Sasha Raskin, the founder of The 6-Figure Practice, talks to Ricky Goodall, a coach, and a former MMA fighter, about becoming a life coach and what is the best life coach marketing.
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About the 6-Figure Practice Program:
The Six Figure Practice with Sasha Raskin, is an online program and community for helpers such as counselors and coaches, who are building their private practice. If you’re looking for a clear, step-by-step road map for creating and marketing your private practice, you’re at the right place!
Free resources to grow and market your counseling private practice or coaching business:
Free 22 minutes crash course – “How to Create a Thriving Counseling / Coaching Private Practice”: https://www.the6figurepractice.com/free-22-minute-crash-course
Free resources about marketing for therapists and marketing for coaches: https://www.the6figurepractice.com/blog
Free 30-minutes strategy session with Sasha Raskin: https://www.the6figurepractice.com/schedule-a-free-30-min-strategy-session/
Our accelerator program for creating a 6-figure business:
The 6 Figure Practice Program: https://www.the6figurepractice.com/the-6-figure-practice-program-accelerator/
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About me:
My name is Sasha Raskin. I’m a Number 1 Best Selling Co-Author in 12 Countries, a Doctoral student in Counseling Education and Supervision, a coach, a psychotherapist and an adjunct faculty at a graduate counseling program at Naropa University.
One of the things I’m enjoying the most is helping other therapists and coaches build their successful private practice so that they could actually help the clients they were taught to help, and thrive themselves. I’m almost always fully booked, so my ability to work with individuals is limited. That is why I’ve created this program to deliver powerful results and create a community where you will feel supported by each other!
This program’s primary goal is to help you build a thriving private practice, in a fun and authentic way. Counselors and coaches invest an incredible amount of time, money, and effort into building their helping skills. However, when their training ends, they usually find themselves lacking the business skills that are needed to start and run a successful private practice, feel isolated, discouraged and not knowing where to start.
I believe that to be truly helpful to others, therapists and coaches have to learn to thrive themselves and definitely know how to get clients whom they can help.
This is where this program comes in. If you’re willing to learn and work hard, a 6-figure private practice is within your reach in a year – 2 years. This program will give you a clear outline, and detailed instructions on how to get there.
Sasha Raskin’s Conversation With Ricky Goodall About Life Coach Marketing
Sasha Raskin: Hi, Ricky.
Ricky Goodall: Hi, Sasha.
Sasha Raskin: So I’m happy to have this conversation with you for a few different reasons. The way it relates to the Six Figure Practice program, we talk about how do you actually choose who’s your perfect client to work with especially if there are many things that you could be doing, right? To create a business that you would actually enjoy. And also how you find those clients and how do you create a system where they find you, how do you connect, and all of that good stuff. So to start us off maybe introduce yourself – what would you do, who do you work with?
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, it’s always a funny question. I mean, my name is Ricky Goodall. And the work I do is such a wide range, I mean, I do high-performance coaching, my favorite clients to work with are warriors, brave leaders, influencers, people who are making the world a better place and they have an impact that they’re creating. So maybe they’re a musician, maybe they’re a politician, maybe they’re a CEO, maybe they’re a doctor, but they’re working with people who are also making the world a better place. So those are my favorite clients to work with.
My work itself can range from high-performance coaching to a shamanic medicine ceremony or a martial arts workout, I mean, I really offer my clients a wide variety of different directions to take their personal transformation. My work is very client-led, so I take my client on the journey that they need to go on and let them lead so it can take them to a lot of different places sometimes.
Sasha Raskin: That’s wonderful. And how did you decide to focus on that type of clients?
Ricky Goodall: I guess it’s kind of a continual refinement process of working with clients and then figuring out who I enjoy working with and who maybe is better for somebody else. And I’ve recognized that, and I mean, this always seems to be the case in coaching – the clients I love to work with are like me, I’m always trying to coach myself, I’m always trying to coach reflections of myself. And so I can coach myself six months ago or I can coach myself six months from now. So I always like to try to coach myself six months from now, so I’m inspired as much as I’m inspiring them.
