Academy for Coaching Parents

Let’s Start With Defining Your Success

by | Jul 14, 2018 | You are an Entrepreneur

How do you define SUCCESS?  One defnition is success is achieving your financial goals through your online coachinfg or consulting business.

Not a Destination

The problem is, success isn’t a destination. Success is a journey with stops along the way.  Being successful is moving toward your goals, this the way to achieve it is to be constantly moving forward with the goals in the distance.  Your happiness isn’t dependent upon actually reaching that goal, however.  Your success is based on the sense of accomplishment you derived from having closed the distance and achieved that goal.

The bottom line is that your definition of success is on the path to get the things that you want, one at a time, and to continue to improve yourself and to inspire yourself to reach the next level.

That brings us to the framework for those goals that you want to achieve – your habits for success. The practices that you cultivate will result in the success you desire. Habits for success are clearly defined, well thought out and designed to take you to the goals that you have set for yourself. To understand what a pattern for success is, set some goals first. But for demonstration purposes, here are three different examples because it can be difficult to know how to identify the successful habit.

The reason that people have problems becoming successful is that they have not figured out exactly what it means to be a success!  Defining it for yourself is the first step in achieving it. AT ACPI, we have varied goals for reaching our audience as well as monthly financial goals to tell us we are on target.

Defining Success

The problem is...success isn’t really a destination. Success is a journey with stops along the way. Those stops are the destinations where you want to arrive, but there is no final destination.  Being successful and happy is moving toward your goals, and the only way to achieve it is to be constantly moving forward.

You are going to want more, and that’s okay. You set another goal – a higher purpose – of being able to attend charity dinners where the price of a plate is over $1000 for example. Your happiness isn’t dependent upon the actual goal achievement. It is based upon your hard work and your sense of accomplishment derived from having achieved that goal

The bottom line is that your definition of success is never a specific destination. Preferably, your destiny is being on the path to get the things that you want and continue to improve yourself and inspire yourself to reach more and more goals.

That brings us to the framework for those goals that you want to achieve – your habits for success. The practices that you will be teaching yourself result in the success you desire. Habits for success are clearly defined, well thought out and designed to take you to the goals that you have set for yourself. To understand what a pattern for success is complete, you set some goals first.

Five Lessons from Warren Buffet

You might be wondering what super-investor Warren Buffett can teach you about life. You might be thinking that he knows a lot about money, but that has little to do with being an expert on life. You might be surprised. Warren is famous for his simple lifestyle and love of his work. Let these lessons in life be a guide for contentment in your own life:

1. Focus on what you love. Warren has a beautiful, modest home, and drives a $40,000 car. He could own the most expensive house and vehicles in the world, but he doesn’t. He drinks Coke, buys what he likes, and enjoys a relatively simple life.

Enjoy your life and the things you have. Avoid being concerned about what everyone else has or about what you could have. It’s more satisfying to own one perfect painting than to own ten that don’t thrill you. Seek out the things you love and avoid wasting your time on the rest.

2. Quality is more important than quantity. You only need to make a few right decisions to be incredibly successful. Warren Buffett has hundreds of billions of dollars to invest for himself and others, yet he frequently only owns 20 or so stocks. Be picky. Be happy with a smaller quantity.

Warren has a very famous line that states, “Your financial wealth would be much greater if you could only make 20 investments in your lifetime. You would make sure they were great if you had only 20 chances.”

3. Do what you love.  Warren has said that the essential part of success and contentment is doing what you love every day. That’s why he’s never stopped investing and making money. If you’re spending your time doing what you love, you continue doing the same thing regardless of how much money you have.

You might not enjoy the career you have right now. But are you doing anything to change that? Do you have a plan? Imagine how much more content you would be if you enjoyed going into work each day.

4. Mind your own business. You needn’t be concerned with what the competition is doing. Avoid being influenced by everyone else. If you do what everyone else is doing, you’ll simply be average. Avoid comparing yourself to everyone else. Follow your intuition. Most of us are overly concerned with others. We’re worried about how we compare. We’re concerned about their opinions of us. They’re probably thinking the same things. Get yourself out of that loop and do your job.

