Hi there, wellness entrepreneur! Welcome back!
Today’s episode is pro-awareness. This episode is about how to get client results. This is where you, as a wellness practitioner, might be unconsciously judging your client’s behavior, or even your potential client’s behavior sabotaging your goal of getting your client the results they desire.
So what exactly do I mean? I mean getting mad and frustrated at your potential health coaching clients, your yoga students coming to consultations, and you’re paying physical therapy patients, at things like when they’re not showing to sessions, not taking you up on the next offer, not messaging you for e-mail and registration details even though you felt like you did a ton of marketing and you don’t understand how they could miss the link to sign-up if they’re consistently late to appointments or even late just once in a while.
Now we’ve all been there. There are times where you have a busy day and a client shows up late and you feel frustrated because it has the potential to set you behind. Or maybe you’re getting busier and someone’s not showing up to their appointment and you have a wait list or someone is not showing up to a consult. It’s easy to feel like people are taking advantage of you and get frustrated and mad.
But here’s the thing. I want you to ask yourself right now, does getting mad serve them? Does it serve your wellness business? And is there another way to go about it? And I’m going to tell you there is. There is a better way which will help you to get your clients results.
The purpose of this episode is not to beat yourself up. Again, it’s awareness, so you understand in that moment when someone does show up late, when someone does no-show, that you have a choice. You can decide to feel into that anger and stew into that anger and frustration or whatever other emotion you might be feeling that’s undesired or maybe it becomes desired or you have an option to feel something different that might serve your people better and might serve your business better.
How You Can Help Your Health Coaching Clients Who Have Undesired Behaviors
So let’s explore that on this episode because here’s the truth, even though their behavior might not be desired, of course you want ideal patients, you want to focus on those ideal clients who do value your sessions and show up to your sessions. But some of that, while you can’t control your client’s behaviors, you can’t control your client’s actions, you can influence what they think and what they feel that can then influence their actions.
So we’ll talk about how you can do that in this episode because even though an undesired behavior that they might be taking is frustrating to you, that undesired behavior like showing up late or missing a session might be the very reason as to why they need your help in the first place. That might be the very reason why they paid you or signed up to work with you. They need help with that and you getting mad at the situation or blowing them off as a reaction to them being late, it doesn’t serve the whole reason as to why they need your help and why you’re in the industry in the first place to help people.
And if you show up with the mindset of serving people, helping people with your own boundaries of what you will tolerate, and understanding that their undesired behavior like being late or no show, it doesn’t affect the results that they get working with you. What if they’re still getting amazing results? What if they’re happy, they’re completely thrilled with working with you? They know that there are areas and room for improvement, but they love the work that they’re doing. They’re just having a hard time managing their schedule or getting their stuff together.
There’s no reason for us to judge them or think that they’re bad people because of this. And if you’re continuously getting mad or frustrated, then your mindset is not so much on them and how you can actually problem solve and troubleshoot in supporting your people because there are some things you can do, which we’ll get into in a moment, but what if the mindset shift is needed less from focusing on how it inconveniences you to troubleshooting and thinking about how you can support them better and how doing that might benefit your business for the big picture? How could that be true?
How You Can Influence Your Health Coaching Clients’ Thoughts and Feelings Through Marketing
So let’s talk about how you can influence their thoughts and feelings. We’ll start with the marketing first. So let’s say you do have people who are messaging you, confused on the next step or where to get the link for your next free webinar or workshop, or they don’t understand that the next best thing that they can do is sign-up for a free consult. First, it’s taking a look at your marketing and looking at your own thoughts and feelings while you’re marketing. So if you need more help on this, you can head back to the blog here: https://igniteurwellness.com/marketing-for-the-wellness-entrepreneur/
And when you’re examining the thoughts and the feelings that you have while you’re marketing, writing e-mails, making social media posts, what are the actions that you’re taking? Are you showing up consistently?
Because even though it might feel like, “Oh my goodness, I made so many e-mails and social media posts about this one workshop, they might still have missed it,” there are algorithms, e-mail open rates is not that great because junk boxes are full and it doesn’t mean that your potential clients and your paying clients don’t value your e-mails and social media posts, they’re just not seeing them.
