Content that markets Coaches. Pt. 1
Coaching is a $4.56 billion global industry, the International Coaching Federation data tells us, and with 34,200 certified coaches in the U.S. alone and 109,200 worldwide, many coaches wonder: How do I stand out? I plan to tackle this problem in a series of courses I’ll roll out on Maven.com this upcoming new year. (The plan is in action — and I promise to update you once I’m live.)
My idea? In the past four years, since training to become an ICF certified coach, I’ve written and published 80+ Medium articles (and have 55 half-baked essays or articles saved as drafts). I’ve hosted two bi-weekly podcasts with a combined 5,000+ downloads and 7,500 plays all on coaching, business communications, confidence, personal branding, reinvention, and/or entrepreneurship topics — which is what my coachees come to me for.
I’m not expert. I can share how I create thoughtful content to democratize coaching for those who can’t get to coaching, to raise my brand, visibility, and to (gently, without promotional language) market my coaching business. It’s worked. In three years, and within six months of finishing my training, I’ve attracted and retained a steady roster of 50–90 steady communications coaching clients without outsourcing marketing. I’ve done things in-house. Even when sharing on LinkedIn (whatever I create) it does not feel like marketing. I’m simply writing or podcasting on what intrigues me and brings me (and others) deep awareness, clarity, strategy, and joy.
This post kicks off a series and opens things up for you to ask your questions. I can address any roadblocks you feel and curiosities. I can break down my process as far as you want and need. [Note to my readers: My advice goes to coaches; but any marketer, professional, or entrepreneur wanting to improve their storytelling and writing can benefit here.] Ready? Let’s go.
Have courage and clarity in your niche
Coaches often wonder: how do I fit within this ginormous industry? The question’s valid. I fell into communications coaching when a dear peer coach suggested I combine my communications background with my newfound skills as a coach. The moment felt euphoric, relieving, and more exciting, even hopeful. My pragmatic mind viewed life coaching as too broad and vague. Communications coaching felt more narrow, but also more viable for me to market and position myself within.
Narrow your niche for your prospective clients, too. As Coach Bill Carmody told me as I trained as a PQ coach with Positive Intelligence, we must think of our bullseye client. Who becomes our absolute premium client? And why? Narrowing who you want to coach might induce worry that we’ll exclude others and not find anyone at all. I’ve found the opposite occurs. Once we narrow whom we want to serve, and why we’re the one to serve them, the ways to reach this audience become clearer. I wrote on this idea earlier this year with a milestone hour post and lessons learned, which you can follow here.
Own your expertise
I became a communications coach vs a life coach because I’ve had a combined three decades working in the communications industry, either as a correspondent for top-tier global media like the Economist, Financial Times of London, and/or Guardian, and as a trainer for corporations and a university professor. I taught business communication and journalism at the graduate level and undergraduate level at universities for 19 years. I also trained as a journalist at UC Berkeley, two decades ago now, with a master’s degree in digital print media and photo journalism. Most importantly, clear and compelling communications and being a champion for our audience was something I felt super passionate about and could speak to at length.
I’ll admit, I did not think much of this work, despite having a lot of joy, fun, and learning so much. Only when my client base grew (up to 99 clients at its peak) and with approving feedback of this skillset did I see and feel the potential to create and share content around it.
I heard from many that this work impressed them and attracted them to me — and that it distinguished me from other communications coaches because of the (their words not mine) “interesting and rare hybrid of skills.” When I plugged in and played with these skills as we coached, my clients outlook, confidence, and communications took off and transformed their lives. This felt affirming too.
Hearing this kind feedback over and over validated my expertise, helped build my confidence as a coach, but also helped me feel more worthy and comfortable with branding this side of myself as I wrote and podcasted. In short, my clients and the work we did together helped guide what content I wanted and needed to produce.
Notice and muse on your clients’ struggles
This awareness created an experimental opportunity I felt willing to play with and test. Journalistic titles dominated anything I wrote and podcasted on: Reporter tips to ad hoc questions, how to “tell me about yourself” like a journalist, and “how to synthesize giant ideas like a journalist” offer some examples. These ideas came from staying curious and observant. I noticed overlap on the topics coachees came to me for help and yet knew ethical rules and parameters existed.
As certified coaches and honorable humans, we must never breach our clients’ confidentiality. Ever. But as we offer cookie crumbs for our prospective clients to find us, we can write and speak on the trends we see within our client base, especially if these very topics become familiar to us because we struggle with them, too.
