Ep #12: Organic Marketing

Welcome to the Make Money as a Life Coach® podcast where sales expert and master coach Stacey Boehman teaches you how to make your first 2K, 20K, and 200K using her proven formula.

Hey Divas. Divos. I have some Divos now in my 2K for 2K group. I don’t call it Diva Business School anymore so we have men joining. Saying what’s up to you too. Welcome to episode 12.

Are you ready? We’re going to talk about organic marketing today. My definition of organic marketing. But first, I want to give my client Hannah another shout-out. So I’ve already talked about her before, but I’m giving you another update, another shout-out because I’m really just so excited. I love when people start getting on fire and everything starts working and I have seen her work so hard in our 2K group and just ask for so much help and be willing to redo things and keep trying, and I’m just so excited.

So Hannah posted in our 2K for 2K group, “I just signed another client, which means I made $6000 in the last month. This is more than I made in the entire year last year in my business. I started here almost three months ago and it took me a while to actually see obvious results, but it’s truly happening now. If you are new here, be patient, dedicated, alright with failing again and again, and keep believing. I plan to keep it all up.”

Hannah, I’m so excited for you. This is so fun watching this unfold, and it’s even more fun when I’m in it and I’m coaching my clients and I’m seeing that they’re just in the work and they’re not getting the results and they’re trying over and over. And my and the mentors gave her some very tough feedback. She had posted like, this is my offer.

I don’t remember if it was an email or something. I think it was emails to her list that she was posting and we just saved the pleasantries. We just dove right in and we’re like, do this, don’t do this, don’t say this, take this out. We just went in and that’s just sometimes the fastest – it’s always the fastest way to do it and she took the tough feedback and just implemented and she even said like, it’s been a little bit hard to take this, but it helped her so much.

Listen, sometimes we need to take the tough feedback. Sometimes we need to be triggered and sometimes we need to hear the thing that makes us super angry or frustrated or overwhelmed or whatever is it. We need that. That is a coach’s job is to get in there and not be thinking about our feelings but just help us in the fastest way possible. That is what I’ve been doing for my clients lately.

If you’re in the 2K group, you know what I’m talking about. I like to think of those days where I just get in and do some really hardcore coaching and get out, I’m like, oh I’m on fire today. Alright, so we’re going to dive into organic marketing. I really wanted to do a podcast on organic marketing for a couple of reasons.

Number one, it’s how I built my business, it’s how I teach my clients and it makes them a ton of money. It’s the premise for the 2K for 2K program in the marketing – at least the marketing part of it. But it even bleeds into the way I teach selling too. It’s a very similar concept. You’re going to hear about that next week.

But what I have found is many business coaches use this term like, they use the term organic marketing, and what I have found is it means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. To many, the definition is as simple as marketing you don’t pay for. So there’s marketing you don’t pay for, there’s marketing you do pay for.

So the paid marketing would be Facebook ads or Instagram ads, radio spots, newspapers. Like, you’re paying for leads, and then organic marketing that creates organically is anything that doesn’t involve paid marketing like live streaming on your free Facebook page or your business page or networking events, it’s meeting people out, blogging and attracting people that way, interacting in Facebook groups, or being guests on podcasts.

And many coaches, the way that they teach growing your reach organically is by getting your clients and your following to market for you. The way that I’ve seen organic marketing taught and I see it all the time, like I follow a ton of coaches, a ton of coaches follow me. My Facebook feed is nothing but coaches and a lot of them are business coaches.

I’m in a lot of different Facebook groups, it’s a lot of business coaches, so I see this concept taught a lot and every time I’ve seen it, it is always taught with getting your clients and following to market for you. And that’s through testimonial or through being an affiliate where they get paid to market for you.

But this is a super important distinction for what we’re going to talk about today because this isn’t organic. It’s paid marketing if it’s an affiliate. You are paying for leads. You are paying for affiliates. That’s not organic. That doesn’t mean someone found you organically. They found you because you paid someone to talk about you.

