How to Get out of Overwhelm as a Coach

Most coaches I know are feeling pretty overwhelmed with all the things they have to do.

They’re not clear on who their dream customer is.

They have too many offers.

They do too many things to try and get awareness and leads.

They’re not clear on how to enroll people into their programs.

They use too many different softwares that they have to glue together with zaps and rubber bands.

They work too hard for their clients and end up burning out, even though they love to coach.

Do any of these resonate with you?

There are three types of overwhelm that I routinely see coaches suffer from:

1. Strategy overwhelm

2. Client overwhelm

3. Systems overwhelm

Let’s look at them one at a time.

Strategy Overwhelm

When it comes to strategy, most coaches have too many offers, they’re doing too many things to try and get attention and get leads, and often they can’t decide on what type of client to go after.

They’re also not clear on how they want to do the sales to get people into their programs.

Now, in the beginning, you’re going to be experimenting. That’s okay.

But you really want to nail your Five Ones.

The Five Ones say that if you focus on…

1. One avatar

2. One traffic source

3. One offer

4. One enrollment mechanism

5. For one year

You can hit a million dollars in revenue.

Until you’ve hit your million dollar mark, don’t even think of adding a second avatar, a second traffic source, a second offer, or a second enrollment mechanism.

Coaches who aren’t making as much money as they’d like think they need to add more offers, more products, more avatars, more traffic sources … all in an effort to broaden their market so they can bring in more clients.

When the exact opposite is the case.

You need to narrow down. Be specific. Choose.

It’s not about making the right decision.

It’s about making a decision, and making it right.

You can make any of them work.

Pick one, and stick with it, till you hit the million dollars.

I know how hard this can be.

But with the right mentoring and guidance, you absolutely can make any of them work.

If someone else has succeeded with it, you know it’s possible.

Then it’s just figuring out the details.

Client Overwhelm

As much as we coaches love coaching and love our clients, sometimes it can be a bit much.

When you’re doing a lot of 1:1 work with clients, it’s easy to burn out.

You find yourself saying the same things over and over again.

You know this feeling of something absolutely brilliant just flowing out of you in a client session, and don’t know where it came from. It feels amazing!

But now you’re bummed that more people won’t get to hear your brilliance, because you’re saying it in a private 1:1 session!

Some coaches not only do 1:1 work, but they’re also doing the work for their clients. A done-for-you type model.

And yes, you can raise your rates so you get paid better for your coaching and can maybe take on fewer clients.

But it’s fundamentally not scalable.

What is scalable is doing group coaching.

Craft a group program where you can work with all your clients at the same time.

You deliver templates, frameworks, live group coaching, and a community.

They get not just you, but they also get each other.

Which means, as the number of clients grows, so does the value of your program.

If you’re not currently doing group coaching, or if a group coaching program is not the core of your business, then this must be your priority, and it should definitely be the “One offer” in your Five Ones.

Systems Overwhelm

It’s pretty common these days to have five, seven, nine, or even more different softwares to run your coaching business.

1. Website host like Wordpress or Wix

2. Email marketing software or ESP (Email Service Provider) like MailChimp or ConvertKit

3. Shopping cart like Shopify or Samcart

4. Course platform or LMS like Teachable or Kajabi

5. Video host like Vimeo or Wistia

6. Funnel software or page builder like ClickFunnels or LeadPages

7. Community software like Circle or MightyNetworks

8. Scheduler like Calendly or SavvyCal

9. Survey tool like TypeForm or SurveyMonkey

10. Affiliate tracking tool like Tapfiliate or Post Affiliate Pro

11. Sales Pipeline like Pipedrive or Close.com

12. CRM like Hubspot or Ontraport

13. Zapier to tie them all together!

There’s some overlap on this list, as some of these tools do more than one thing.

But then again, there are others that are also commonly used that I didn’t list.

You see the list gets pretty long pretty quick.

It not only adds up to a hefty monthly bill.

It also adds a lot of extra work and mental bandwidth for you.

First, there’s the decision fatigue from deciding on all of these tools.

For each category listed, there are numerous alternatives, and they each have their strengths and weaknesses, and some of them span multiple categories.

You have to evaluate them all, then decide on which one you’ll use, then figure out how they integrate with the rest of your stack.

And then comes the actual integration.

Do they talk natively to each other, or do you have to use Zapier to “zap” them together?

This is another headache, and the connections are brittle.

They’ll break, especially when you’re on vacation, and it’s up to you (or your team if you have one, and if they can figure it out), to fix it.

And then there’s the mental bandwidth of having to switch between the softwares, each one doing things a little differently.

It creates a lot of context switching where you have to change work style every few minutes.

If you’re uploading your logo in more than four places, it might be time to look for a smarter alternative.

With Simplero, you can literally do it all in one platform.

With NO zaps.

No glue.

No rubber bands.

Your entire business in one place.

Like finding your home on the interent.

And all the parts talk seamlessly with each other.

Your clients only have to enter their information once, and you have it in your database.

You can connect their opt-in to their application form to them scheduling a strategy session with you.

Easy. Clean. Simple.

Start your Simplero trial today if you’re ready to make your business and your life simpler.

–Calvin