5. Stick to your talents. Warren is famous for shunning high-tech investments, even when they were practically a sure thing. He has stated that he doesn’t understand them well enough to invest in them. Stay in your areas of strength. You don’t need to do everything. Focus on what you know well.

We usually enjoy doing the things that showcase our strengths. That’s human nature. It also makes life easier. Work on your weaknesses, but leverage your strengths.

You might be thinking, “Yeah, anyone could be content with $50 billion.” But that’s not true. Studies have shown that happiness and income correlate to $75,000. Above that income level, happiness does not increase.

Super wealthy people became wealthy mainly because they were comfortable living a particular way and kept moving forward to those goals or achievements they had scheduled into life. You can be just as content, even if you never amass a mega-fortune. Aim to increase the amount of contentment in your life. It might not be an issue of money, possessions, or the other things that most people think to lead to happiness.

 

 

Coach Online–Marketing Tips and Ideas to Make Money Online

by | Sep 13, 2017 | Business Training & Marketing Courses

To make money online as a parent-family coach or an ACPI Trainer, you need to market your business online. The following marketing tips and ideas will guide your marketing efforts.

  1. When you decide who you want to work with, keep narrowing down your ideal client to a specific niche or group. Don’t send a marketing message to a general group. Specifically target the demographic you want to work with.

Narrow it down like this example:  Dads....of teens....preparing to graduate from high school....who need a Core Temperament Inventory.....to consider career choices.

2.  Talk about your business everywhere. Network with prospective clients. Give speeches at conferences. Clearly articulate your value when talking about your business in a video presentation for online viewing. 

3. Write about your business in blog posts, newsletters, magazines and newspapers. A case study presents your strengths in helping a client. You could also discuss group coaching and when and how you offer services. Sell value! Send out a press release when you add a new service or you are just starting your business.

4. Be active on social media. Participate by answering questions, providing helpful information and being authentic. Over the last three years and the changes made to social media offering, Facebook still remain primary. Facebook also bought Instagram, and placing an ad on both sites bring traffic to you and your web site. 

5. Create a professional looking website. Include your services, testimonials and an about you page as well as the home page. 

6. While I do not advocate free sessions, you will notice in reading blogs that it is a popular way to meet new possible clients. Give away a free coaching session and see which  prospective clients  go on to purchase a bigger package.

7. Build a strong client list. Keep in contact with them, asking for referrals and testimonials.

8. Send out a regular newsletter and update your blog regularly.

9. Comment on other blogs and social media channels with relevant information. These types of connections, formed through social media, are reciprocated when you support others and ask for the same. 

10. Get interviewed by a well-known person in your niche. Promote your coaching services during the interview.

11. Create YouTube videos with helpful information. Include links to your coaching services.

12. Include a link to your website on everything, including your email signature.

Marketing is a necessity in any business for making money online. It is how clients will find you.

The Next Step

Making money online with your coaching business can be done in many ways. It’s about how you package yourself as an expert, the marketing plan you create to get the word out about your services and the different types of services and products you offer. Your next step is to decide on your market, plan out your marketing, determine how you are going to make money, and begin attracting clients.

Coaching Online–Attracting Clients

by | Aug 1, 2017 | Learn about Coaching

Making money online with your coaching business means you will need clients. Attracting those clients could be difficult, but with practice the process can become easier.

Attracting Clients

Step 1 – Know Your Target Market

Narrow down your target market. Don’t try to get just any client. Choose a specific group or area of expertise that fit those people you want to coach or work with.  Shape your message to serve this specific segment. Use the words they use for emotional topics or soft skills, Talk about the specific benefits you offer that provides solutions to their challenges.

Examples of target markets:

  • Realtors who are faced with a lot of competition in a slow market.
  • Hair salon owners wanting to find a way to stand out among other salons or who are overwhelmed with their work.
  • Parenting coaches choosing to work with a special needs segment of the school population.
  • A Family Coach who want to coach mothers and children through the divorce process.