And it’s really a refinement process that happens through experience. I’ve been coaching for about four years and I’ve stayed pretty active. I was a nutrition coach for a few years before that. So I stayed pretty active in building my clientele and so like it’s a continual changing process, but that seems to be how it works.
Sasha Raskin: And that’s so important. Many times people, well, coaches and counselors or consultants get stuck on, “I need to figure out my niche,” right? “I’m figuring this out for years,” and that stops them from actually creating the work that needs to be done to build their clientele. And it’s not set on stone for you. You’re saying you actually constantly, well, not constantly, but you can pivot and choose who you resonate with more at what stage in your career and life.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, it’s really following my inspiration. So if I come across an individual who has a very inspiring story or they’re up to something very inspiring in their work I might ask if they want to experience the work I do and kind of take them on that journey through a couple of conversations. And then if it makes sense for us to work together we’ll have that conversation. But really I follow my inspiration more than anything.
I used to do the niche kind of work, and I know that’s a big thing in the coaching industry – find the type of person you want to work with. And I once learned an exercise where you think of any three people in the whole world you love to coach, it could be your neighbor, it could be a celebrity, anyone at all. And then think of three admirable characteristics they all share. And those three admirable characteristics are usually a reflection of us, but it also gives us an idea of the broad archetype or the type of client that in this moment we like to work with or that I like to work with.
So again, that can change all the time. I mean, I used to think that I really wanted to work with coaches and I do enjoy working with coaches, but coaches are just a small part of the clientele I love working with. I love working with CEO, but, I mean, sometimes CEOs don’t have the level of freedom or the level of autonomy over their schedule that I would prefer in the clients I like to work with. So it’s really a dynamic process and it changes all the time.
Sasha Raskin: And the place where you start with is what you get inspired with.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, that’s right, so it’s really about following my inspiration, speaking my truth. And the more I do that the more, I mean, from a simple perspective, I mean, we resonate with the people that are inspired by the same things we’re inspired by. So by following my inspiration I’m meeting more people who are aligned with my views and aligned with my values and connecting to more people in that way.
And then, of course, when I’m vibrating in that high frequency of living in my inspiration and doing what I love to do I’m naturally kind of attracting people like that to me, whether it’s for coaching or for personal relationships or what-have-you. And of course, all coaching clients start from a relationship, so that’s really the most important thing for me is focusing on relationships.
Sasha Raskin: So true. Could you describe in general terms your business development, from the beginning, maybe right after you finished your I guess nutrition coaching training and all the ups and downs? I know it’s a lot to package into.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, so when I was a nutrition coach it was during my mixed martial arts fighting career. I was a professional mixed martial arts fighter for eight years and fought …
Sasha Raskin: You have been.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, 21 professional fights in my career. And so I started nutrition coaching because when I started fighting I was overweight, and I worked with a nutrition coach and I lost a bunch of weight and I decided I wanted to do that for other people. So I ended up working with over a thousand clients of my nutrition career over about five years, and a lot of my clients I didn’t even meet in person and they were paying me as little as $150 for a four-week nutrition plan.
So when I transitioned into coaching I was charging $50 to $75 a session when I began, and I found Rich Lipton on YouTube and he had some videos out about his coaching. And I looked him up and I emailed him and I begged him to coach me. And a couple of months later his administrator responded, she got me to fill out all these forms by hand and scan them and send them back. She did that a few different times, put me through all these different filters.
And then I got connected to one of Rich’s coaches, Giovanna Caputo. And in one conversation with Giovanna my income tripled in a matter of a couple of weeks. I recognized that the thing that I wasn’t doing that creates the most amount of impact in our coaching financial career is asking for what I wanted to get paid. I thought I had to build myself up and slowly work my way up to getting paid what I wanted to get paid. And she helped me recognize that first of all I wasn’t working with the types of clients I wanted to work with, I wasn’t asking for the type of fees that I wanted to ask for which is making me less excited to coach which meant I wasn’t creating the clients I wanted to work with.
And so from that point forward, that was in May of 2016, I just started continually building my career from there, so coaching people as often as possible, filling my schedule with conversations, taking people very deep in the conversations and asking for referrals and connecting to more people.
