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A Podcast for Coaches shines a light on one of the most elegant, underrated business models in the world: one-on-one coaching. Mark Butler hosts the show, and he's been a coach and advisor to every kind of online business you can think of, having helped businesses earning everything from $0 to $25,000,000+. Although Mark believes every online business model has merit, he worries one-on-one coaching is viewed as a stepping-stone business for people who aren't ready or able to scale. But it's not true, and A Podcast for Coaches sets out to show people--through clear teaching and rich, current stories of successful coaches who love their business--that one-on-one coaching is one of the most gratifying and lowest "hassle-per-dollar" businesses in the world.
Speaker: Hey, this is Mark Butler and you
are listening to a podcast for coaches.
I find myself interacting with newer
coaches sometimes and occasionally,
or maybe even often as I'm interacting
with a coach, I find myself thinking.
They just don't get it.
And then I almost immediately think to
myself, that's not a useful thought.
And it would definitely not
be a useful thing to say.
And I don't even know what I mean by that.
But if I'm having the thought, there
must be something in there for me and
maybe something in there for them.
So then what I do is after the
interaction, I go puzzle on that.
I just think about it.
What do I mean when I say
they just don't get it?
Today's episode is my attempt at
explaining one of the big things
that can contribute to
a person not getting it.
I want to talk about this through the lens
of business strategy and business tactics.
Now I want to do a good job here
because if you go to Google or YouTube
or chat GPT, you will get a million
definitions of strategy and examples.
And the same thing with tactics.
And so let's not over invest
in my definitions here.
Let's just hope.
That these lenses, strategy and
tactics give us some insight on
how to be more effective and more
confident and above all happier as
we attempt to build our practices.
So for me, strategy is the heading
that I use to describe a person's
way of being in their business.
It touches on what they
do at the highest level.
So strategy , touches on what a coach is
doing in their practice at the highest,
most zoomed out level, why they do it.
And how they do it also at
the most zoomed out level.
So if I were to describe my business
strategy and my coaching practice,
it would sound something like I
do one on one coaching because
I believe in and value and enjoy
regular, deep one on one interactions with
people who are trying to Self discover,
self improve, transform in some way.
I create those client relationships by
talking into a microphone and waiting for
people to reach out and ask for coaching.
That's my strategy.
You notice it doesn't have
a lot of detail in it.
That's not what a strategy
description is for me.
A strategy for me is two or three
sentences that describe what I'm doing,
how I'm doing it, why I'm doing it.
Someone whose strategy is very
different from mine, maybe even
almost the opposite of mine would say.
Something like
I sell courses to people who want
to develop a specific skill and
those people find me primarily
through paid advertising.
That's their strategy.
Now, the reason I think it's important
to try to figure out what your
strategy is or what you want it to be.
is that it will help you figure
out what your tactics will be, and
it will help you figure out who to
pay attention to and who to ignore.
If my strategy is
I create longterm one on one coaching
relationships, and I do that by
talking into a microphone and waiting
for an email to land in my inbox,
then There's no reason for me to pay
attention to someone who teaches people
how to succeed with paid advertising.
If I know what my strategy is and I'm
happy with my strategy and the results
that it produces, then It makes it so
I can cut out a very high percentage
of the content that I might consume,
the programs I might purchase, the
communities I might hang out in.
I can just ignore all of them because
they don't relate to my strategy.
With clarity on what my strategy
is, I can go pay attention to
people who help me get better.
At talking into a microphone , that
might mean buying courses.
It also might just mean listening to
podcasts and seeing what I want to mimic
in what I'm hearing on those podcasts.
It might mean hiring coaches.
And just experiencing their way of
being and figuring out how I want
their way of being to bleed into my
way of being, what do I want to model?
It might mean signing up for
trainings and certifications.
If I think that they meaningfully
impact my ability to do
the work that I want to do,
but I'm going to take actions that
are in support of my strategy.
If I have no idea what my strategy
is, I'm I have no idea what actions
to take because the actions or
what I'm calling today, the tactics
always flow from the strategy.
Where I think we get into trouble.
And by trouble, I mean frustration,
discouragement, confusion is
when we value equally advice, and
instruction,, that spans all strategies.
So if I'm part of a coaching community,
for example, that hosts what we would
call general business calls, these
are probably great in many cases.
