This one’s for the coaches tryina make more cash (without exploiting yourself or others)

Hi beautiful people,

First of all, the lovely Melanie Rose Prince took this photo of me in my truest summer mood at IntimacyFest. Oh, togetherness under trees. My fave.

Second, this post is long because I have lots of opinions about sales and the coaching industry. At the end, I invite you to a free 2-hour ConSensual Sales Class. Because we don’t have to be weird, sneaky, or slimy to make great money doing great work. If you wanna skip the post and simply sign right up for the free 2-hour class, here’s the magic link.

Okay… story time:

10 years ago, I was just getting started as a coach. I’d done my Coaches Training Institute certification process, and was thrown into the wild wild west of self-employment.

Back then, I did a few simple things to get the ball rolling:

1. Emailed everyone I knew and told them I was officially a coach, my doors were open for business. In a down-to-earth fashion, I listed all the things I’d be jazzed to work with people on. Asked my friends to pass my name along. Landed a few new clients.

2. Made a hand-drawn flier I was REALLY PROUD OF that featured the question How am I not myself? from I <3 Huckabees with a lil invite for people to call or email me, then hung it in coffee shops all over DC. Don’t think that landed me much, but ohhhh, I loved that flier.

3. Made up a game called 31 for 31. Offered to do 31 coaching sessions in 31 days with 31 new people. Each session cost, you guessed it – $31. And? They were 31 minutes long. I love making up little games, and apparently people love playing along because I had at least 25 sessions with brand new people in ONE STINKIN’ MONTH!

What worked about this approach wasn’t just that I leaned on my existing relationships or that I created something fun for people to join in on… (though those things were helpful).

What worked was… I did what felt great for me to do. I was in consent with myself. I wasn’t forcing someone else’s strategy, formula or tactic. I was being human.

Turns out, humans love humans. Humans love to HIRE humans. Especially when it comes to doing deep, intimate transformational work.

And…if you can remember how to be more human with the humans you’re here to serve, they’re gonna be much more excited to enter into deeper, more committed relationship with you. Because the truth is, we all just want to feel more human.

Over the years, as my practice has narrowed in on trauma resolution, my “feeler calls” (aka sales calls) have become an even more important part of the overall coaching relationship.

Not because I’ve needed to enroll prospective clients to trust me…

Not because I’ve needed to convince them they were worthy of receiving support…

Not because I’ve needed to make sure they committed right away with their credit card over the phone (God forbid someone changes their mind)…

But because I needed to know if we were safe for each other.

Because I needed to know if we could love the shit out of each other.

And I needed to know if this was a doable investment for them to make, in terms of both time and money.

I wanted the ethos of my practice to run consistent throughout someone’s entire experience of our work together, not just after they were “in the gate”.

Here are my ConSensual Sales ethos –

Transparency creates trust. Your safety matters most. I have a scope-of-practice that isn’t all-inclusive – I will humbly refer you out if I know I’m under-qualified. Your body and soul’s timeline are more important than my business agenda. I trust your capacity to make powerful choices for yourself, and encourage you to do so! I am here to champion your most aligned, delightful evolution – whether that includes you working with me, or not. This isn’t some weird transactional exchange; this is incredibly intimate work and we both deserve to love working with each other in a way that’s regenerative and sustainable.

I had to ask myself…if the above things are what I believe form a healthy foundation for healing relationships to grow, what sales process can I create to be in coherence with my professional (and spiritual) ethics?

That’s when the ConSensual Sales model came to me!

Is it safe?

Is it ideal?

Is it doable?

These three questions are central to the model. And in order to answer them, both coach and prospective client need to also ask themselves:

Am I being honest?

Am I being honoring?

Am I being brave?

These might sound like simple questions, but there’s a LOT that goes into forming a safe, ideal, doable, honest, honoring and BRAVE coaching relationship. You know, the kind that changes someone’s life forever.

Beginnings matter. Contracts matter. The energy with which a contract is signed…kinda like the energy with which two people enter into sex…matters.

If you wanna change someone’s life in the long term, why not give ’em your full-on highest expression of love right out the gate?

That’s what ConSensual Sales is all about. Loving the human you’re talking to, and loving yourself, too…enough to discover the most resonant, destined, safe, exciting path forward for you both.

I’d love love love to teach you the nitty gritty of my ConSensual Sales model. From sales page, to feeler call, to follow up, to contracts.

Sign up here for the free 2-hour ConSensual Sales Class!

xox,

Rachael

PS – Mid-July I’m opening registration for the next round of ReBloom Your Business. We’ll begin September 12th with an in-person Kick-Off Workshop in San Diego. Full details coming soon! 😉

PPS – It’s been so nice being off social media. My brain feels like a restful space. I’ve spent hours drawing and painting like I used to in high school. So much sweetness. I’m gonna come back on Insta mid-July to do some promotion for ReBloom Your Biz, then probs disappear again for more nourishment and deep work. In my little morning drawing and painting sessions (book-writing creative warm up!), I’ve been making pages for a mini-book called Tech Free with Friends. It’s pure love. Can’t wait to share.