And listen, this doesn’t sit well with me, business coaches who teach their clients to market them and constantly be giving testimonial about them. I want my clients busy marketing themselves. Not me. I want to take responsibility for my own marketing.

So I just think as a business coach, teaching their clients to market them, whether it’s subtle or a little bit on the subconscious, if you are a business coach having your clients affiliate market you or whatever, I just think like, is that truly in service of your clients? It’s different if they reach out and say I want to be an affiliate, and some people do do that.

But I just think it’s not in service of your client because they should be learning how to market themselves. And let me also be clear. That’s not to say you shouldn’t ever give testimonials as a client or ever ask for them as a coach or ever refer people. I totally believe in giving referrals and testimonials freely and abundantly. I believe it in being natural, like, organic, as in it’s my client’s idea if they want to talk about my business, share my podcast, tell someone they should join my 2K for 2K or my 200K, if they want to write a testimonial for me or post one in the 2K group.

You see me reading them, you hear me reading them before the episodes, but I’m just literally taking what people are posting on the page and reading them. I’m not asking for those testimonials and they’re just posting their celebrations and then I’m reading their celebrations on the podcast.

So if someone offers me a testimonial or refers me, that’s amazing. If they feel like truly that’s what they want to do, I do that all of the time for my clients, for my colleagues, I love referring people. But it’s like, one thing when it’s organic, it’s natural, it’s your idea, it’s another when you’re like, being paid to do it or someone’s asking you to do it or you’re asking other people to do it.

And so I’ve just never been a fan of any of this in general ever. And you all hear me, I talk about my coach constantly. I would give her any testimonial she ever wanted. I refer people to her coach certification all the time and my clients tell their colleagues all the time about my program. But I’m not asking them to, and I never ask my clients for referrals either.

So this is what I’ve seen on the market in an extremely brief summation, really more like a rant of things I don’t like. I wanted to give you background for what I’ve seen and experienced but then I’ve deeply thought about my own definition and process of organic marketing. And so I want to be clear; I haven’t merged definitions together or researched a ton. I have really thought about this is what it means to me and it’s the process I teach my 2K for 2K program. This is from my brain, the way that I think about it.

So if this feels like wait, but I’ve never heard this before, I’ve never – this isn’t what other people are teaching, you’re right. It’s not. This is 100% the way that I see the world. And I think it’s why people come to me and finally start making a lot of money is because of the process and the definition that I’m going to give you. My clients finally start feeling alignment for maybe the first time ever, and they aren’t feeling like icky and graspy about marketing themselves anymore.

So here it is. My definition of organic marketing is allowing for the client working with you to be their idea. Letting the client come to you. Just like letting referrals be organic and come naturally from other people. When it is their idea, they are more committed, more inspired into action, and more sold than when it is your idea.

So example, you meet someone online in a Facebook group. You comment on their post in a form of friendship and maybe or maybe not adding value, and you do this all the time in said Facebook group. You show up, you participate, you give value and support, you cheer people on, you build a relationship, you allow friending on your personal pages to be their idea.

So like, they either just interact with you in the group or they love you so much in the group they decide to friend you outside of the group. You allow them to decide if they want to see more about you and scroll through your feed once you’re friends. You allow them to decide to click on your link to your business page or your website or your podcast. You let them decide to engage with the live stream you did that day or the post that you made or the blog that you added.

You let them engage safely without the pressure of trying to get them interested. Then you allow them to take you up on an offer you made on said content that they found out in the world, your blog or your podcast or your live stream or your website. You allow them to want to be on your email list and to sign up for something. You allow them to decide to come to your training. You allow them to come to you and express interest in working together.

And even when they do, you hold space for them to just express their interest without jumping immediately to let’s set up a call. You let them lead. So it might look like this. I’m going to give you a real walk you all the way through it.

