My business is YOU: the benefits of working with freelance coach
Marketing strategy: I don’t do any of this crap. I just find stock images and bung them into blogposts ;)
I am a terrible small businessman.
You'd think that after over 10 years as a freelance public speaking and accent coach, I would not just be good at being a coach - I'd be good at all the 'other stuff'.
The stuff you have to be good at to run a thriving business: marketing, sales, business development, web design, networking, entrepreneurship.... (plus I’m my own IT support, bookkeeper, tax accountant. Yes I still do my own tax return).
I had to face up to how bad I was at ‘business’, a couple of years ago.
Long story short: I had stopped taking on new clients in order to focus on family and voluntary work; not long after that, I split up with my partner and the mother of my children, and had to set up home on my own.
I found myself with only a handful of clients, no new business coming in - and lots of new bills to pay!
What's a struggling coach to do ? Yep - get coaching.
I worked with small business coach Marisa Guthrie on a plan for how to revive my practice (I much prefer the term 'practice' to 'business' for reasons that will become clear) and find much-needed motivation for how to approach 'the other stuff'.
Marisa’s great. Everything is going much better since I worked with her: I'm busy with a large and growing number of clients, and I can pay those bills - just about.
So I’m a slightly less terrible small businessman. I still hate marketing.
Why am I telling you all this?
Is this 'useful' to you? Why I hate marketing
This blog- as Marisa advised me - is supposed to provide you with useful insights that will help, inspire, motivate, entertain you - and make you want to book a course with me, right?
This is marketing - we all know it. And I hate marketing, so I feel like I'm trying to sabotage it while simultaneously hoping it'll work. So yeah, do book a free taster session with me!
(Side note: I love this personal manifesto on marketing by the productivity coach and author Graham Allcott, who, as well as being an inspiration and mentor for how to actually be GREAT at running a business, is one of my oldest and best friends)
To be brutally honest, I find running a public speaking business - sorry, PRACTICE - boring.
But I really really like public speaking and accent reduction coaching!
‘Bad at business’ is my USP
Here's why I think it's worth being honest with you about all this: being a bad businessman is my USP.
Because I’m really not interested in anything apart from being a great public speaking and accent reduction coach.
One thing I said to Marisa in our first meeting was, 'I have no interest in becoming the UK's most successful public speaking coach'.
It’s not that I’m lazy - I'm very interested in becoming the UK's BEST public speaking and accent reduction coach! I take my work seriously and give as much time and attention as I can to help my clients achieve their goals and sound the way they want to sound.
But 'most successsful', ie. with the highest turnover, the biggest-selling courses, the highest brand recognition? Nah.
Then I'd have to spend less time coaching, and more time on 'the other stuff' - marketing, product development, managing a team of coaches, et cetera.
What this means for you, if you work with me, is that I'm focused on YOU - YOU are my business.
My competitors
Big Coaching: some of my competitors have a whole team of people just to churn out marketing copy like this :)
Have you noticed how some of my competitors - big companies with swish offices in expensive areas of central London - have a LOT of options to choose from?
They offer individual packages, group programs, corporate schemes, separate bundles for interview skills, presentation skills, elocution, accent reduction... at several different price points...
Business on this scale doesn't come cheap: the rent on those posh offices, the dozens of coaches, the team of full-time support staff whose salaries need paying... they have to keep the new customers coming in order to cover all these overheads. And I’m sure the founders and owners aren’t just scraping by…
So the marketing is slick, and takes no prisoners. And the fees are pretty high.
That's just the genteel end of the market. Have you seen how they market public speaking training in the US??
I like Tony Robbins; I like Vinh Giang - he's very entertaining on Instagram.
But their courses are big-ticket purchases; the marketing in relentless and in-your-face.
It has to be this way - theses guys are doing business in the multi-millions.
But the truth is, the coaching and courses on offer from these big outfits can have a bit of a factory feel - the coaches are nice people with good skills, the main guy (almost always a guy!) has star quality, but you the client are a number on a very big spreadsheet.
I'm not knocking success - well, I am, a bit. Sour grapes, I'm sure.
But at the scale I operate on, it really is all about you. My spreadsheet is pretty small. I know everyone's name, what you want, what your experience has been in speaking situations over the last week, and your particular quirks, that I've adapted my coaching to accommodate.
That's the way I like it, because like I say, I really only enjoy the coaching bit. Not the other stuff.
It's reflected in my fees.
My fees aren't exactly cheap. Buy cheap, get cheap! I'm worth every penny haha. Book a free taster session and you'll see :)
But seriously - your money's not going on slick marketing, or high-end office rental, or buying me my seocnd Porsche. (To clarify: freelance speaking coaches are not rich enough to drive one Porsche, let alone two).
It's how I make my living, and that's it.
When you book a course with me, you're getting ME: my time, my 10+ years of expertise and experience; you're getting my EAR.
I can hear what's going on with you. I can hear what you need, and what you don't need.
I'm not going to waste my time or your money on anything that doesn't help you become a better, more confident communicator.
So that's my USP - me. And my business is YOU.
If you like the sound of that, or you know someone who would - contact me, and lets take it from there.
Thanks for reading :)