The Savvy Entrepreneur

Are you an entrepreneur who offers a service that is difficult to explain? Do you get blank stares when you tell people what it is you do? I do too. I’ve been having discussions with my coaching colleagues lately, and found that the actual description of the coaching profession is confusing to the average person.

Here is the ICF‘s definition of coaching:

Professional coaches provide an ongoing partnership designed to help clients produce fulfilling results in their personal and professional lives. Coaches help people improve their performances and enhance the quality of their lives.

Coaches are trained to listen, to observe and to customize their approach to individual client needs. They seek to elicit solutions and strategies from the client; they believe the client is naturally creative and resourceful. The coach’s job is to provide support to enhance the skills, resources, and creativity that the client already has.

Still with me??

Now just imagine saying that to someone at a networking event…!

So far, I’ve found that the best way to explain what I do is by NOT telling people I’m a Small Business Coach. Instead, I explain what I do by saying who I help, how I help them and what they get (see my 30-second pitch blog post).

Quantifying the benefits and results of coaching is also a challenge because it depends on:

• what point is the client in their life/business/career when starting the coaching relationship
• what the client wants to be coached on
• what goals they want to work towards
• their commitment and risk level
• other factors that only the client knows or that can only be determined during sessions

Julie Fleming Brown has also been lamenting the lack of “data to back up coaching’s claim to effectiveness”. For her particular field, the use of reports summarizing the ROI in leadership and executive coaching seem to be especially helpful in quantifying results to her potential clients.

So where does that leave us, the service professional offering services that the client has to actually experience in order to fully understand the benefits?

I’ve already posted a few suggestions, like productizing your services and designing your 30-second pitch so that others ‘get’ what you do. I’d also like to add testimonials to that list. They are useful since it’s a real-life client saying, in their own words, how you’ve specifically been able to help them. And as we’ve seen, reports or actual case studies can be of use.

The more “real,” specific and measurable (with actual names, quotes and numbers), the better.

So, start compiling testimonials and actual results your past and present clients have achieved by working with you and… flaunt ‘em.