You can get more health coaching clients from social media by reading this blog: https://igniteurwellness.com/get-clients-from-social-media/
And so you might need to market more than you think you do, meaning that you’re underestimating the amount of marketing that it might take for people to really see your work, which yeah, you can go into the mindset of how unfortunate that is, or you can look at the mindset, “Oh wow, social media, they’re free platforms and I can use them and actually make money off them.” How cool is that? And if you want to ensure that more of your marketing is really getting eyes on, then you can pay for it. Social media is a for-profit business just like your own. So you have to respect where they are as well in your marketing.
How You Can Influence Your Clients’ Thoughts and Feelings Through Your Copy
You also have influence over your copy. Maybe you need to explain your offer more clearly, more directly. Maybe you need to explain the details and actually write them all out so they know exactly what the next step is or clearly writing out the value of working with you so they understand what they get when they work with you.
Essentially, it’s always thinking of that ideal client and what you could do in that very step to help them to make their lives easier. So how can you help them find the link easier? How can you help them to sign-up easier? How can you help them to get to a consult call easier that will ensure their likelihood that they are taking you up on these offers, that they are going from step to step to step instead of just throwing your hands up in the air and being like, “Well, I’ve tried everything. I did everything.” That mindset really doesn’t serve you. What that serves is getting you stuck and frozen and sometimes really frustrated.
How You Can Influence Your Clients’ Thoughts and Feelings To Get Better Results in Consultations
Okay, let’s talk about consults. Having people sign-up for consults and then show up to the consults. For me personally, I’m always thinking about when someone’s signing up for a consult with me, what are they feeling in that moment and what do they want to feel when they get off the call? They probably want to feel supported. They probably want to feel relieved that someone has heard them and understands their problem and they’re not alone. Maybe they’re excited because now they actually have a solution that they can work towards. They understand better about their problem and they know the steps to fix it.
So for me, I bring a lot of those emotions into my welcome consult e-mail sequence. In fact, if you want to experience it yourself, you can sign-up for a consult only if you are curious of working with me, or you can also sign-up for my next free webinar or workshop because I go through the same experience in my follow up e-mails to help people and encourage them to sign-up for a consult call. I always inquire what might they be thinking, where might their fears be, what are their hesitations, how can I help them through this, how can I simplify the process for them, am I making my offer very clear and direct so they know exactly what they get when they work with me?
Both tangible and intangible, what is it like when my clients work with me? Okay, it’s one-to-one sessions, you also get a portal and workbooks and understanding the value behind why they want to need all of those, as well as understanding the intangible of what they get when working with me. The intangible is the process to hit a six-figure business and beyond the process to prevent and heal burnout and exhaustion, the process to implement systems and structures in their business to streamline hiring and getting the right support that they need. Those are some of the intangibles. Are my e-mails clearly describing all of that?
How about for you? Do you have a consult welcome e-mail sequence? Do you send consultation reminders? And in those reminder e-mails, are they highlighting the value of what they’ll get when they’ll show up to the call? Those are all ways to keep propelling them forward. Keep reminding them of the benefit of showing up and working with them. Maybe it’s something simple, a tactical thing of having an easy way to reach out to you if they need to reschedule. Maybe it’s just hitting a button or maybe it’s reclining to one of the reminder e-mails and just letting you know, “Hey, I can’t make this appointment. Can I reschedule for a different time?”
Sometimes it can be as simple as that for my sessions. I never get mad if someone shows up late or has to reschedule last minute these days. I very rarely will get a no-show. I mean maybe one or two a year if that. And I have a busy schedule and people, sometimes I, because I’m in Facebook groups helping and serving people, they’re baffled as to how that happens. And the reason why I sign and work with very committed people, and together we figure that out on the consult call, my prices also reflect this commitment. It’s money that they just can’t blow off. So they’re committed and they show up and do the work. And when they’re in my sessions, I’m always listening. I’m always asking, “What are you feeling now? Why isn’t that feeling or thinking working for you? Where do you want to go?” And I help them clarify the process to get to where they want to go.
