The coaching industry has exploded in the last decade.
It’s now a $2.85 billion industry with 1.5 million searches made online every month for life coaches, business coaches, and executive coaches. The value of the industry increased by a whopping 21% since 2015 (2020 ICF Global Coaching Study).
Following demand, the number of life coaches increased by 33% from 2015 to 2019.
And it’s still going up.
If you’re a part of this booming industry, then you might reasonably wonder how you could use one of the most powerful marketing mediums — email — to generate leads and get clients.
That’s what we’re going to talk about.
Get Everything You Need To Grow Your Email List With ClickFunnels!
Why is Email Marketing Important for Coaches?
Other than email, here are some other ways you could market your coaching business…
- Sponsorships
- Advertisements
- Influencers
- Search Engine Optimization
- Affiliate Marketing
… and each of those has merit.
But email marketing is better.
Why?
Look at that list again. Every single one of those has a gatekeeper… someone (a person) or something (an algorithm) that tells you who you can reach when you can reach them, and what you can say.
Not so with email marketing.
Your subscriber list is your audience.
This is why, in Traffic Secrets, Russell Brunson highly recommends building your own email list, and he distinguishes between the traffic you control (ads, sponsorships, etc.), the traffic you don’t control (SEO, affiliates, etc.), and traffic you own (your email list).
The goal should always be to funnel as much traffic as possible toward giving you their email address so they become part of your ecosystem and you can continue marketing to them for free.
The more emails you have, the more money you’ll make in your coaching business.
This is a fact as old as email marketing itself.
Russell Brunson says you can expect to make about $1 per month per subscriber that you have (so long as you email regularly!).
Jon Morrow over at SmartBlogger has said the same.
So you need an email list if you want to build your coaching business and we’re going to show you how to build one and how to make the most of it.
What’s the Best Email Marketing Software for Coaches?
Using email marketing software is important because you don’t just want to send emails from your Gmail address — you’ll get marked as spam and it will go terribly.
You need software that can get emails, create opt-in forms, build automations, and send emails.
But which software should you use?
ClickFunnels, of course!
We have an article over here that compares ClickFunnels to just about every popular marketing platform — including email marketing platforms. Here’s just a glimpse of the feature comparison…
The fact is, you’re not just building an email list… you’re trying to grow a coaching business… of which email marketing is only one part.
You might also want to build a website, create and sell courses, craft sales funnels, A/B test various components, write blog posts, or manage leads in a CRM.
ClickFunnels does all of that under a single subscription.
That’s why it’s the best email marketing software on the planet for coaches.
Because it’s not just email marketing software.
It’s every piece of software you need to grow your coaching business online.
And you can try it for free by clicking here.
5 Email Marketing Tips for Coaches
You know why email marketing is important and which software to use to get started.
Now let’s talk about how you can actually be a successful email marketer — in terms of growing your list, sending compelling emails, and turning subscribers into clients.
Here are 5 tips.
1. Create Opt-in Funnels
The first step in any successful email marketing strategy is to create an opt-in funnel… or several.
An opt-in funnel is a set of pages on your website that get visitors to enter their email addresses in exchange for something valuable (like a free ebook, course, or report). This is the foundation of your list and it’s crucial to get it right.
How?
Create a lead magnet that solves a specific problem for your ideal coaching client. This could be as simple as an ebook, or something more complex like a free mini-course. Then create a squeeze page on your website that quickly explains the benefits of signing up and how it will help solve their problems.
Challenge yourself to create this lead magnet in less than 30 minutes. People aren’t paying for it. So it just needs to provide a bit of real value and it should be easy for your audience to consume.
Ask yourself, “What is the most immediate problem that my ideal client has right now?”
Then create a lead magnet that helps them solve that problem.
The landing page can also be simple (you don’t need a long sales page for this).
Here’s an example…
Then you want to make sure you put that opt-in form (or a link to it) in any high-traffic areas of your website — your About page, blog posts, homepage, etc. You might make it a pop-up or an in-content form.
Either way, you want people to be able to find your lead magnet easily so you get as many subscribers as possible.
2. Drive Traffic
Creating lead magnets and putting them on your website is ground zero for growing your email list.
But there’s a problem…
If your website isn’t getting traffic, then those lead magnets aren’t going to do a whole lot of good…
So how do you drive traffic so that you can actually grow your email list?
Russell Brunson’s bestselling book, Traffic Secrets, is jam-packed with practical advice for coaches to be able to drive traffic to their websites. And we highly recommend getting a copy (you can get it for free via that link).
The most important concept from his book is that of the Dream 100.
This is a process that any business can use to build brand awareness, generate leads, and make sales.
In fact, it’s the exact process Russell Brunson has used to grow ClickFunnels to a business worth over $100 million (without any venture capital).
Check out the video below.
Here’s the gist.
The people you want to serve — your dream customers — are already congregating in lots of different places online.
They’re listening to the same podcasts, reading the same blogs, signing up for the same newsletters, and following the same Instagram influencers.
