A group coaching program can be really difficult to implement, or really easy to implement. Some of the common things I hear when I recommend a client start a group coaching are:
1) I don’t have time to talk with dozens of clients each week
2) I don’t have time to spend 5-10 hours a week writing lesson plans
3) I can’t be available 24-7 on email
4) It just takes too much time.
5) It’s a lot of work technically to do it.
And the thing is, those are all valid – because in so many of the older models, that’s how it might have worked.
In fact, maybe as you read that list, you are thinking, yeah, that’s me – I want to start a coaching program, but it just seems like too much work.
So let me ask you this:
What if I were to show you a way you could coach 100 – 1000 clients in just 2 hours a week, and they get almost the same results as working with you 1-1?
If that would be cool, if that would feel like, “yeah, I could do that,” then read on!
Because I’m going to show you a super-simple coaching model that really works.
Before I get into it, I want to go over one concept: and that is the idea that group coaching doesn’t get the same results as 1-1 coaching.
The thing is, the coaching itself isn’t what gets results.
Your clients’ ACTION and implementation gets them results.
The biggest reason that 1-1 coaching generally gets better results than group coaching is because with 1-1 coaching, the client feels obligated to finish his work before your next scheduled call.
How many times has your client told you, “yesterday I remembered I hadn’t finished the assignment you gave me, and I thought about cancelling today’s session, but decided to work a late night to complete the work instead,” or something similar?
The thing is, if that client had been in group coaching, he probably wouldn’t have done the work.
But is it really the group coaching or the clients’ motivation that gets the work done?
Your client needs to step up and do the work on his own. You are a coach, not a babysitter. You are a coach, not a high school teacher. It is your clients responsibility to do the work. He needs to learn how to manage his time, and learn to focus. You can teach him those things, but he has to do it.
You are a coach, not a personal assistant, personal planner, or daytimer.
Now, here’s the thing, if you are willing to limit yourself to helping only 20 clients at a time, when you have inside of you the ability to change possibly millions of lives (I mean, how many people NEED what you help with?), then you shouldn’t probably do group coaching.
But what if you knew there were 1000 people RIGHT NOW in your circles whom you could significantly help – as long as THEY would be personally responsible for their results?
So yes, 1-1 coaching gets better results. But it’s not because of the teaching (think about it, if you have 20 clients, over time you work with all of your clients on the same 95% of the material you work with everyone else on, right?) So that means that only 5% of your individually – coached material is unique.
So why are you doing 1-1 coaching for the 5% difference? Why not just do a group coaching session instead that teaches the 95%, then open the call up for group questions and answers, and anyone that needs a unique 5% solution, can speak with you personally?
When you do that, you open yourself to being able to genuinely HELP 100-1000 people instead of being limited to your own ability to deliver 20 hours (or less) of quality 1-1 each week?
(And before I give you the model – let me say this – maybe you have 100 -1000 group coaching clients, PLUS 1-1 clients who really need the personal attention because they want to do much, much more than you teach most clients, and they genuinely need more personal attention to go over and above your average client. They are willing to pay more for your time. And you are willing to coach 2-5 1-1 clients at one time. And that’s fine. My belief, though, is that the bulk of your coaching can – and should – be done in a group environment. Read on to see how easy it is.)
Here’s the model:
–> One group coaching call 60-90 minutes per week.
On this call, you teach a topic for 45 minutes. The rest of the time is spent coaching, answering questions, etc. The clients learn EXACTLY what they need to learn, and they get to talk with you just like it were 1-1 – but you aren’t doing the teaching 1-1.
–> After the call, you send a recording of the call to your clients via autoresponder. This takes 5 minutes.
Each week, you record the 45 minutes of training you do, and add it to the autoresponder campaign you have created for new clients, so all new clients sequentially get exposed to every lesson you have ever taught.
This allows you to literally duplicate yourself, as you only ever teach one topic once, and anytime a client needs instruction on an already-taught topic you just send them to that recording.
And they can always come onto the call live.
This total coaching program, with 100-1000 clients only takes 60-90 minutes per week for the actual delivery, plus about 10 minutes per week queuing the emails into your autoresponder delivery for coaching clients.
That is less than 2 hours a week.
You can help hundreds of clients instead of 20.
It only takes you 2 hours a week instead of 20.
And if you REALLY want to work with 2-5 1-1 clients, you can.
Can you see how easy this can be?
It really can be this easy!
It’s what I do.
It’s what my clients do!
And you can too!
Now, maybe you have questions, like these:
1) Well, do I have to offer email access?
Answer: you can if you want. But you don’t have to (and with 1000 clients, you can’t possibly answer all your emails, so with a lot of clients, no, if they want to get a question answered, they simply have to come to the call [which they should come to anyway, right?]) Fair enough?
2) Do I offer skype access? I don’t. Skype is highly distracting to me. Skype is only useful to me for pre-planned specific conversations, where skype would be faster than telephone. But if you are looking at your skype box 24-7, can you say DISTRAAAAACTION!
3) Do you do a webinar or a teleseminar for delivery?
Answer: here’s the thing: I often find that new coaches want to offer webinars for their coaching. They think it is more personal. Then they spend 5 hours a week preparing a powerpoint and realize that 99% of everything they teach could be spoken instead of shown. If you REALLY have to show something, record what you want to show, and send the recording out before the call in an email. Have your clients watch the video before the live call. They can ask questions about anything they want to on the call.
Plus, webinar means you HAVE to be online for the call. It means you have to have a good internet signal. It means you have to transcode the recording, upload a bulky mp4 file, and let’s face it, that can take hours of your time or your assistant’s time. PLUS your client has to WATCH the video each week.
Instead, I use teleseminars. Many reasons.
1) I don’t have to prepare a powerpoint.
2) I don’t have to be online (I have done coaching calls from Costa Rica, on the road, in my car, walking in a neighborhood when I was out of town traveling and my car was in a shop, from a ski resort, and many other places). With a teleseminar, I just call in the dial in number, and presto, I am on the call.
3) The recording is done automatically by my teleseminar provider. That means within 5 minutes of the coaching call being over, I can send an email to my coaching clients with the recording.
I don’t have to upload, download, transcode, deal with 400 MB, nothing.
If I don’t want to, I don’t have to think about my coaching call until next week.
The system is easy, when implemented the way I have just described.
You can easily coach 100 – 1000 clients in a productive group coaching call, 2 hours a week total involvement from you, the entire program runs almost completely on autopilot, except for 2 hours a week from you.
And you have the rest of your week to live, to focus on getting new clients, and to truly enjoy the entreprenuerial life you thought you would have by now!