And I’m planting the seeds, “Okay, on this session, here are the wins, here are the takeaways, and next sessions, we’re going to deepen this. We’re going to work on this. We’re going to work on the next steps.” So they can always see, “Oh, next session I know what we’re going to work on. I feel the benefit of this session and I understand why next session will be valuable and I’m going to prioritize that.”
If you want help structuring your consultation then be sure to read this blog here: https://igniteurwellness.com/how-to-lead-a-successful-consultation-call/
Sometimes, Life Just Happens for your Health Coach Clients
Also, when people work with me, I try to keep the schedule as simple as possible. We pick a day and time each week, that’s going to be their reoccurring appointment time. So they don’t have to spend, and I don’t have to spend, a lot of time each week trying to juggle and fit in appointments. It’s just an energy leak for everyone. So they know their appointment time and day and if they can’t make that, they’re able to reschedule easily by hitting a button or just reaching out to me.
So I’ve problem solved and troubleshooted through a lot of this and ensuring that they always know where they are in the program with me, ensuring that they know their wins, they know their successes, they know the work that they’re working on. There are tangible takeaways every session. So they’re always valuing the work.
And here’s the thing, sometimes I do get people who show up late or need to reschedule last minute and it’s not a big deal because life happens. I’ve been late to appointments that I really value. I’ve been late to practitioners who I love to work with. And of course I try to minimize this as much as possible, but sometimes it just happens where I’m trying to get out the door and something happens with Kaylee or I got behind in the session before and then I’m late. And those times I am so grateful for the practitioner who just supports me and says, “It’s all right. We’ve got plenty of time, let’s just get to it.” Right? Or they are accommodative and supportive and listen to what’s going on in my life. Because typically if I am late, since I really try to ensure that I’m not late too frequently, something’s going on in my life, and that might be part of the reason why I’m actually showing up to their appointment in the first place to feel better.
And so if they’re caring and compassionate and listening to that and thinking about, “Oh, how does this actually impact the work that we’re doing? How can we work on this to help Allison get more benefit and results in her life?” I am so grateful for that. So how can you do the same for your person instead thinking, “Well, that’s just another wasted session. That person’s always buying packages and never showing up. They’re just taking up my spots. They’re just taking up my time, they’re taking advantage of me.”
Support Your Clients, So They Can Show Up For You
That thinking will only just bring you down. So instead, it’s withholding your boundaries and you decide what those rules and boundaries are for your business. So for example, if someone can’t make an appointment last minute for me, which happens very rarely, I will typically make an assumption. I’ll say, no problem, let’s just reschedule. Because truthfully, here’s the thing. I have so many things that I need to do in my business that if I have that hour of time, I will just get things done and I know that they’re getting back in the schedule as soon as they can. We’ll take a moment and reschedule that right away.
I can just move forward with my life. I don’t have to stew in anger or think that they’re taking advantage of me or misusing my time or any of those things. They just, maybe they got sick or they’re kids having a really bad day, or they’re having an emergency or a health crisis or something is coming up. I want to support them in the best way possible so they can move through that issue and meet me for the next time. And we can actually problem solve and tweak that. Versus if I get mad and I’m resentful, then they might get mad and then the relationship might suffer or end because of that.
When Is It Too Much Though?
However, I do hold boundaries in terms of lateness. And it’s not just me, because again, I’ll sit there and work until someone shows up on their call. However, it’s respecting the next client because I do book my sessions back-to-back and sometimes I have two or three in a row, then I usually put in a break. But if I have a break, that usually means I need to eat and care for myself, get water, go to the bathroom before I go into the next block of two or three. So that time, if someone shows up late, I’m not going to go over the session late and my people know that. They know I’m going to end the session on time because I don’t want to make the next person wait. That’s not respectful to them if they showed up on time. So I’m going to start their session on time.
