This is your ultimate guide to social media marketing for coaches.
Here, you’ll learn:
- How to grow your coaching business with social media (even if you’re brand new)
- Steps to getting clients on social media platforms
- The best platforms for you
And much more!
Want to learn more? Read on!
Get the Ultimate Guide
for building a
6-Figure Coaching Business so you can achieve more freedom!
What is social media marketing for coaches?
Social media marketing for coaches is the use of social media platforms (like Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, and Facebook) to promote your coaching business. And good news: When you’re new to coaching, social media is a really great tool to connect with potential clients, build an audience, and share more of yourself and what you know than with other marketing tools.
Because here’s the thing:
Never before has there been such an effective way to connect with people on a deeper level.
More than half of the world uses social media (62.6%). 55% of people buy directly on social platforms.
These days, social media is an invaluable piece of your business. It’s a great place to get started and connect with people quickly and get your first paying clients.
Down the road, social media will help you build a deeper relationship with your existing audience so that they see you in a way that just your emails and other content can’t.
How do I know? Because I used to grow my own coaching business.
How social media helped me grow my business to 6-figures in 4 months
Social media made ALL the difference for my business early on.
I was in my 9-5, dreaming of being able to work for myself, while building a side hustle that I hoped would make my dreams come true.
Within four months, I had grown that business to six figures, which allowed me to walk up to my boss and hand in my resignation letter.
That was all thanks to social media and the way I used social media platforms.
Sure, I didn’t scale my business using social media. That’s what I did with ads and email marketing (strategies that helped me grow my business to $1+ million in a year).
I never wanted to rely on social media.
But it did help me get a great start. And as I added on more social media to my business (like YouTube), I’ve just seen even more engagement and sales from all different channels.
In the same way, I’ve had clients who have crossed five figures and more in sales with social media alone.
A few of those clients include Emily, who is a career coach. Emily used platforms like LinkedIn and Pinterest to get her first clients.
Ruby is another client who successfully used social media (Reddit) to start her relationship coaching business.
And Cristina, a naturopathic doctor, used Instagram to get one of her first paying clients.
Here’s how to use social media for coaches, even if you’re just starting out.
Avoid these social media marketing mistakes
Look:
Social media is a great place to start to get your first paying clients.
By finding that watering hole for your audience (where your clients hang out online), you can naturally start building relationships with potential clients.
Ultimately, I see social media as a great way to engage.
You have true engagement and real-time conversations with people. Thanks to this engagement, I can tell if a topic I share is a really helpful topic and if it “clicks” with my audience based on how often people like or respond to a post and message me.
One of the first things I do in the morning is to see all the random and fun messages I get. That helps me get to know my audience even more.
Just one example of a social media message I received.
But there are mistakes I see my students make that keep them from making sales and growing their businesses. Here they are:
Mistake #1: They sell on social media
The first mistake is to start selling the minute you enter a social media group.
Yes, you can sell on social media. But that’s not the first thing to do. People don’t go on social media to be sold to.
Instead, make it about connection and conversation and make it fun. If you do that, sales will naturally follow.
My own goal is to make my posts something that people want to check, just like they want to check for updates about their favorite channel or TV show. You’ll naturally become the person they look to for more help on what it is you offer as a coaching service.
Mistake #2: They rely on social media alone
The next mistake is to rely on social media alone to grow your business.
At the end of the day, the social media platforms you use are not your own platforms. That’s why you need to think about them as part of a multi-channel approach. You have your different client acquisition channels — your email list, your social media channels, and maybe some other acquisition channels down the line, like advertising and SEO.
They work together to bring leads and clients to you. But you shouldn’t rely on just ONE of these for your business.
Mistake #3: They overwhelm themselves
The third mistake is to overwhelm yourself to the point where you don’t get things done.
Something I do is I will reshare content from my different channels because not everyone is on every one of my channels.
And so if you’re feeling overwhelmed, that’s something you can do.
I also don’t try to be everywhere at once. I started out on Facebook and around that same time, I started building my email list. Over the years, I added on Instagram, YouTube, and more.