And a few times in that period I slipped back into the belief that I had to continue to create content and changed my website and do all these different things to create clients. And all of those methods are great for supporting my clients or my conversations and my relationships, but I’m continually reminded how the only thing that’s necessary to create a client is a relationship. And so as I healed my own social issues and became less socially anxious, more socially connected, developed my social skills with others and learn how to connect with people then my coaching career continue to develop from there.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, that’s huge. And I see a website is actually an extension of a relationship, right? It’s kind of like an extension of you that reaches out to people who you’re not there in that second to have a conversation with in-person, right? And if it’s a website and a text that’s written from a really authentic place, they can connect with you before they connect with you, right? And that’s such a nice way to work with the possibilities of the internet. And yeah, you’re totally right, it’s about connecting with others in a powerful way, and the work is also that, right? But the marketing is also that and there’s not a big difference between the marketing and the work itself.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, I mean, I once heard that a website and a business card they’re tools to create relationships.
Sasha Raskin: Exactly.
Ricky Goodall: In today’s world we can’t say we need those things I guess, but, I mean, they’re certainly … it’s like you don’t need to wear clothing, but it’s life is a lot better when we wear clothes sometimes. And I think that clothing our business with good marketing materials is the same way. So having a good Facebook page, having a good website, having a good, if you use business cards, I don’t use business cards personally. But these tools are great for creating relationships.
And I like how you said if your copy, if your content on your website is authentic and it’s real and it’s genuine, this person gets to have a feel for you before they even connect with you. They get to experience you which you and I had talked about before, the most important thing is that they experience us. They get to experience you before they experience you. And that just creates … it continues them down the client journey.
Sasha Raskin: Totally. And the way we like to have conversations with others, the same, if a person just talks about themselves that’s not a conversation we would enjoy. Same applies to a website and the text, the same thing. If you as a coach or a counselor is just talking about your achievements, your education, you, you, you, it kind of makes sense when people just kind of try to do it on their own, but actually it doesn’t, right? Me as a potential client I want to have a conversation, I want you to ask things about me, right? And that’s something that you can literally do on your website. Are you really struggling with your business? Whatever it is, right? Does it feel lonely at the top?
If you can get into your potential client’s head, then have that shared experience, “Okay, I get you and I get what you’re going through,” right? “And there are things that can be done,” then this conversation actually feels good.
So that’s quite a roller coaster – you did MMA, you did nutrition coaching, you’ve been coached by others. That’s actually a huge thing. I know so many counselors and coaches who do not have coaches and counselors to help them, isn’t that real?
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, I mean, it’s like I was one of those guys when I started, right? Like I was one of those coaches. I had great martial arts coaches, great nutrition coaches but when it came to doing deeper work with people I didn’t have any experience being coached in that way. And like I said earlier, one conversation transformed my income and I continued to work with that coach for nine months and then continue to work with other coaches connected to Rich’s team. And I still have coaches now that I work with. I have coaches I’ve trained who I now work with you too. I mean, we can’t see our own blind spots.
And it’s really like it’s understandable that a lot of coaches might think, “Oh, I don’t need a coach,” if they’ve never experienced powerful coaching, because they can’t possibly understand the value of having somebody reflect back things that you can’t see yourself or ask you questions that you’re just not able to ask yourself, and then hold space for you to figure it out for yourself. And so I can get why people might think, “I don’t need a coach. I’ve got ten years of education or I’ve got this, I’ve got that.” But it’s sort of like what Rich says in the Prosperous Coach or Steve Chandler says, “It’s like a doctor who doesn’t believe in medicine.” A doctor that doesn’t see a doctor.
We all need somebody to work on us as much as we’re working on others, and if we really want to serve our clients in the most powerful way possible it’s challenging to sell something we’re not buying. And so when we know what it means to invest in ourselves and we know what it means to go through that journey and to take a chance on ourselves and to invest that time and energy and money into ourselves, then we know what the client’s going through and it puts us in a better position.
And I love how you said earlier about on the website talking about what their pain, understanding them, instead of just talking about, “Oh, here’s why you should hire me”, “Well, maybe here’s why you shouldn’t hire me, because you’re great as you are, you don’t need me. I’m just here to help you in your journey. I’m here to support you in that process. Something that you can do without me, and you’ve got here without me but maybe I can help you get a little bit further.”