So potential client looks you up and engages on your post. You engage back, but be cool. Not like it’s the first person who commented on your stuff in months. Now, for some people it stops here. That’s all they ever do. But you don’t even notice because you’re engaging with so many other new people. You are being responsible for building relationships and offering value.

So they watch your live streams and they start engaging. We’re going to say they continue on, they’re not one of the examples of people who fall off. So they watch your live streams, they start engaging, and one day they send you a message. “Hey, I’m wondering what it is exactly you do.” You respond cool. The theme is be cool.

So you might say, “As a life coach in general or very specifically what I work with my clients on?” And you don’t send them a book and a pamphlet and a link to schedule a call with you. And then they respond back. Remember I said don’t. You don’t do those things. So they respond back and they say, “Well, I’m just wondering if you could help me with x, y, z,” whatever their issue is.

And you respond back, “Yes, absolutely. I would need to know more details obviously, although we all have similar issues, the cause is often unique to the individual, but I’m more than happy to help if I can.” They respond, “Okay, so can we maybe jump on the phone to chat?” You respond, “Sure, absolutely.” No exclamation marks, y’all.

And then you say, “When are you thinking?” And they respond with times they’re available. Notice how much faith has to be kept that that person will do the work to get what they need, that they will keep conversating with you. Notice the space and time allowed to give this person a chance to be invested and want it for themselves.

This, to me is organic marketing. In order to bring leads to me, truly in an organic way, it has to be natural. No additives, no preservatives. No engineering the process. And this is hard for people because people want immediate feedback and results. The human brain wants to take control and drive results. Your brain wants you to do something and it believes you should do something like reach out, ask someone to do a consult with you, ask your clients for referrals.

That is direct marketing and even when I was coaching network marketers, I advised against this. Sliding into someone’s DM is not the same as someone reaching out and saying, “Okay, I have to know what you’re doing,” but many of us are operating from insufficiency and not enough and so we feel like but I got to do something right now because where I am is not okay and I’ve got to make something else happen.

And we don’t have enough confidence in ourselves to trust that people will come. That is really what it boils down to. I think organic marketing requires confidence in yourself, in other people. That is why it’s so important to build your belief, therefore your confidence, by meeting as many people as possible, telling them you’re a life coach, making offers to help them. It all goes back to that.

All we need to do is be responsible for showing up, building relationships, giving value, and the mindset that creates all of that. Now, I create a place for my work to be found for sure, let me be clear. I don’t make them hunt me down. It’s very clear if you go to my Facebook page or my business page like, who I am and what I do. It’s super clear that I’m a coach, that I help people make money. My website is super clear so it’s not like – I’m not making them hunt me down truly.

I’m offering value everywhere with my podcast, on my Facebook page, I’m getting ready to really start actively working on my Instagram. But I just don’t hunt them down. I’m not hunting clients down. Instead of reaching out to people, asking for referrals, asking for a consult, telling them I can help them, basically soliciting my business when it hasn’t been asked about, here’s what I do do.

And actually, before I say that, P.S, just a little side note, think about this from your potential client’s perspective. When you reach out to them, what do they think? When business coaches reach out to me, I think they don’t make money. That’s my first thought. You clearly don’t make money because you have time on your hands to reach out to me.

When coaches reach out to me, for the most part, I think they’re super presumptive in knowing me and my problem without having listened to me at all, without knowing about my problem or even just me. They’re just assuming, and it really does not create the inspiration you’re looking for.

I have had coaches recently within the last six months reach out to me, offering me help to lose weight for my upcoming marriage, offering to help me heal my energy when I’m sick, MLMs offering to make me rich, to sell me on this new hot product. Now, I’ve also gotten a few – I will say a very small amount – of actual really good offers that made me think and consider and they were super tailored to the person knowing me and listening to me and being super creative in their offer.

But a few is it. And I’ve made direct offers like that before with people I feel I have a relationship with and I’ve already coached. They’ve already hired me and I know them based on my knowledge of working with them. That’s a little different when you have a really good relationship with someone or you’re already working with them. But when that hasn’t happened, think about what it feels like to the client and the impression they get.