Choose one platform, master it, and get really good at it before you move on to other platforms. It’s better to have one channel where you’re doing well and where people love to connect with you versus trying to do all of them.
Now that you know which mistakes to avoid, it’s time to look at what content you should create for each platform to get engagement and, yes, sales.
How do you market a coaching business on social media?
Social media is a great place to get started fast and don’t have a lot of proof or a reputation built up. It helps you connect with people — and that’s also why I recommend it as a place to start out on.
Granted, you don’t want to rely on social media long-term to get all your clients. But even long-term, social media will help you build and boost relationships with people in your audience.
And here are the steps to take to grow your coaching business on social media.
1. Create engaging and converting social media posts
Social media was not built to help you grow your business and make sales. So the way you use social media has to be aligned with what social media was intended to do.
Think about how YOU use social media. You probably check your Instagram feed, YouTube, or TikTok to be entertained, to see what’s going on, and to learn something new.
Ask yourself:
How can I use social media in that way?
Your content needs to build on these three pillars:
#1: Connect
#2: Entertain
#3: Learn
Really often, I see people posting just about one of these pillars. For example, they’ll post motivational quotes. Or they ask fun, engaging questions (“Tell me a fun fact about yourself”). Or they’ll only share facts.
When I started out on social media, I thought that the more information I would share, the more people would appreciate me. I’d share long and dry posts like this one:
But that’s not all people want. And when I started using more fun pop culture references and shorter, crisper content, people immediately responded so much better:
To create your content, you can use social media templates (like this one by Canva).
Here’s more on how to create the best social posts:
2. Use a mix of ways to deliver your content
Written posts will only take you so far, but video content helps you connect with people much faster.
That’s why you need to mix up your content — written content, videos, livestreams…
For example, when I was marketing myself on Facebook, I wrote posts and did livestreams.
Also, consistency is key. The more consistently you show up in people’s feeds, the more they will think about you and get interested in what you have to say.
Create a schedule where you deliver different types of content on a regular, daily and weekly basis. Example: One post every day and one livestream every week.
3. Use different types of content
The way you teach can be mixing in different types of content. Something I’ll do is I’ll deliver what I want to teach as a series of posts. Or I’ll share tips, stories, or the high-level strategy, depending on what it is I’m teaching and what works best for that topic.
A few ideas for posts are to:
- Post content that helps people interact socially with each other. For example: Ask people about their interests.
- Post informative content. For example: Share your expertise.
- Entertain people. For example: Share fun quizzes and facts.
- Share your opinions. For example: Ask a question to get people’s opinion.
Ultimately, it all comes down to mixing it up so that people have fun AND they learn about who you are and what you offer.
If you need more ideas, take a look at these social media post ideas for coaches:
- Share testimonials
- Offer a checklist
- Analyze industry trends
- Talk about your own story
- Share a contrarian opinion
- Host a Q&A session
- Share a poll
4. Give A LOT of value
The main rule on social media is: Offer a TON of value. That doesn’t mean more information. Instead, the important thing to focus on is to create conversations with the people you are connecting with.
You probably won’t start with a ton of people in your audience and you’ll likely not get a huge amount of engagement from your posts in the beginning either.
But if you do it in the right way, the people you DO connect with will be so much closer to wanting to work with you because they’re getting direct access to you — not reading automated emails or watching scripted webinars.
That’s why it’s so important to remember:
Your posts aren’t one-sided conversations. Create them FOR your ideal clients and create them to initiate conversation.
And besides publishing posts and doing livestreams, search for conversations in groups you engage in. For example, if you’re a health coach for busy professionals, you might search health-related groups for things like:
“Busy”
“Healthy lunch”
“No exercise”
Once you find those conversations, you can start answering people’s questions and giving your insights.
Get the Ultimate Guide
for building a
6-Figure Coaching Business so you can achieve more freedom!
5. Sell your services
How do you eventually turn people into paying clients?
When I started my business, I didn’t know anything about using social media to get clients.
At this point, I didn’t hang out in online groups with the intention of selling. I just wanted to know more about what I could sell.