And it’s really understanding that the client, they have everything they need, and as great coaches we’re not giving them anything they don’t have other than just the space to figure out what they already have inside of them.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah. And if I’m being really frank, that might polarize people, that’s okay, I think it’s a hypocrisy to expect from your clients to pay you for services while you are thinking, and I hold that many times, that approach, “I want to save money. I don’t have money for a coach right now, I don’t have money for therapy right now,” right?
And I think that comes across when coaches or counselors have conversations with potential clients. I think it’s always present, right? So for myself, my voice doesn’t shake when I ask for even high fees from clients because I invest in myself so much, right? I have three different coaches, I have my own therapist, I do neuro feedback and many other things. So (a) I invest in myself, part of the revenue that my business is bringing I invest in my clients, right? I want to be a better person and a better clinician and a better coach for them, right? So I invest back. And also it’s just kind of this energetic thing. I believe in investing in myself so it allows me to feel comfortable asking that from my potential clients.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, that’s exactly it. I mean, again, it’s hard to sell something you don’t believe in. And if we haven’t ever had that … I mean, I know you’ve felt it when you’re having that proposal conversation with a coach and they tell you that fee and you’re like, “Whoa,” you can feel it in your stomach, you can feel it, it’s an uncomfortable feeling. I mean, that’s the feeling of transformation, that’s the feeling of our lives changing.
And I’m about to hire my third coach very soon and been working with him for a while, he is an amazing guy. And it’s the same thing it’s like his fees are higher than anyone I’ve paid before, it’s higher than what I was charging my clients before I decided to start working with him, and it’s just that’s the level up. That’s the game.
And I mean, I have compassion for people who really truly believe they can’t afford it or they can’t invest in it, because, I mean, that’s programming and I get it, I’ve been there, I’ve been in that mindset, I’ve been stuck behind those programs of I can’t afford it. And I think in their defense, the defense of their ignorance, as Rich says, “When a coach serves you powerfully enough that you can see the value in the coaching, it’s not an expense anymore, it’s an investment and the dream that you might take action on.” And if you’re not ready to take action on that dream, then there’s no point in investing, because it’s going to take real action, it’s going to be continual leveling up in our decisions and stepping out of our comfort zone and leading into our edge.
And so the fee is really the first assignment in coaching. It’s really the first hoop to jump through. And if an individual gets through that, and I don’t like to use this language loosely, but the miracles that happen as a result of investing in ourselves are something that science can’t measure. And I’ve seen it myself. As soon as I invested in my first coach I made my first 10K client a week, I swear to you, in a week. In the first week of her program I made my first 10K client.
And so when we invest we create room for miracles and those synchronicities, and that energy goes out in the world and the world changes. So it’s not really an investment in the coach, it’s investment in our own dreams. And the question is – well, how much are our dreams worth? And if my dream isn’t worth more than the coach that I’m going to hire, well, then maybe that’s not the coach to work with. Or maybe it’s time to level up my dream and think bigger.
Sasha Raskin: That’s huge. I think investment, especially one that you can really feel that you struggle to gather, is a powerful commitment. And it’s exactly like you said, a few months ago I signed up for a program, 15K, and I do a lot during the day but the week I signed up for it and paid that money the amount of work I did during that one week was the same as the three months that came before it, right? Because I’m full in, I paid that money, now I better step up and do the work, right? That’s kind of I’m past that door, I’m already in the deep water, now I better swim.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah. I mean, how many times do we hear the story of the coach who invests his last bit of savings or re-mortgages their house or gets a limit raise on their credit card or sells their car, whatever. I mean, it’s like it’s burn the boats, it’s like that old ass Crete story of the … and I forgot the details, but basically this military general that they take all the boats to the Island of Crete and they burn their boats, because they said, “We’re either leaving this island winter or we’re not leaving this island at all.” And that’s just how it’s going to have to happen. And I mean, that’s what we have to do when we take a chance on ourselves. When we want to level up, when we want to have a quantum leap in our transformation we can’t get to where we want to get to with the same thinking that got us here. We have to change our thinking.
