FIVE WAYS TO CREATE A QUICK CASH BOOST FOR YOUR COACHING BUSINESS

Last week we asked coaches to tell us their biggest challenge right now. The response was overwhelming, you told us you needed more cash in your business, and you needed it NOW. So we’re doing our best to help. Over the next few days, I will be posting ways for you to get a quick cash boost in your coaching business and we begin today with cash boost #1:

Come along on Friday at @2pm EST to my Live Masterclass Fast Coaching Cash: How I created an $88K cash injection in my coaching business in just 2 days. Click here to register

No matter what kind of coaching business you’re in, it’s inevitable that you’re going to face cash flow issues at one time or another. You might experience a jump in expenses or a profit shortfall. 

A sudden change in the market could affect your bottom line or, as a coach who is also a small business owner just getting started for the first time, you might find that you’ve slipped up on your planning and now you’re out of cash.

Since cash flow woes are bound to happen, you should have a plan for effectively dealing with them to mitigate the hassle and damage they cause. There are many creative ways to combat this problem — over the next few days you’ll learn a few things you can do that are quick, easy, and ready for you to implement today. 

Cash Boost #1: Host a Sale

Businesses often run sales when they need a quick boost of cash. You can offer select clients a special, one-time discount on a product or service to get extra income immediately. 

One way to do this is to offer the sale only to email subscribers, site members, Facebook group members, or some other group of people as a “thank you.” This increases the value of the sale because it’s only available to exclusive members. It also allows you to control the sale when you know how many people will be eligible to take advantage of it. 

There are other ways you can place limits on your sale. One is to offer a discount for a limited time only. You can also limit the number of products or service packages you’re offering. Imposing a limit not only allows you to control how many you sell but also gives the sale some urgency. People will want to buy now while the deal lasts. 

To make a sale even more effective, tie it in with a holiday or seasonal event. Choose a special day that’s important to your audience, keeping in mind what holidays are celebrated in the country where your target market is based. Every day is “National (something) Day,” so get on Google and see what you can find that’s appropriate. 

If there isn’t a good holiday available, you can invent an occasion for your sale. You could celebrate the anniversary of your business or something personal like a family member’s birthday.

Next Steps:

> List three ideas for limited-time sales you could run right now. 

> Schedule and run one of your sales ideas. Record your results and decide how you’d do it differently next time.

Cash Boost #2 - Make a VIP Offer 

It’s easy to see how lowering prices with a sale can result in fast cash, but there are also methods where charging more can actually earn you short-term money. One way to do this is to make a VIP offer where you present a higher-value item to select members of your audience.

People are willing to pay more for a product or service as long as it offers true value and a solution to their problems. For your VIP offer, you can give your clients a high-end customized solution. The price is higher, but this item goes above and beyond your usual offerings. 

There are many ways to do this depending on the nature of your business and its offerings. If you have a coaching service, you could offer a half-day coaching session that goes beyond your usual one-hour sessions. If you coach groups, you could offer a one-on-one session customized to meet the needs of an individual member of the group. 

Think about your coaching services, you could charge extra for “priority service,” where you give your client priority scheduling, for example. If you offer any done-for-you services alongside your coaching you could offer a faster turnaround. For coaching products, your priority service might feature next-day delivery. 

If you sell coaching resources, you could bundle a number of products together and sell them at a higher price. Add exclusive content to give it added value and target it to a certain segment of your market so that it’s highly specific and relevant.

Customized products are a great option for a VIP offer. Hold consultations with clients to see exactly what they need from you and then deliver the product they desire. 

To get ideas for a VIP offer, take a look at any feedback you’ve received from clients. What do they want more of? What additional service do they ask you about? Wherever there’s interest like this, it’s a good indication that people would be willing to pay more. 

Since a VIP offer requires that you go above and beyond, limit it somehow or it could turn into too much work and you’ll be overloaded. Choose which VIP clients to make the offer to or put a time limit or item limit on the deal. This also helps to market your VIP offer because it becomes exclusive and limited. 

Next Steps: 

• After reading the examples above, what type of extra service can you offer your clients?
• If it makes sense for your business, go ahead and set up a limited offer for a service you want to provide as a VIP deal. Record your results and decide whether to make this an ongoing offer.

Cash Boost #3 - Add Upsells to Your Shopping Cart 

You can sell more by adding upsells to your shopping cart. This is a technology solution that’s automated so you can boost your sales without any extra effort on your part (but of course, you need to have a funnel in place first!)

On your checkout page, people will see similar products to what they’re buying or products that go along with their current purchases. The shopping cart system allows them to easily add and pay for them. 

The key to successful upselling is to offer something the person is sure to want. It must be a product that adds value, solves a problem, and is relevant to the client. Rather than pushing an additional sale on them, you’re simply making it easier for them to get what they need in faster and smarter ways. 

The upsell product could be something similar or an item that clients usually purchase along with the product they’re originally purchasing. It could also be an upgrade or fuller version of the one they’re already buying.

