Written by: Pamella Pritchard, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
For better or worse, love or hate it, if you're on Instagram as a life coach you're in for a ride. You're going to have to get comfortable with an ever-changing algorithm, resisting the doom scroll, getting visible and avoiding comparisonitis at all costs. You won't keep up, so don't try, you're not here to be an Instagram specialist or influencer wannabe, you're here to sell life coaching to real people with real-life problems.
Instagram happens to be where I built my business. I have never been an influencer, I started my account from scratch and now have a modest following (c 1200 followers) with 3-20 likes on a post if I'm lucky. I left my established 6 figs corporate career 2 years ago and my practice is nearly fully booked with soul clients who mainly (80%) come from Instagram and are a dream to work with. I have a laugh using the platform, I'm deeply grateful for the reach, access, and opportunity, and it certainly didn't start as sunshine and rainbows. As a life & business mindset coach who helps coaches in a 9-to-5 start and grow their coaching business, navigating Instagram is a frequent topic of discussion in client sessions.
Here I Share My Top 6 Tips On Making Instagram Work For You As A Life Coach:
1. Business FIRST, Instagram Second.
Don't get so busy posting, scrolling and watching your engagement that you lose sight of what you're there to achieve. You're there to speak to and connect with your next client. The person who gets you wants help and can see clearly that you will help them. This requires you to have your business in order before you get sucked into the Instagram game. How to get your business in order? You need 5 simple things to start and grow your coaching business.
Once you're clear on your offer, and how you help your clients, then you can start getting intentional on Instagram.
2. Stop Looking At Engagement.
Are you watching your engagement like a hawk and feeling a pang of disappointment when the numbers don't blow your mind? This is a classic sign of being more invested in getting vanity metrics than doing what matters to create clients. Only looking at engagement to judge your marketing efforts is like looking at a photo of a cake to decide if it tastes right. A photo tells you sweet F all about how the cake tastes, or smells. It doesn't tell you how much fun you had making your cake or who would love to eat some.
Instagram is the same. When you're a life coach, looking to sell to just a handful of clients per month as you build your coaching practice around the 9-to-5, you're not trying to create big 'influencer' scale numbers because you don't need them. So looking at the vanity metrics only shows you a small picture and completely ignores what matters. It becomes a game of cat and mouse, an endless chase with little reward when this is your main and only focus.
3. Your Clients Come First
The only problem you want to be solved as a life coach is how you can help your clients. When you're more focused on what your clients need help with, where they are struggling, or holding themselves back the focus changes dramatically. Instead of obsessing over your engagement and being in a shame, frustration, and comparison spiral start focusing on your clients. This changes everything. Yes, you're going to repeat yourself. You'll sound like a broken record. You'll feel like you're talking to a brick wall sometimes and you know what, it doesn't matter. Because the client most likely to buy from you is least likely to be telling you about it, right up until she is.
Focus on your clients and being the coach they need as if they are already in front of you and see what shifts. This sentence is the hardest part and one of the main reasons my clients hire me to support them as they start and grow their coaching business around the 9to5.
4. Develop Deeper Mastery Of Your Client's Challenges
Focus less on yourself and focus more on your clients and you’ll naturally develop your skill in communicating potently and effectively with them. You get clearer with every iteration. You get bolder with every post. You find new ways and angles to consider the problems and solutions you help your clients with. You develop an understanding of your client better than they understand themselves. The more you create, the more you create. This depth is what positions as you an expert.
Keep doing this, over weeks, months, years, you start to build a reputation. Your unique voice starts to shine through more powerfully and you develop greater self-trust and confidence in your message. Ironically by focusing outwards, you develop inwards and your clients will feel this in your energy and potency as you show up. If you would like help with this: Struggling to sell life coaching? Here's why will show you exactly how to communicate with your soul clients.