I'm not opposed to them in
principle, but if I go into this
general business community call
and the coach or the presenter.
is giving advice and telling
me what to care about.
That's useful if the advice they're
giving relates to my strategy,
but it's completely counterproductive
if the advice they're giving
does not relate to my strategy.
If they've got five or 10 or 500
people on that call, you can't expect
or hope that the answer they're
giving to another participant or
that the principle they're teaching
or that the advice they're giving.
relates to and supports your strategy.
It's your job to know your strategy
and it's your job to decide what
to consume and what to ignore.
It's not fair for any of us to blame
other people for our confusion.
If we don't know what our strategy is
now, the earlier a person is in their
business, the harder it is to know what
their strategy is in the early days.
We're trying to figure
out what our strategy is.
We're working on a hypothesis that
sounds something like, I think what I
want to do is sell courses using paid
advertising, or I'm running an experiment
where I do one on one coaching and
where I only look to create one on one
coaching clients by fill in the blank,
you know, hanging out in communities or.
Having a podcast or whatever.
We should have our own experiments, our
own hypotheses and our own strategies,
and then seek support around those.
But if you're hanging out in
communities where general business
advice is being given, then the
confusion becomes your responsibility.
Also the clarity.
If you end up with clarity, then credit
to you, you gave yourself that clarity.
The coach didn't give you that clarity.
You gave yourself that clarity by
seeking out the right environment
in which to get insight.
As you consider who to listen to, ask
yourself first, what is my strategy?
What is my current experiment?
Am I clear on what tactics
flow from that strategy?
For me, being a person who wants to
create one on one coaching relationships,
primarily through my podcast, then
I get into tactical questions.
Well, should my podcast
have lots of guests?
Should it all be me monologuing?
Should it be once a week?
Should it be once a month?
Should it be three times a week?
Should the episodes be 10 minutes?
Should they be one hour?
All of these things are tactical
implementations of my strategy.
They can all be experimented with as well.
We get ourselves in trouble when
we think tactical questions are the
only questions or are the important
questions., Tactical questions matter
much less than strategic questions.
If a beginner or a newer coach finds
themselves thinking primarily about
How often should I publish my podcast?
It's the wrong first question.
The first question is how does
a podcast fit into my strategy?
When I encounter a coach who says,
what do you think of this
particular newsletter?
I wrote, I'm happy to give an opinion.
I always have one, but my
opinion isn't worth very much.
What I want to do is ask that person
instead, how does your newsletter
relate to your overall strategy?
What is your newsletters
role in your business?
What do you believe about newsletters that
causes you to think that a newsletter is
one of the things you should be doing?
Because the newsletter can be part
of a strategy, but it's a tactic.
It's a, it's a thing you do.
It's not necessarily a why.
If a person can very clearly tell me how
a newsletter relates to their strategy,
then I will say, Oh, okay.
Then you probably want this kind
of approach to your newsletter.
And consider this frequency.
And now I can give a bunch of opinions.
They'll still just be opinions
that a person could go test or not.
I'm wrong probably as often as I'm right.
So are they.
That's why we experiment.
Until we have some sense of why
we're doing what we're doing.
We're just sprinting forward in the dark.
And bumping into a lot of
furniture and walls along the way.
There is a big benefit to that, because as
you sprint forward in the dark, you will
gain experience and you will gain skills,
depending on your demeanor, you may grow
in confidence by sprinting forward in
the dark, and you may grow in enthusiasm,
but if you're a person who struggles
with a lot of self doubt, or a person
who just likes things to be a certain
way, you like things to be orderly,
you like to know what's going to happen
ahead of time, Sprinting forward in the
dark will cause you a lot of pain if
you can get yourself to do it at all.
I'm not really a sprint forward in the
dark kind of person myself, so I have no
criticism of any of these ways of being.
My suggestion is try to figure out
and name your strategy first, and then
dig into which tactics flow from that
strategy, and then consume content, maybe
courses, maybe coaching, around developing
skill and confidence in those tactics.
But first work on your strategy now
as a concluding chapter here, I'll
give you my two cents on how to figure
out what your best strategy might be.
And that is to know yourself deeply.
Here's how I work on knowing myself.
I've done a lot of experiments over
the last 20 years that I've been
doing kind of entrepreneurial things.
As I do those experiments, I've gradually
learned what I like to do and what I
don't like to do, where I feel the most
at home, where I feel the least at home.