I’ve always wanted to show up like a booked solid coach in high demand. It just feels better. And when I feel better, I take more action. Okay, so anyway, here’s what I do instead. Instead of reaching out to people and asking for referrals and asking for consults and soliciting my business, I work on my belief that clients are out there already thinking of hiring a coach who want to work with me, and I just need to step into belief and confidence to inspire them to take action.

This may not seem like enough to just change your belief and how you feel, but it is everything. It isn’t about what you do. It’s always about how you do it and why you do it. What the intention is behind it. Many people are mass direct marketing from a place of lack and fear and what they need and what they want has nothing to do with the client whatsoever. They don’t even know the person deeply.

And I think the confidence piece, there’s such a huge difference. You see it online, you hear it in podcasts. Between a coach with confidence and coach without it, you could literally just scroll through her Facebook newsfeed and tell the difference. Confidence seeps out of you. Our energy is scent. Instead of smelling it, you feel it.

If you have confidence and belief, everything you do is magnified. It’s bolded, it’s more compelling. When you lack belief and confidence, it feels like you’re invisible. People aren’t watching, they aren’t engaging, and they for sure aren’t reaching out. So if your people aren’t reaching out to you, if you don’t have people reaching out, you’ve got to check your confidence and your belief in yourself, in your product, in your offer.

Seriously, I’ve never heard one time a coach say, “You know, I just really don’t think I can do it. I don’t think clients want to work with me, I’m not making any money, I’m just a baby coach,” and then a plethora of clients just start reaching out to them suddenly. That only happens in fairytales, y’all. So if that’s the inner track that’s constantly going in your mind, of course people aren’t reaching out.

And also remember, lacking confidence, not signing clients, and clients not reaching out isn’t because you haven’t created enough content. You learned that in the last episode, or because you need to give them a nudge. You don’t need to give them a nudge. It’s because you aren’t inspiring enough yet. You aren’t commanding enough yet. You aren’t owning the room enough yet.

That takes belief, confidence, and experience. That’s seriously why you have to get out there and show up and meet as many people as possible and tell them who you are and what you do and practice engaging and connecting with other people. And that’s online or in person, seriously doesn’t matter. That is how you build your attraction power, it is how you learn to command.

And again, think about the client, what makes them want to reach out to you after reading your Facebook post or reading your email or watching your live or just paying attention to you for a few months and your journey and your life. They are inspired. They want what you have. What they imagine your life feels like. You have motivated them, you have shown them the value in your offer by how you show up in your life and your results and your clients and their results.

But what is so interesting is none of that involves sitting in your office creating e-books. Organic marketing is rooted in the belief that clients, therefore money, are created by the inspiration that comes from the value we create. The value we create comes from our thinking.

And here’s what’s amazing; value can be created just by you showing up, just by you being you. Think of the value you put out in the world when you believe you are a new coach who’s a baby, who’s just learning, who doesn’t have any clients yet. How do you show up? What is the experience of you?

There are so many coaches I meet and my experience of them is fear, lack, overwhelm, confusion, I’m never going to make it, maybe it’s not going to happen, what if it doesn’t work. It’s like their experience is – that is how you experience them. They’re jittery like Chihuahua energy.

Now think of the value you put out when you believe you are truly a life coach who has tons of value to offer and people want what you have to offer and they’re waiting for it right now. My experience of those coaches are they’re so fun and inspiring and commanding and I want to pay attention. Really think about that.

Your thoughts create clients. Not your eagerness to sell someone or make money, and not the content you create. And your thoughts are powerful enough to inspire people to take action to reach out to you. Your thoughts are powerful enough for your marketing to be organic. That’s all possible. You just have to believe that it is.