And it also ensures that I end my day on time and I’m getting time to make sure I have enough time to eat my lunch, replenish my brain for the next block of clients and work that I need to do. So that is one boundary that I hold and people don’t abuse it. I do have people who show up late on occasion. And again, that’s okay, life happens. We make the best use of the time that we have. In fact, I’ve had people who have shown up more than half the session late and they’ve had maybe 20 minutes left, but we’ve still gotten major insights, wins and takeaways that they can implement to the next session.
Or you have the option, and I’ve done this too, we can reschedule for the next week, but I don’t make it mean that they made anything mean about my time or my time’s less valuable. They just had a bad day. But I can decide, “All right, are we going to make the most use of the time that we have? Can we get a win and takeaways and insights to implement? Or maybe should, we should just reschedule.” And I can come to that decision from a neutral place because I made the best use of my time. I wasn’t just sitting “there waiting for them. I was actually getting really good productive work done. So now I can say, “Okay, what serves them best right now in this moment?” And I don’t have to bring in any other feelings that might make this decision more about me than them.
What Your Clients Are Actually Thinking When They’re Late or No-Show
Because here’s the thing, most of the time they’re not late thinking, “Oh, she’ll just sit around and waiting for me.” Or if they’re no-showing to a session, “Oh, I’ll just take advantage of her time and book another session.” No, they’re probably stressed out in thinking about the million one things going on in their life that they just completely didn’t even think about your appointment. Or if they’re late, they’re probably frantically rushing to try to get to you. So they’re not thinking about how they’re taking advantage of you, or if they’re missing appointments or they’re signing up for class sessions and not showing up to them. Maybe you just need to have a call or put in a boundary.
So for example, if I have a wait list, which sometimes I do and people don’t show up to appointment then, and I’m not able to get a wait list spot filled, then I need to problem solve my system behind that. “Okay, if I was getting a lot of no show and not able to fill my wait list, then maybe I need to ensure that people do have a cancel policy.” Maybe it’s 24 or 48 hours. And if they’re not canceling, maybe you do charge because you have people who need your help and could take the spot. And it’s to ensure that you are making sure and serving those other people. You’re not charging them because they’re inconveniencing you. You see the difference? You’re charging them because you have to remind them that there are other people who need the spot and you want to help and serve those other people. So it’s from a place of serving for the greater good of the community.
Conclusion
So maybe you, if you find a lot of this happening frequently, you need to take a look at your systems, your processes. What reminder e-mails do you have? What policies do you have in place? How do you enforce those policies? What’s your energy behind the policies? And take a look at what happens the next time a client shows up late to a call or to your session. Or what happens when someone books a class or a session and then doesn’t show up? How do you react? Do you react? Or are you calm, grounded, confident that you know exactly the process for them? You can help support and listen to what happened and serve them and then also serve the rest of your community as well.
If that’s not happening, that’s where your work is. And again, it’s not judging them, it’s not thinking that they’re trying to take advantage of you. Because most of the time they really aren’t. They care for you. That’s why they’re paying you. Most people don’t pay someone who they don’t like unless they’re the only specialist in the area or the only specialist doing their work. But they still, in this case, maybe won’t hang out with them and like them as a friend, but they still value the work, which means they still value the time that they spend with you. So they’re not necessarily out to take advantage of you or ruin your business. It’s none of that.
So it’s looking at what are your own thoughts and feelings when you create the systems and the processes that you do in your business and why? And what are your potential in paying clients’ thoughts and feelings and what actions can you do that’ll influence their thoughts and feelings, where they are always valuing their time, where they’re always looking forward to a session working with you, where they are prioritizing those sessions so they don’t show up late and miss them? What can you do to ensure that that is higher level thinking, that is thinking that’ll keep propelling you forward and will keep serving you, your clients and your business?
And when you focus on that, then you’re really preventing energy leaks, exhaustion, spins, which really suck your time and at times cause you to overwork. So this could be huge for your business. If you need help with this, then just reach out to me. I’m here to help you!
All right, I’ll see you next week. Bye for now!
If you want more Health Coaching Clients then be sure to get this free training: https://igniteurwellness.com/get-health-coaching-clients/
Book your free call with me to see how I can personally help your wellness business grow: https://igniteurwellness.com/business-coach-for-health-coaches/