It doesn't have to take 20 years.
It will probably take a while for
you to very deeply know yourself
in the context of a business.
That's okay.
It's fun.
It's rewarding to self discover and
self explore through a business.
You can use tools like personality tests.
I love a personality test.
I've taken all kinds of personality tests.
I don't over index.
I don't over invest.
I've In the conclusions of those
personality tests, but they're very
helpful in giving me another way of
looking at myself and my way of being.
Sometimes I take a personality
test and its conclusions help me
make much more sense of myself.
And then as I'm considering a strategy in
my business, I can say, Oh, I don't really
think that aligns with my personality.
I don't have a lot of evidence
in my personal history that says
I will enthusiastically charge
ahead inside that strategy.
Get to know yourself and get
to know the best way to express
yourself in your business.
My strategy includes talking
into a microphone and then
waiting for people to reach out.
That strategy comes from a very clear
understanding of myself at this point
in my entrepreneurial life at age 45,
because I like talking.
I mostly won't shut up, ask my family.
I like thinking.
Feedback I've gotten from people
over the years is that I overthink.
I agree with that feedback,
but the strength on the other
side of that weakness is that
I'm a really good thinker.
I think hard about things.
I fall asleep at night working on puzzles.
I wake up with those
same puzzles in my head.
The puzzles might be a programming
problem that I'm trying to solve in,
in some software that I'm building.
Those puzzles might be a relationship
that I'm coaching, you know,
between a couple where I'm thinking
about him and I'm thinking about
her and why does she do that?
And I wonder why he does that.
I'm puzzling.
I'm thinking hard.
That's who I am.
It's what I like to do.
I'm really good at it.
I also sometimes overuse that
strength and I get too analytical,
I overcomplicate things, I don't
move forward, et cetera, et cetera.
This is all part of me being me.
My strategy flows from this understanding
of who I am and how I like to be.
When you look at the other part of this
strategy where I say, talking to the
microphone, wait for people to reach
out, the wait for people to reach out
part is also very authentic to me.
I've said it on this podcast before.
I don't want a business that
involves me doing a lot of pursuit.
It's not that I think pursuit is bad.
I have such admiration for people who
can sustain a lot of energy in pursuit.
These people in my mind,
they make the world go round.
They make things happen.
I've been the beneficiary over the last
10, 15, 20 years in my business life.
Of working for people who have
a lot of energy for pursuit.
Thank goodness.
They are the way they are.
It's not really my energy.
Sometimes I wish I could generate
a little more energy for pursuit.
I think it would benefit me.
I'm sure that I can
brains are plastic things.
None of us are trapped in our way
of being so I could ask myself Okay,
do you want to generate energy?
For generating energy for pursuit
and maybe the answer
is yes My default is no
and then I attempt to have my business
strategy and my tactics flow from my
defaults from what is closest to my
natural way of being my easy way of being
just consider that if you hear a
person talking about their way of
being if you hear them giving advice
and it just Does not resonate with
anything inside of you That's okay.
You're not wrong.
What you're looking for is
that resonance for yourself.
So you hear someone else
talking and you say, that's
much closer to my way of being.
I'm going to try something
along those lines.
I'll have my strategy
look something like that.
And then the tactics, they will
differ in their specifics, but
they'll be kind of similar because
the strategy is kind of similar.
So.
A person who's maybe wired a little
bit more like me, they might say,
I want to talk into a microphone too,
but I really like highly structured,
action oriented, informative content that
would almost be like a really good class.
Okay, great.
That's their strategy.
And then the way they implement that forms
around, how am I going to do my research?
How am I going to
structure the information?
What's going to be on the
back of that information?
Will it be quizzes?
Will it be workbooks?
Will it be courses?
What do I want to do?
It's all good.
It's all good.
It all flows from an understanding
and an acceptance of who I am and
what is my preferred way to be.
Yeah, I think that's what
I have to say about that.
Your strategy describes.
The big picture of what you're
doing and why you're doing
it and how you're doing it.
The tactics are the actions
that flow from the strategy.
And the way to discover and to experiment
with your strategy is to know yourself,
acknowledge and accept your preferred
way of being and then gravitate
toward people whose ideas and whose
enthusiasm line up with yours.
Yeah.
I think that's pretty good.
I'll talk to you next time.