And I have had this experience because I deeply believe this is the way the world works. Now, right now you might be thinking, “But what about making offers? Aren’t we supposed to be doing that?” And for me, an offer is what happens at the end of your value. It’s like your blog, podcast, your live stream, your Facebook post, you do a value, you teach them something, you tell them a story, you share your story, and then you say, “Hey, if you’d like to reach out to me or if you’d like to do this work or you need help with this work reach out to me, I’d love to set up a call with you.”

That’s an offer at the end of your live stream or your Facebook post. And here’s what I will say, this might really blow your mind is what I will say I didn’t do a ton of those either. People often gasp when they hear that. I just really believe I didn’t need to, that people would reach out and ask how to work with me when I inspired them to do so.

Like, it would be a chain reaction, a direct result of what I was doing with my energy. This is all about taking full responsibility here. The power is always in your hands. When you work with me, I want you to always know that the power is in your hands. You are in control 100%, whether you’re paying for marketing or not, for the amount of clients you work with and the amount of money you make. 100% that is the truth.

Here’s the other thing that’s super interesting. I thought my value was my offer. It’s why I didn’t have to put it at the end. I just believed my value was so powerful that it was like my yelling hey come work with me, like it was my powerful intention, my commanding the space in the newsfeed of look out, you want to reach out to me without me even saying it. That’s really interesting.

I’ve always believed I am in control of the money I make and the clients I sign by the way that I think and what I believe, and I am in control of how many people reach out to me. You guys, seriously, this is so good. I hope you’re listening.

Also, this is just rant Wednesday, let’s just say. Also, offers happen on consults. So when you’re on the phone with a client, you do want to directly find out if at the end they want to work with you or not. Many coaches I also see mix this up. Bless your hearts. You do a lot of direct offering constantly in your marketing and then you very indirectly offer your services on consults.

We have to flip that, my darling. I recently asked my 200K mastermind, we had an entire call about this and I asked them what their client funnels were. Their organic marketing funnel, how they get clients, and here were some of the answers. I’m going to read them to you. So they believe clients are there, they get them from offering value, from nurturing their audience, from meeting people in real life, referrals from other people, like who they’ve given value to or met in person or online and showing up with certainty to those people who give them referrals.

So one of my clients said, “I just showed up with such certainty this woman was like, I have to tell all of my people about you.” They said they got their clients from their social media circle, from sparking up conversations, building relationships. Did we already say that? I looked at this list before I started reading it but it seems like I’ve said that before.

They get it from being out and about engaging with life. One girl was like, “I met someone on the plane, met someone in a bar.” Just being out in the world, not sitting in their house like a recluse. They get it from showing up in the coaching world. If 100 coaches know what your niche is and who you are and what you do and they have a strong confident experience of you and they feel like you know what you’re doing, they’re going to refer people when they meet people and they’re like, I can’t help you or the price isn’t right or I don’t have any openings or this isn’t my niche, whatever, you’re going to get referrals from that. Just being in a coaching community.

They also said talking about my clients and the work that we’re doing together and the results they’re getting. I do that all the time. I talk about on this podcast, I talk about it on my social media, all the things that my clients are doing. So I’m not just talking about my results. I’m talking about their results. That’s inspiring to people. Just the way that they talk about their coaching.

Again, it goes back to the difference of talking about what you do from a place of fearing someone doesn’t want to hear what you have to offer or what you do or that they don’t know what you do or fearing that life coach is this dirty word or it’s not good enough or it means something that’s not compelling and amazing.

Believing consults come to them, that people always show up. That’s a great one. Showing up for themselves, like when they show up for themselves, they sign clients. Believing they’re an amazing coach. When they believe they’re an amazing coach, people reach out to them. Consistently working on their own coaching. That was my favorite answer. Like, doing the work, being an example of what’s possible, being a product of their product is what makes them money and signs them clients.

If you took this list and you compile it down to the most simplest form, how they get clients organically is through their belief, their confidence, doing their own coaching, believing they’re a great life coach, showing up, meeting people, building relationships, giving value everywhere. That is how you get clients.