Can you begin to see how attracting clients is your task and focus most every day. An this process could be automated. 

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Step 2 – Have confidence in your coaching service

Show you believe in your services and value your time in everything you say and do. Clients will see your value as well. How do you act or speak with confidence? Do you speak about how you offer services? Then switch the discussion to the vapes and emotional benefits your clients feel and experience when they work with you. 

Step 3 – Connect with prospects    

When talking to prospects, really listen and connect with them. Let them that feel you understand. Take the time to let your prospective clients know you as a person. Become known as someone who is friendly, helpful and willing to go the extra mile.

Step 4 – Be where they gather

Go to the forums, meetings and social media outlets where your prospective clients are hanging out. Interact with them. Network with them at events.

Step 5 – Show yourself as the expert

Get your knowledge out among the crowd by answering questions and helping others in the places where your clients are gathering. Write articles and books on your niche. Use social media as a way to create a buzz around your coaching business. Use Twitter, Facebook and your own blog to help spread the word about your services. 

Volunteer to speak at networking events and conferences to build your reputation as an expert. Choose Facebook Live as a venue for coaching or educating prospective clients. Ask for testimonials from current clients to build your authority. Form alliances with other coaches and people in your niche.

Step 6 – Ask for referrals

Ask your current and past clients for referrals. Everyone knows of a friend, colleague or family member who might be a good fit for your services.

Step 7 – Create a compelling marketing message

Your marketing message, tagline and elevator speech should grab the attention of prospects and make them want to call you.

Step 8 – Create your services package

Package your services, what you offer and what you know into courses and systems that make the prospective client take notice and want to work with you. Your coaching packages should be positioned so they sell themselves also apart from packaged programs.

Step 9 – Create a marketing plancoach-training-global

Create a specific plan to help you reach your prospective clients. Don’t put all your eggs in the same basket. Use several different types of marketing. For example, some methods that a parenting coach might use to become better known in their community would be to

  • offer a free parenting talk at the local library
  • write for a local parenting newspaper, to magazine

 

Step 10 – Learn to close the sale

Once you have attracted your ideal client, age next step is making a sale. To do that, learn how to close the sale properly so you don’t scare a person away or leave them hanging by not providing the next step. 

Attracting your ideal client gets easier the more you do it. Spending time in the right places and using the right marketing plan can help.

1. Storytelling for Business

by | May 16, 2017 | Storytelling in Your Business

Stories work in marketing, and especially in coaching. Each parent you coach has their personal story and their parent story. You will find the different story themes in commercials and in the way brands present themselves. Storytelling is especially helpful in parent coaching and family coaching. Each person has their story, their version of how they happened.

Sharing and telling stories work well for online marketers.

The hardest part of telling a story is figuring out what to say. It's not easy to come up with a good storyline when you're staring at a blank screen. The solution is to stick with one of the tried and true basic story plots and tweak from there. Here are three of the most popular ones.

1. Good Vs. Evil

1. Let's start with the big good vs. evil theme. Most fairy tales use this storyline as do fiction books like Harry Potter series. You'll also see in television programs that the story line follows a pattern.

You accept a challenge
You face adversity In coaching, the adversary may be a quality in a client to name and tame, or perhaps you have had a personal problem with procrastination that you want to reprogram for better business success.

2. A second pattern is a transformation. Similar to the previous, this plot features an inner change, instead of changing the outer form. You may find this theme often in your clients. You may have your personal transformation story.

Here is an example of my conversion story:

I had waited too long to seek treatment for a growing, painful condition with my right ovary. I thought I could handle it, but I had no clear understanding of the problem. My new, young, inexperienced gynecologist explained to me that the ovary had turned in on itself and was necrotic, in short, dead. She scheduled my surgery immediately with her professor, also a surgeon.