What if you could implant your business, your message, and your offers into those congregations?
That’d be super valuable, right?
Heck ya!
The first step is to make a list of 100 different places — hence the name, although it could be more or less than 100 — where your dream customers already congregate online.
Find…
- 10+ top websites & forums where they spend time
- 15+ active Facebook groups
- 50+ influencers they follow on social media
- 30+ podcasts they listen to
- 40+ email newsletters they read
You could also target YouTube Channels, blogs, or even magazines.
Once you’ve got a list, you can either…
Work your way in — This means reaching out and building relationships with key people. It’ll include guest blogging, being a guest on other people’s podcasts, or reaching out on social media to create friendships.
Buy your way in — This means you pay money to insert yourself into the conversation. That could be through advertisements, sponsorships, or agreements with influencers.
Here’s a graphic showing how this works to build your email list…
This is the foundation of your email list-building strategy because it tells you where your target market is — and once you know where they are, you can create a plan for inserting yourself into the conversation.
As Russell Brunson explains…
“The core strategy to understand is that your dream customers have already been congregated by your Dream 100. If you focus on identifying them and marketing to them, your dream customers will start flowing into your funnels faster than by anything else you could do.”
You can use this Dream 100 process regardless of the marketing tactics you utilize (ads, influencers, sponsorships, SEO, etc.) — just choose your tactics and then follow the Dream 100 process. It’s the yellow brick road to success.
Get Everything You Need To Grow Your Email List With ClickFunnels!
3. Email Often
I recently bought a course on email marketing from Josh Spector — the founder of a successful email newsletter, For The Interested.
In the section that talks about emailing frequency, he had some great advice.
He recommended that you only email daily if the things you’re trying to sell require a deep relationship with your audience… because emailing daily is the best way to build relationships with your subscribers, but it often results in more unsubscribes.
And I can’t think of any product or service that requires a deeper relationship than coaching.
So yes…
You might seriously want to consider emailing your list daily.
But it doesn’t need to be complicated.
Use our Seinfeld Emails strategy. Check out the video below to see how this works.
Here’s the gist…
Every day, send an email about something that’s happening in your life — like a funny story or a lesson you learned.
These emails don’t need to be long or complicated — just keep them conversational and interesting, and sprinkle in helpful advice or stories from your coaching experience.
Then, at the end of every email, you can have a CTA for your coaching program or for courses that you’re selling.
Here’s an example…
By doing this, you’re building relationships with your subscribers while also giving them the opportunity to learn more about you and your offerings.
It might seem like a lot, but emailing daily is the best way to make more money from the list you already have.
4. Automate a Soap Opera Sequence
The Seinfeld emailing strategy above will help you to sell to your subscribers consistently over the long haul… but what about new subscribers right upfront?
How can you introduce them to your coaching business, tell them your story, build trust, and convert them into a client (in the case that they’re ready to take action right away)?
The answer is the Soap Opera Sequence.
Here’s how it works…
Like a soap opera, the emails guide the visitor irresistibly from one “episode” (email) to the next… and eventually to buying your products/services.
Here’s a great breakdown of how this email sequence works from Ryan Wegner…
The soap opera sequence basically consists of 5 emails sent over 5 days (one a day).
You set the stage, create high drama, share your epiphany, discuss hidden benefits, and then use urgency to push the lead over the fence.
If you want a more detailed explanation of how this works, get a free copy of Russell Brunson’s bestselling book, DotCom Secrets ← just pay shipping.
5. Create a Coaching Funnel
You have an email list and you’re emailing them daily.
But where, during your Soap Opera Sequence and afterward with your Seinfeld emails, are you going to send them to get them to convert and become clients?
That’s what you need a coaching funnel for.
A coaching funnel is a series of pages that provide more information about your services/products and lead people through the buying process.
At the core of any good coaching funnel, you should have:
- A Landing Page – to introduce yourself and your services
- An Offer Page – where people can purchase your service
- An Upsell/Downsell Page – where they can add on additional services and products
- A Thank You Page – to thank them after the purchase
- A Follow-up Email Sequence – to keep in touch with your customers
The best part about creating a coaching funnel is that it’s automated and it continues to work for you and grow your business even when you’re sleeping.
You can set up a funnel once, and then use it time and time again with every new client that comes through the door.
You can build a coaching funnel with ClickFunnels (it’s sort of our bread and butter!).
Final Thoughts
Email marketing isn’t just important for building a coaching business. It’s critical. You can use it to build relationships with your subscribers, introduce them to your services, and convert them into clients.
To get started, create an emailing strategy like the Seinfeld/Soap Opera Sequence and set up a coaching funnel. And once you’ve got everything in place, you can start emailing your list and watch the money come rolling in.
The more you email and the bigger your list, the more money you’ll make.
Click the link below to get a free ClickFunnels trial and get started!
Get Everything You Need To Grow Your Email List With ClickFunnels!