That’s why I used to engage with people who posted questions related to what I was hoping to sell (digital advertising). I’d answer their questions and be helpful in any way I could.
At one point, I happened to message this woman who was asking a specific question about ads and I offered to give her advice in return for a market research call. She said yes and so we hopped on a call.
Over the next two weeks, she messaged me with a bunch of follow-up questions.
During those weeks, she got so much value so she ultimately messaged me and asked if we could work together.
I ended up offering a $5,000 package, which she said yes to without blinking.
That’s how I got my first paying client on social media — without any sleaziness or salesyness involved. And that’s what I recommend that my clients do as well.
My secret? I didn’t assume she’d buy.
Similarly, your sole focus shouldn’t be “I’m going to make a sale with this person.”
Instead, approach it from the perspective of “This person might or might not end up buying from me. But I’m learning so much from talking to people and ultimately, this will help me create a really great offer people want to buy.”
Now, actually transitioning to a sale can be very natural.
People might ask you how they can work with you. Or after engaging with someone for a while, you might ask if they want to learn more about how you can work together. Here’s my full guide on how to sell as a coach.
6. Make time for social media
When I started engaging in social media groups, I made sure I did it every day.
I believe that what’s in your calendar gets done, so I essentially scheduled time to work on my business every day. I’d do this during my lunch hours, in the evening, during weekends…
I recommend you do the same.
Schedule set times when you get in front of your audience on the social media platform of your choice. 3 x 15-minute time slots every day is enough. During the weekend (or when you have more time), you can create content to share.
What is the best social media platform for coaching?
There are plenty of social media platforms out there. Which one should you choose?
Good question. First: Choose ONE platform. That platform should be where your clients hang out, not where you like to hang out.
Ask yourself:
Where are my clients spending their time?
For example, when I started my digital advertising coaching business, I found my audience in Facebook groups for entrepreneurs. But your audience could be on YouTube, Instagram, Reddit, or LinkedIn.
Here are a few platforms to consider:
Instagram is a visual platform that works well for coaches with that visual aspect, such as health coaches or wellness coaches. Users are nowadays mostly focused on stories, DMs, and reels, so make sure you offer content in the way your users like to consume it.
For example, you could share client testimonials, recipes, and personal stories in stories and then ask people to DM you for more information.
Here’s my guide on how to use Instagram for your coaching business.
TikTok
A third of US adults use TikTok. TikTok shares content with people outside of their network, which makes it easier to get found on the platform. It’s also still relatively new compared to other social media platforms and so it’s slightly easier to get organic (non-paid) views.
Facebook (or Meta) doesn’t offer a ton of organic reach – you’ll mainly be shown to your friends. However, Facebook groups can be an excellent way to reach your audience. That’s how I got started!
I talk more about Facebook groups here and Facebook advertising here.
LinkedIn is a platform that’s especially useful for coaches who work with professionals or businesses, including career coaches, executive coaches, business coaches, change management coaches, culture coaches, and transformation coaches.
As LinkedIn isn’t as crowded as many other platforms, you can still get organic reach on the platform. You can also use LinkedIn’s ad platform. Ultimately, the platform has over 1 billion users.
Want to learn more about LinkedIn marketing? Here’s my guide on LinkedIn for coaches.
Reddit consists of subreddits that cater to specific niche interests. So as a coach, search for subreddits that attract your target audience. (For example: Career subreddits for career coaches, health subreddits for health coaches, and so on.)
YouTube
YouTube has over 2 billion users. And because video content is so engaging, you can build up a very loyal audience on the platform. Just note that building a YouTube channel takes time – plus, you need to be able to create high-quality content to be competitive. That’s why I usually don’t recommend YouTube for new coaches.
Get the Ultimate Guide
for building a
6-Figure Coaching Business so you can achieve more freedom!
What’s next?
There you have it. Now you know how to use social media for coaches.
What it comes down to is building relationships that build up trust and interest. By taking these steps consistently, you’ll sign up clients faster than you think.
But mastering social media is just one part of building your coaching business.
How do you build a sustainable and profitable business?
That’s what you’ll learn in my free blueprint on how to grow a six-figure coaching business.
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