And letting them come to you, that’s how you get them organically. And so many of you are just focused on what you need to do and it’s seriously what you need to believe. Here are some amazing thoughts from myself and from my clients that create clients for us. Are you ready? I’m going to give them to you. Here they are.

People always show up. I’m an amazing coach. People always reach out. They want what I have to offer now. Consultations always come. I love coaching, I love my clients, I love my business. Think about when you’re in that energy. You will move mountains. When you are thinking this, you are showing up consistently, you’re doing your own work, you’re getting coached, you show up excited, you talk passionately about what you do, your clients, their results, your results. You serve everyone that comes your way, you give tons of value just by being in a room.

You’re present to take advantage of opportunities that come your way, you’re engaging and confident, and this is the experience other people have of you and they’re inspired by that. Versus think about what you might be thinking or what you are currently thinking now. What is coming before your marketing?

I don’t have any clients, I don’t know where to find clients, how do I get more clients, I’m a baby coach, I just got certified, I’m not making any money, what if I can’t help them, no one is reaching out, haven’t had a consult this week, haven’t made any money this week.

Like, think right now about how you show up believing people don’t want to hire you. Convincing them, graspy, explaining in detail why coaching is so important, not showing up at all, avoiding your business completely or showing up inconsistently. Think about what you do when you think you don’t know how to get clients.

You spin, you’re confused, you focus on content. We already know that doesn’t create clients. You show up when you do in total drama so people that have experience of the Chihuahua energy, it’s just really frantic, chaotic. You don’t meet people and expand your social circle or your audience and you don’t give value.

And when the client is looking for help, who are they going to reach out to? Person number one who believes they’re an amazing coach, or person number two who’s like, oh my god, no one’s reaching out, I don’t have any clients, I’m not making any money. Really think about that.

So I want to leave you with this; we’ve talked a lot about your part in organic marketing and letting clients come to you and it’s all about your belief and your confidence, but I also want to offer to pay attention not only to your own lack of confidence in yourself but also in other people. We don’t have enough confidence in other people. Our potential clients, that they will want it bad enough to come after it.

I want you to think about have you ever wanted something so bad you reached out and asked about it? Of course. I know I have. So think about that. I believe that about other people. I believe all day long whether I’m sending emails out or doing trainings that clients are signing up for my 2K program because they are thinking of it all of the time and they want it and so they will find the link and sign up without me telling them to because they’re self-sufficient, because they are able to take action, because they are amazing.

I believe people will refer others to me without being asked or paid. I believe they will pay me without asking for the money on the call. I believe they will follow through and show up to their consults. I believe they will find the money. I also believe they’ll stand up for what they want with their spouses and they will do all of it right now.

I believe people are hungry. Hungry for change, hungry for a better life. I don’t need to convince them or hound them or remind them. I believe they’re so capable of change I’m not afraid they won’t get results at all. And I also believe that all I have to do is show up and be a reminder of what is waiting for them when they take action and say yes.

Folks, that it is. Marketing doesn’t have to be complicated. Susan Hyatt once told me it’s just energy. That’s it. And I was like, what? It’s one of my favorite calls when I worked with her. So good. Yeah, it’s just energy. What energy are you giving out? What are you marketing, truly? What are you selling all day long? Is it confusion and overwhelm and frustration and belief that your client won’t pay unless they pay right then and there on the call?

Or is it I’m totally worth it, they’re totally worth it, and they’re totally going to show up to this consult and they’re totally going to figure out how to make it happen. So good. Seriously, it’s the difference making money and not. Alright, stay tuned. We’re going to talk about selling next week and the way that I think about that that makes it so natural and aligned and not creepy at all. Get ready.

Hey, if you’re ready to make money as a life coach, I want to invite you to join my 2k for 2k program where you’re going to make your first $2,000 the hardest part using my simple 5 step formula for getting consults and closing new clients. Just head over to www.staceyboehman.com/2kfor2k. We’ll see you inside.