After surgery, I died in the clinical sense. I had closed my eyes and instantly opened my eyes in brilliant white light in which I floated. I was delighted to be there, experiencing the transition with consciousness. The experience made evident that I was to "take on a new task," explained the voice. The result was my formulation of the Academy for Coaching Parents International which took about three years to get off the ground.

2. The Reluctant Hero Returns

This storyline should sound familiar too. The boy leaves home, builds his fortune while he's away, or learns something important. Then the hero comes back to share the discovered wealth or knowledge. Along the way, he might just save the day. Does that sound like a Western or romantic comedy you've seen lately?

With this storyline, you can share your personal story of how you discovered your chosen niche. Maybe you're the gluten-free expert because your child was diagnosed with Celiac Disease, and you and your family had to find a way to live with it.

3. Rags To Riches

This storyline also shouldn't come as a surprise. You've seen it in a million forms from Cinderella to Shark Tank. The idea is to share how you went from nothing to where you're at today. It's the quintessential American story.

This storyline works well when you're sharing how you've made your money online. If you're marketing to marketers or business to business, this is the storyline you'll use more than any other. The story line is not limited to the "making money'" market. Tweak the same storyline and share:
1. how you found more time in your day,
2. how you organize your office or your writing,
3. how you found your faith, your courage, or your self-esteem.

Any journey of growth could become a "rags to riches storyline.

What is your story? Which category for storytelling best suits you? Please answer in the comments below so I can learn what stories you would like to read.

Business Planning With Values and Vision

by | Dec 16, 2016 | Business Training & Marketing Courses

Do you have an online business plan or are you flying by the seat of your pants? A yearly planning document that reflects your values and goals is the most useful tool in your business arsenal.

Your mission statement and your business objectives provide a road map that keeps your successful business moving in the right direction. However, the map is not enough. You also need a compass to stay the course and realize you are on track. Your values and vision comprise the compass.

A statement of values is a set of principles that guide the way you operate your business. For example, whenever you have an important decision to make, like setting a price for your services or for a product you sell, you would review your decision according to your values. The values and decision are congruent, not at odds. This process means you won't question your decisions or wonder if you are doing the right thing. You operate your business from a core of integrity.

A vision statement is a precise set of words that tells people what your successful online business does and how you do it. The vision defines what you hope to achieve.

The planning I suggest is a simple blueprint for how you intend to establish or grow your business. Use your business
plan to map out your goals, action plans, and financials while significantly increasing your chances for success.

Business Planning Benefits

1. A yearly business plan organizes you to take stock of your progress, examine what is working, and coordinate goals and actions for the upcoming year. Almost all of the very successful business owners will tell you that they create business goals and action plans on a regular basis like each month.

architecture concept. architecture design and model my own

architecture concept. architecture design and model my own

2. A business plan reflects your most profitable path.

3. A plan shows you where are making mistakes or losing profits.

Planning a business includes these sections:

1. Description of your business model
2. Who are your customers, the target market?
3. What do you offer? How is different from others who offer the same thing?
4. What are your specific, measurable goals that you want to achieve and when?
5. What marketing strategies will you put in place and what is their timeline?
6. What are the tasks you need to complete and when?
7. How much is all of this going to cost on a monthly basis, and what kind of revenue will you expect? How long will it take to break even and make a profit?

In summary:

A business plan is a living, breathing document that will grow and change along with your business. When first starting a new business, determine if you have a financially viable idea.

At the beginning of each year, it helps you to plan out your goals and strategies. Of course, if you need to raise money, people will want to see a detailed plan.

You need to revisit your business plan regularly. Why? Market conditions change. Laws or regulations change. Technology changes your results too, and this should be reflected in your plan.

Your business plan serves as your blueprint for success. Write it and live it for your best results.

What If you have a great business idea but still wondering about how to create a viable business plan?

Register for Successful Coaching Business Set-Up In Systemized Steps. This course will not only help you make a plan of activities, but it will take you step by step from planning, designing, marketing and making money out of your business.

Successful Coaching Business Set-Up In Systemized Steps