Rich calls it the success, struggle, success pattern – what got us here is not going to get us there. And so if we want to get to the next level we need to think differently and think bigger and expand our mind. And that never stops. I don’t think there will ever be a point where I don’t have a coach or a healer or a guide or a shaman or somebody working with me to help me reach the next level, because it would just be irresponsible, unless I’m retiring and I’m going to go live in a beach for the rest of my life. But even then I still feel like there would be value in having that person or those people around, questioning my blind spots and keeping me on my toes.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, it reminds me of the slogan of the university I’m teaching at, Naropa – transform yourself to transform the world. And it starts with yourself though, right? Take care of your own shit before you’re thinking about helping others. And continue doing that, so you could be more of a help to others. I love that you put it into it’s irresponsible not to continue doing my own work as a coach or a counselor. That’s so true.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, and I mean, what it really comes down to it it’s like the work really never ends and we can only take our clients as deep as we’ve gone ourselves, and so not to say that we need to be self-masochistic about it, we don’t have to constantly be healing and always searching for more, but I think that there’s value in continually expanding and recognizing that there are always new levels to grow to.
And maybe financially we’re happy or maybe we’re happy in some areas of our life, but what are the other areas that we’re not totally happy and fulfilled, where can we expand horizontally instead of vertically, where can we find more happiness in our relationship, more fulfillment in our tasks outside of work or even inside of work, how can we enjoy the moment even more, how can we savor every drop of goodness out of it? And that’s what I think working with coaches and working with healers can really help us do.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, wonderful. I created the Six Figure Practice program also to connect to in a way different universes that in my mind are two separate, coaches and counselors, psychotherapists, right? And I’m both a coach and a psychotherapist and those are just two different doors that different people come in to see me to either change their actions in the world or change the way they feel about things in the world, right? Basically show up more powerfully in their lives. And there are differences in the way that coaches and counselors work in many, many ways, in the length of training usually for counselors it’s longer, at least the formal training, right? The coaches who are coaching like all their lives before they start calling themselves coaches. It sounds like something you did, right?
And also in terms of fees, that’s a big one. So in counselor’s code of ethics you kind of need to charge on average what other counselors charge around you. And that can vary from 30 bucks to 500, 600 an hour, it depends on where you’re at, how long you’ve been doing it. And just like you said, the biggest one – how comfortable you are with saying the number, right? So that’s a big function in that. But I bet that for counselors who hear you speak right now and they hear 10K client, what the hell is that? What are those unicorns and how is that even possible, right? Or even coaches who are starting out and never worked with high paying clients yet or are still charging by the hour, which is totally an option, right?
But I think it’s great for counselors and coaches to learn more from each other and be aware of what’s possible, because there’s no reason why counselors can’t also start working as coaches. And one of the reasons might be, if that’s something they would like to explore, is 10K clients. Could you say more a little bit about your fees and how is that possible for people that are listening and it’s outside of the realm of their possibilities?
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, so one of the most important things I learned was that my fees will change based on the client and their project and their needs and what they’re looking to get out of the experience. That 10K client was in the first six months of my coaching journey, and so in my very first session, with like I told you earlier, my income tripled or whatever.
What my coach helped me recognize was two things – one she asked me what I would love to charge somebody per month, and I said, “Per month? I’ve never done that before, I’ve only charged by session.” She’s like, “Yeah, but what would you love to charge them per month? They’re not just getting you in the session, they’re getting you in your prayers, in your meditation, in your intentions, if they need to email you you’re there, if they need some emergency comes up you’re there. You’re in their life 24/7 in their subconscious mind. They know that they’re getting supported with you through the whole journey. So how much would you love to charge per month?”
I was like, “Oh, well, $1,000 a month,” and I was so excited. And she said, “Okay, how long before a person experiences a true transformation with you?” Not just like we can all experience transformation in one conversation, but how long before they start changing their habits and then their habits stick and then they start seeing the echo back from their lifestyle changes, how long before they start to really see a transformation? I was like, “Well, I really had to think about it.” And in my nutrition coaching it was a minimum of three months, minimum of three months before somebody would see a transformation, so I said, “Three months.”