5. Experiment
Keep it fresh – Instagram has a range of features and ways to communicate. Focus on reels, then change it to IG lives, go wild with your stories, or experiment with carousels. It's all there to be exploited so, exploit them and have FUN. Pick 2 or 3 to play with and have some fun with them for 30 days in a row. You get some variety, and so does your audience. This can be a great way to generate excitement and interest.
Check in with yourself if there's a feature you know you're avoiding (IG Live anyone?). Maybe it's a video, or doing a LIVE, or doing a poll. Maybe you use the features but you're not really saying what you want to say. Growth comes through your discomfort and when you walk the walk you are showing, not just telling your clients that you can really help them. Check out this article on ‘Business Procrastination to help you’. With every new experiment, evaluate your efforts and go back to steps 1-4 regularly.
6. Play The Game
Instagram is a visual platform. Consumers (aka your potential clients) will be drawn to accounts that are engaging, interesting, authentic and visual. Do not mistake this for conventional beauty standards, doing a photo shoot, or paying money to create a brand that feels like a fake Stepford housewife version of you that you're simply not, because your audience will sniff it a mile away and it stinks.
Be yourself and play the game. Here’s how. Borrow a phone and search yourself like you're someone new and checklist the following:
When you land on your page is it clear AF, bold and confident about what you do?
Is there a clear link to take the next step and does it work?
When you click through highlights does the first second of each story grab your attention and feel compelling to you?
Do you have clear AF CTA's?
Is there some kind of consistency with style, color, or brand? (Literally, since I started I had ONE brand color (plum) and everything else is black and white. Simple, easy.
Is your profile picture clear, bright and do you look welcoming?
Do you have a minimum of the following highlights: 'About', 'client feedback', 'work with me'
About – e.g. Who you are, your story, what you're passionate about
Client – e.g. social proof, testimonials, sign-ups, screenshots of msgs, case studies, before/afters
Work With me – e.g. your current offer, who it's for, what you do, what they get, next step
Is there a recent video of you talking to the camera so your audience can clearly hear your voice and feel your energy as a person (and therefore feel more connected to you?)
Final Words...
You are on Instagram to be an authority, to create, to connect with your existing clients, and attract your potential clients. To own your authority and position, and approach it with confidence you have to choose to be confident. Again, waiting for the numbers to make you feel good won't ever work. You literally only need to be a step or two ahead of someone else and you're not there to win a popularity contest. Your dreams, mission and vision are way deeper than that.
When I go to Instagram, I go for the challenge and joy of creation. I go to connect, and foster relationships with people. I participate but I'm onto myself if that participation becomes more mindless scrolling and searching for something it can never give me. I'm not there to share my wounds, look for validation (see point 3 – stop looking at engagement), or for my audience to make me feel better about my business. That's my responsibility. So I get in, and get out with a massive dose of appreciation for all the opportunity it provides.
Instagram and any platform for that matter is an incredible free resource that you have chosen to use for your business. But remember, it doesn't have to be how you create or rely on making money either, nor do I recommend my clients to because, if Instagram disappeared tomorrow and then where is your business?
Thank you for reading. If you found this useful drop me a DM on Instagram (of course!) and let me know. If you loved this then download your FREE RESOURCE BUNDLE which includes the ‘6 Stages of a coaching business checklist’, ‘The Employee to CEO Mindset Masterclass’ and ‘How to create coaching clients in 4 simple steps’ for coaches starting and growing their coaching business around the 9 to 5.
Pamella Pritchard, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Pamella Pritchard is a certified business mindset and life coach to coaches who are building their soul-led coaching business around their 9to5. Bridging the gap between corporate and purpose-driven entrepreneurship, Pamella helps professionals navigate the transition from employee to CEO in mindset, energetics and strategy. Her signature program THRIVE helps coaches make this transition with simplicity, confidence and clarity, you can schedule a free consult here. Pamella has now left her own corporate London career to travel, and is currently based in tropical North Queensland in Australia.