A good place to start looking for ideas is to review your sales data. Look at your top-sellers or the products that get the highest reviews. These are the products from your catalog that are easiest to sell and thus easiest to upsell.

You can also look at products that are usually purchased together or brainstorm the kinds of items people might want to buy together. For example, if you sell blog content, you might add social media content as an upsell, explaining that you can use social media posts to link back to the blog posts. 

On your checkout page where you’re offering the upsell product, make sure you have space for some good sales copy that explains to the client the unique value the upsell offers. Explain how it can be used with the original purchase to make things easier for them.

One tip to help upsell more is to offer a free shipping threshold. If people purchase X amount or over, they get free shipping. Set this threshold so that one product doesn’t reach it, but the purchase of a second will. This adds free shipping as an extra incentive to buy.

You can set up your upsell through your e-commerce platform. 

Next Steps:

• Look at your product lineup and determine which products are relevant to each other and which are your best-sellers.
• Set up a shopping cart upsell with your e-commerce provider.

Cash boost #4: Improve Your Payment Plans 

You’ll get more sales if you offer more ways for clients to buy from you. If you only offer limited payment methods, this could be a barrier to sales. Instead, offer multiple ways of paying and make it easier with payment plans.

How many payment methods do you take? Look at online payment methods such as PayPal. If you haven’t recently, you might want to conduct a survey of the most popular online payment methods being used right now. It might have changed since you first set up your e-commerce site. 

You can also take it directly to your clients and ask them what payment methods they’d like to see you offer. This is even better because your market’s tastes might tend toward certain methods over others. 

Another way to make it easier to buy from you is to offer different payment plans. For example, offer monthly payments instead of a lump sum, especially for high-ticket coaching. Break up payments into small installments that are easy to make. You can further boost sales by offering a discount for clients who pay in full at once. 

This is also something you can ask your clients directly. Base your decision on their feedback and what you’re capable of offering. Keep in mind that installment plans will require a little more bookkeeping work. You’ll need to have a way to accept recurring payments and keep track of who has and who hasn’t made payments. 

Once you decide on your alternative payment plans, create material that explains clearly and in detail how it works. It can get confusing for your clients and you need to make sure they understand.

Once you implement your payment methods, monitor to see what’s popular and what’s working best. This will give you ideas on other options you can offer in the future. 

Next Steps: 

• Survey your clients and determine what payment plans or methods they’d prefer.
• Look at your business and determine what payment options you can offer. If it makes sense, go ahead and set one up. Be sure to track any changes in sales you see as a result.

Cash Boost #5 - Raise Your Prices

Many coaches underprice their offers. You may not realize that your clients will pay more for your coaching products and services if they offer unique value. We tend to err on the side of caution and lower prices in order to undercut competitors. 

A small raise in your rates can make a huge difference to your bottom line. Even a couple of dollars added to each purchase could grow to be hundreds or thousands with a volume of orders. For you, raising your prices means you get compensated more for the hard work you do.

It’s generally best to raise prices gradually. A huge jump could cost you clients and it’s much harder to justify. Small increases over time will have less impact.

Announce the price hike well ahead of time. Choose a date when it will go into effect and let your clients know as soon as possible. Send reminders as the date approaches. In addition to added income from the new price, you’ll also likely receive an influx of orders from people who want to buy as much as possible at the old price.

Explain the reason for the price hike clearly. If there’s no reason, tell your clients that it’s in order to keep up with rising costs of labor or raw materials. It’s expected that as a business grows, its rates go up. 

As you explain the reasons for the increase, drill down on the unique benefits your products or services offer. Create excellent marketing content that reminds clients of the unique benefits they receive from buying from you instead of somebody else. This will explain why it’s worth the higher rate. 

There are a few ways you can further soften the blow. One is to add extras. Throw in some freebies or other added benefits to make people feel good initially about paying more. Make sure it’s not something that costs you more to produce. 

You can also take this opportunity to offer a tiered pricing structure or payment plans. Tiered pricing works because you can offer options; for example, your coaching program can have three tiers with more features as you go up. Your clients have to pay more now, but they also get something more uniquely suited to their needs. 

You may choose to lock in pricing for existing clients and only raise rates for new business. This ensures that you won’t lose clients.

Next Steps: 

• Conduct market research and determine a higher price to charge. Consider your target market’s preferences, competitors’ pricing, and the cost of production.
• Create and implement a plan for increasing your prices where it makes sense to do so.

The key to implementing these cash flow solutions is to approach it from the mindset of helping. Think to yourself, “What can I do right now that will help more clients and result in a boost of cash for my coaching business?” Approach it with this attitude, and you’ll always choose solutions that work to get you the income you need. 

Why not come along to my Live Masterclasses happening next week (November 9th and 11th 2020) Fast Coaching Cash: How I created an $88K cash injection in my coaching business in just 2 days. 

Click here to register for Monday 9 Nov 2pm EST

Click here to register for Wednesday 11 Nov 2pm EST