I’m working on a lot of new coaches to get their life coaching business started. Recently a new coach asked me whether or not it makes sense for the average salary life coach to join Profnet.com to gain credibility and try to get good publicity and media coverage.

The simple answer is NO, unless you take all the rest of the steps necessary to take advantage of what Profnet has to offer. The key to good media exposure is not just to do one thing, but to do EVERYTHING necessary.

The simple answer is also NO, most of the time, because the average salary life coach (making 20k per year) is probably not ready to invest in publicity or ‘become an expert’ strategies.

Checklist To Know If You Can Take The Risk To Invest In Profnet And Other ‘Expert Building’ Strategies In Your Life Coaching Business As An Average Salary Life Coach

If you, as an average salary life coach, still want to try your hand at becoming an instant expert, at least go through this checklist before you take the plunge in your life coaching business:

1. Do you know that you have an expertise that is rare and that can help clients get a valuable, measurable result?

2. Do you know that your target market (customer group that you’ll be selling this expertise to) is hungry to work with an expert such as yourself (or at least hungry to learn what you know as that expert)

3. If you can’t check #2, then do you at least know that your target market is hungry to get a result that you know your expertise can help them to produce?

4.  Do you interview, speak, communicate, and present well in front of groups, cameras, etc. and can you handle adverse presentation situations (i.e. speaking in front of a group of people that are making noise or speaking in a public place like a park, etc.)?

5. Can you SELL?

6. Do you already have an internet presence, especially one that will automatically capture the email addresses of your interested prospects?

If you can check off almost all of the above (if not #2, at least #3), then you are probably in good shape to start the ‘instant expert’ process that Tim Ferriss outlines in The Four Hour Work Week.

The Instant Expert Life Coaching Business Process: The Five Steps That The Average Salary Life Coach Can Take To Hit The Big Time

Understand that if you truly are an average salary life coach, that you’ll be investing a large percentage of your salary in this process in order to make your life coaching business a hit. Tread softly and smartly. You money doesn’t just automatically come back to you just because you pay for this stuff!

1. Join 2+ trade organizations, especially the ones with the official sounding names, that fit in with your expertise and fit with the clients you are trying to target

2.  Read 3+ of the latest best selling books on the subject you want to be known as an expert in (even if you already ‘know all this stuff’ because you want to be up to date on the current known thought-leaders in your area and the latest lingo and trends)

3. Give one 3 hour seminar at the local university (you can promote it however you’d like, guerrilla strategies work just fine) and have someone PROFESSIONALLY video tape and photograph you speaking during the event. Don’t skimp on this step, because you’ll want your finished product to look professional.

4. Give one seminar at a local branch of a well know fortune 500 company. I.e. Prudential or State Farm, etc.

5. Write and publish a few articles for well-known trade organizations.

6. Join Profnet.com or another expert network that journalists use to find people like you.

Once you’ve fully completed these 6 steps, you will be able to prove to anyone that you are a bone-fide expert in your field, and you’ll have the ability to rise above the average salary life coach in your life coaching business. Even though the expenses in the above strategy can easily rise to $2,000 or more, it is well worth it, if you area READY.

Jeffrey T. Sooey

CEO, JTS Advisors

Founder, Coaches Training Blog community