And she said, “Okay, so it’s a minimum three months to work with you and the investment is $3,000.” I said, “Yeah, okay, that sounds right.” She said, “Okay, here’s what I want you to do – I want you to go to Staples and get one of those clickers, one of those counters,” the event counter when someone walks in you click the button and when they walk out you click it or whatever, “So go get one of those, I want you to say it’s the minimum three months to work with me and the investment’s $3,000, a thousand times in the next 48 hours or I’ll never going to work with you again.”
I swear, I’m using the washroom, I’m driving, I’m repeating this phrase over and over and over again and clicking the counter, and in two days I send her a picture. And I swear to you, Sasha, within seven days I had a conversation with a guy and he said, “Well, how much to work with you.” And I said it’s a minimum three months to work with me and the investment’s $3,000.” And he said, “Okay, how much for six months?” And I had to make the number up in the spot, I didn’t know what to say, I said, “$4500.” And I signed him for $4500, only a week and a half after this call. And then it was, like I said, it was after I invested in a program with her that I got my first 10K client.
And so what I learned was that it’s less about the fee that I charge and more about what they’re willing to wager on their dreams. If they’ve got a $5,000 dream they’re probably not going to pay $10,000 for coaching. No one has a $5,000 dream, lots of people have a $5,000 step toward their big dream, but I don’t believe that the $5,000 dream is the dream, it’s just it’s not true. We all have a bigger purpose I believe inside of us we’ve all got something bigger that wants to come out. And so my job as the coach is to challenge the individual to say, “Okay, what’s bigger than that?”
I had a really well-known author, he wrote a book with Jack Canfield, I did a coaching session with him and his goal was to sell a million copies of his book, his new book. Great book, a great selling book, well done. And I said, “Okay, we can talk about selling a million copies of your book, but what’s even bigger than that? What’s bigger than a million copies? I want you to 10X that goal, like what’s the true legacy goal here? If I talk to you in 20 years and we look back and say, wow, I did it, what goal do you want to say you achieved in the last 20 years?” And he said, “Nobel Peace Prize.” “Okay, now you’re thinking big, now you’re imagining what’s really possible for yourself.” This book he was selling was just a vehicle toward the type of world he wanted to create. When he was thinking of the book he was thinking one dimensional, when he was imagining what the book was for and the world he wanted to create as a result of that book suddenly the dream became worth far more than just selling a million copies of his book.
So it’s really about pulling the dream out of the client that’s so big that the investment is a no-brainer for what they’re working toward. And then keeping them taking that massive dream, breaking it down into these small, like you said earlier, actionable steps, that make you feel like every week you’re working harder than you have in the last six months in just one week, because you’re taking inspired action, you’ve got a deadline, you’re moving toward your goal, you’re doing things in shorter time period, shorter deadlines. And the person can feel the inspiration that comes with that, and that’s a priceless feeling.
So for me it’s about first of all thinking about what does the client trying to achieve with me. If they’ve got a five-year goal and I charge them for a month of coaching, that’s not really going to make a lot of sense. I’m not going to really going to get them to that five-year goal. They’re going to need at least six months, maybe a year of working with me, to be sure that the transformations that we experience last toward that goal. So what’s the big dream we’re working toward and then what’s the cost of not having that dream in their life? Like, what are they losing by procrastinating on that dream? And then it’s really from there.
My fees range and they vary based on who I’m working with. And it’s really about helping them invest in their dream and stay accountable to their dream. If I invest 10K into a dream, you can bet your ass I’m going to take action on it. If I invest $1,000 on a dream, I might take action on it but I might not. And so the fees I’m charging are less about what I can do and more about how much action they’re willing to take toward their dreams. And that’s really kind of how I gauge my prices and how I work with clients like that.
Sasha Raskin: Beautiful. How do you find clients? How do you create clients?
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, that’s a good question too. I mean, it’s like where we focus energy is where the universe kind of creates. So the secret is simple, it’s just meet people, be interested, for me, be interested, ask some questions, learn about them, learn as much as I can about them, understand how they think, how they work, what their challenges are, what their struggles are, what their successes are. And if it makes sense I’ll invite them to experience my work if I think I can support them, if I’m interested in working with them.
