're not thinking about education in your business. You're a coach. Somebody signs up on your calendar and you say, Hey, what can I help you with today? My belief is that when people understand what it is that you are helping them work through and they understand it through the education that you provide, again, the results are going to be much more transformative for them. So what if you had a course or you had education that wasn't just standalone, but it was complimentary to your coaching services.

So imagine offering your clients a blend of both pre recorded teachings, maybe workbooks, maybe journal prompts, whatever that is, coupled with the interactive personalized coaching sessions that they really do desire. So I like to tell people who come to me on a consultation call, I am not offering you videos to watch. What I am offering you is some education so that you can watch something about marketing. And then you can come to the coaching with me, you're informed, and you can ask me quality questions and we can have a really significant conversation about what to do with your business so that education sets them up for success.

This would be the same in your coaching business, no matter what you're coaching. The education you provide helps to enhance the experience of your coaching. I think it's a really holistic approach, right, that also caters to very diverse learning styles. Some people like to listen to things repeatedly. And I must confess that I like to listen to or watch training repeatedly. When I'm working on something significant, a transformation in myself, I actually like to listen to it two or three times and then go and get some coaching around it. So, if you have a way to provide the education and if you offer the coaching, then basically you're able to accommodate all kinds of unique learning styles and coaching styles. So you get to explore with your client what works best for them.

All right. I did, again, look up some stats this time I use ChatGPT. It did not give me a source to site, but it said that the stats, I'm telling you, they don't lie about what I'm talking about. 80 percent of individuals who have been through coaching, they actually prefer a combination of recorded teachings and open coaching. So this is what I'm saying. I think this is really a way that you might want to move in your coaching. You can utilize this for private coaching or for group coaching.

One of the things that I do in my coaching program is I open all of the content. All the education is open to you on day one, whether you pay in full or whether you make payments. Now, I support that with a series of emails to keep people on track because we're building businesses to basically provide accountability. But in my case, I open all the content. And your pace, maybe you just want to rip the education part out and then just coach around the one topic that you have talked to him about when they come to their coaching session that week. So, either way, make that work for your coaching business.

Alright, so, I want you to offer both. I want you to entertain the idea of offering both. Because what if this would be the thing that would provide what it is that your clients really are missing from just pure straight coaching, or maybe from that live teaching, which I do live teaching as well. I do live education. We do business training, you know, where everybody is there and we can answer questions live. But I still believe that doesn't replace the actual recorded training. So again, I want you to think of your business and your coaching in a hybrid approach. What would work best for your ideal client?

Now, if there was one key takeaway here, I just want to say courses really alone are not the answer. In order to effectively earn a living and to sell courses, you have to have a big audience. You have to. I'm talking about hundreds, potentially thousands of people. The conversion rate might be 1%. All right. So you want to have a very big audience. Plus, you have to be really good at marketing. You have to be able to set up funnels. Yes, this is where funnels come into play, right? You have to have funnels that take people on a journey through a selling funnel of getting them to buy your course.

So, I want to encourage you to set the course idea aside. Yes, if you want to use video content for education or audio content for education, that's different. But let's make sure we're getting clear on the way we talk about it. The course is a self-study. It's self-paced. Somebody pays for it and they just go through it. And you know what happens? I'm pretty sure you probably bought a course that you haven't finished either. Most people don't finish courses. So I want you to have integrity with your coaching. One of the things I take pride in is that when we work together in the Business Building Boutique, people get the stuff done, right? They go through education, they get their business built. It's not passively sitting and watching just more videos. It is really watching, learning, then doing, and implementing, and coming to coaching to get all of your questions answered.

All right. I hope that this provides some clarity for you. I hope that you now know the direction you want to take your coaching. It does not matter whether it's private, or whether it's group, or whether it's a membership, all of those formats work really well when you provide education and you provide the coaching.

All right, let's talk about how you can expand your business. Think about what's right for you in the new year. And oh my goodness, guys, I want to help you build your business. Let me be the one to answer the questions and to give you really the honest truth. I love to tell you what you really honestly need to know on a consultation call and in our coaching together so that you can really get your business built. If that sounds interesting, make sure that you go over to debbieshadid.com/schedule. And let's schedule a time to talk about how I can help you get your business built so that you can do more of what you love in 2024. All right. Have an amazing week until next time. Bye. Bye.

Outro: Okay, ladies, that is it for today. Before we go, I want to invite you to head over to debbieshadid.com. I have this incredible Canva training, specifically designed for life coaches where I'm gonna teach you how to use Canva to create beautiful graphics to market your life coaching. All right. Have an amazing week. I'll talk to you very soon. Bye bye.