The average life coach graduates from life coaching school and waits for clients.  Unfortunately, what most coaches miss in life coaching school is exactly the coach training you need to be a success.  Most people go into coaching because they love the job of helping people and get a lot of connection from doing it.  But when the time comes to enroll potential clients into your programs, you’re no longer in the giving process.  In fact, a lot of people look at the whole sales process as if it were a take.  When you imagine that, a lot of fears about not being good enough come to the surface.  Here is some practical coach training to help you enroll more clients, and retain that feeling of connecting and contributing during the process.

Coach Training That Goes Beyond Life Coaching School and Helps You Relate

In essence, there are 3 ways to think about how you relate to your prospects:

Coach Training Tip #1:  Individual Think vs. Group Think
You want to make sure you relate to each person as their own special individual.  Avoid telling people what they should do.  While sometimes telling a story about another client can be very effective, you want to make sure that you don’t make generalizations about people.  You need to get inside their personal world.  Make sure you make it relevant to your prospect right up front or you’ll miss the boat.  If you don’t, even if they do buy they won’t feel taken care of.  Or they might get upset and disconnect.  Then you’ll never be able to make a difference for them with all the skills you’ve learned in life coaching school.

Coach Training Tip #2:  Co-worker vs. Family/Friend
Think of your prospects as family or a close friend.  Your goal is to establish a one-on-one relationship.  You don’t want to maintain a professional superior attitude and tell them all your credentials and life coaching school certifications.  If you’re in rapport, as you loosen up and start treating them as a trusted friend they will treat you as a trusted advisor.  They will feel special.  Give them a pleasant experience.  Most prospects won’t meet with you in the first place if they don’t think you’re superior in some way.

Coach Training Tip #3:  Inferior vs Equal vs Superior Posture
There are different parts of your brain.  We have a tremendous ability to think reflectively, using the emotional part of our brain.  Our basic instincts are about fear and posture. If we talk with someone who is very significant, and they say something like, “I don’t want to waste my time. Let’s get to it,” we immediately ask ourselves questions such as, “Is this person going to hurt me?” or “Will this person help me?” With time you’ll eventually start to think as a superior when you give information, but you’ll need to be flexible in your ability to relate to different people and their postures.  The target is to relate as equals, with just a slight edge of superiority.  If you’re superior you won’t listen to them, and it will be a monologue.  And if you don’t have a superior edge they won’t buy what you’ve worked so hard to master in life coaching school.

Make Your Own Life Coaching School and Add Rapport to Your Coach Training

Now you have the coach training you need to set appointments and enroll just about anyone.  Unfortunately there a lot of good life coaches out there who never enroll their fair share of clients, just because most life coaching school programs aren’t able to give people the experience of mastering these skills.  But with some practice, you’ll find your ability to establish rapport is stronger than ever with your prospects.

Colette Seymann
JTS Advisors Designated Accountability Coach