Sharing them with my clients gained instant, quick, validating feedback. One article on brevity and tips and tactics to stay brief got huge thumbs up from CEOs down to interns. (I drew on lessons I once taught, rules my Economist editors told me, and tactics I’d co-created with coaching clients.) One said: “Nobody has ever spelled out the ways I tend to be wordy and showed me such quick, pragmatic fixes. This article’s one I’ll share with my teams.” This encouraging feedback kept me on this path.
Write and muse on your own struggles
The more I coached, the more I realized my own communication and life challenges were ones shared across continents, hierarchies, and industries. For instance, I noticed around the end of the western calendar year, I was overthinking the packing of my suitcase for a long overdue trip back to my New Zealand motherland horribly…packing and repacking, wondering how and what things would fit.
Hearing a coachee reflecting on a similar issue they faced when going back to India and another on their first trip back to Brazil in three years since Covid, made me see: This experience I’m grappling with is a phenomena, a deep emotional issue challenging our personal brand and how we want our first family and community to view us when we leave the land we now call home and return to go ‘home.’ I called this essay The Suitcase, which you can read here.
Be willing to go deep in relevant, helpful ways
Another topic I mused on (first in my journal then as an essay) tied to losing some Tom Ford sunglasses in Ohape Beach in New Zealand, on that same trip ‘home.’ I agonized irrationally over their loss. I wondered how I could have been so silly to take them into the sea. I realized my real trigger to over thinking losing something I once cherished tied to a deeper fear of falling back, having grown my business so well, and becoming poor once more after progressing in the opposite direction. This essay, the Lost Sunglasses, the stress of losing lovely things, lives here.
In another, noticing the growing curiosity from many clients in how to disarm powerful people and the nuanced ebbs and flows in human conversation, I essayed on how I grew comfortable with stranger conversation. The comfort started early (I realized from writing) as early as my first five years growing up in rural New Zealand and then from chaperone assisted trips overseas.
I surprised myself with how intimate I felt willing to get with prospective readers. My feelings around wealth, falling back, losing prosperity after building prosperity tied to lingering scars of bankruptcy I weathered in Christchurch, New Zealand in my teens and my frugal, independent travels as a single woman. I read the Lost Sunglasses as an episode for my Competency No 5 podcast, again driven to share these insights lest they evoked awareness in others. I loved how I read this essay because it came from somewhere honest, reflective, and deep. On Medium, this essay became the most read for 2024. Coachees following me on LinkedIn found it and loved it.
The best part? My writings inspired their own essaying and podcasting, which boosted confidence, a feeling of control over their destinies, and for many, reminded them they loved to write. For these coachees, many of their work and personal communications challenges became wispy and reduced. Their written word, in its raw, uninterrupted form, transformed how they felt and how and when they spoke up. This felt wonderful and transformational for us both.
I’ll pause here because I’m realizing I’ve written a lot and do not want to overwhelm. In subsequent articles, I’ve a rough idea of what else I want to say based on where my coachees and peer coaches feel stuck. (Please! Add or detract from this list):
- What’s a good format? Meaning: How do I structure a solid piece of writing? Word count?
- What kind of writing seems to work? Meaning: We have personal essay. We have how-to pieces. What else can we write?
- How much do titles and headings matter? If so, what rules ought we follow?
- What are ways to hook our audiences in the opening?
- How do we improve our writing?
- What about podcasting and informational videos in 60 seconds or less?
- How do we ensure the tone does not sound promotional nor like marketing, which will erode our presence and how we connect with prospective audiences?
The Economist magazine published this year a new issue of their faithful style guide with its timeless rules. Their editors remind us: “Clarity of writing usually follows clarity of thought.” Indeed. I’d add that clear content (oral or written communications, even visual communications) helps clarify thoughts and unlock feelings in others. Coaches, entrepreneurs, and marketers — all of us — have an opportunity to stay clear, delightful, thoughtful, and original in what we share. Step away from the fluff. Move into our legacy work, and have fun sharing what’s on our minds with others. Make the marketing of your business the byproduct of creative discovery and play.
Debbi Gardiner McCullough has reinvented three times across three continents and three industries, most recently leaving academia after 19 years of service to train to become a coach. From Wisconsin, she owns and runs Hanging Rock Coaching and serves as a communications coach to leaders all over the globe with BetterUp and Sales Rocket Fuel.