But I recognize that the more people I asked the more to the universe seems to send clients to me. Maybe not even in the direction that I’m asking it. So I could ask 10 people they could all say no and then somebody could randomly email me asking for coaching. So the momentum creates miracles. So as long as I’m moving in the direction of what I want and asking for it and putting myself out there consistently and creating energy in that direction, it seems like the clients just magically come to me.
As soon as I stopped creating relationships, as soon as I stopped asking for clients the engine seems to slow down. The next thing I know I’m like, “Oh, my God, I got to find clients again.” But it’s always simple – it’s always create relationships, ask, put myself out there. And if I get rejected, it’s fine. Yes lives in the land of no as Steve Chandler said in the Prosperous Coach.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, such a wonderful book. So let’s say you met a person, and I bet you’re talking both online and offline, right? In the real world and online. You reach out to that person and it feels like potentially a good fit, how would you invite that person to a coaching conversation with you?
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, it’s a good question. I mean, you said it earlier about authenticity, and I really think that authenticity and transparency are the currency of business from this point forward in life. I mean, the inauthentic, misleading entrepreneurs are just not going to survive the shift that our world is going through.
Sasha Raskin: Yep.
Ricky Goodall: So for me it’s just really about being honest. It’s like, “Look, you really inspire me, you’ve got something really great going and I could see that you’re doing amazing, you don’t need to work with me, you don’t need anything from me. But I would love to see what we could create together if we had a conversation. I would love to see how I might be able to support you in creating this thing that you’re creating, because I just want to be a part of it. I don’t want you to necessarily buy anything. I’m not trying to sell you anything. I don’t know if we’d be a good fit working together long term, but I would love to experience at least one conversation with you and to see what we can get out of it. And if you enjoy the conversation you can give me some feedback on the experience, that would be great in itself. Would you like to experience a conversation with me?”
And I always ask them directly direct question. I learned that direct questions get direct answers, vague questions get vague answers. And so I don’t say, “Hey, if you ever want to work me, please let me know, I’d love to.” I used to say that but now it’s just a direct question, “Would you like to experience a conversation with me?” “Hell, yes.” If they’re like, “Yeah, I would love that,” then I’m in. If they’re, “Oh, yeah, that sounds good, maybe sometimes,” I’ll say, “Okay, well, let’s call it a no, and then maybe if anything changes we can discover it then. But you know that the invitation is there and I’d love to hear from you if anything changes.”
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, wonderful. I think there is a room for both worlds, right? Connecting one conversation at a time and doing online work. And I think the problem starts happening when people are kind of just hiding behind a website and hoping that something will magically happen, right? And in my mind, vice versa, when people rely just on one conversation at a time there is a missed opportunity that people that you could be inspired to work with might never find out about you, just because you’re limited in your time and energy, right? And I think that’s why Rich Lipton with the Prosperous Coach is doing a newsletter every Wednesday now and all of that and the Facebook groups and all. And I think he found a really good way to do it authentically, not in a kind of factory massive scale but creating a community of people that connect with each other as well. So I think both method works, especially if they’re combined together.
And I hope this conversation was helpful for counselors and coaches who are listening to get inspired (a) for taking action consistently, believing in themselves, and taking this leap of faith – you can help people, now it’s time to start taking action to actually make it happen, right?
And also from your own journey and seeing the exponential, really not even the exponential, in your case some of the things you described really fast jumps forward that can happen when this moment of insight happens it’s like, “Oh, okay, I can do this when possibilities … what’s possible expand into what wasn’t possible before,” right? It’s like, “Okay, I can try that.” And maybe some of the people that are listening right now, they might ask … some of the coaches at least, might ask their next client and say, “It’s 3K for the next three months.” And I have a coaching call in seven minutes, and I’ll be doing exactly that, right? Providing value in the conversation, and there will be a moment and I’ll say my fees in a very direct way. And then it’s take it or leave it. I already know that I provided a lot of value in the conversation, so that’s great, my job is done in that regard, right? And now it’s just offering, just like a waiter at the end of a restaurant meal, “Well, would you like the dessert menu right now.” And the person might say, “Well, I’m kind of full.” And that’s okay, but they might want the dessert menu.
Ricky Goodall: That’s right. And like you said about the website, it’s a great way to provide value before the person ever meets you. If it’s authentic, if it’s full of inspiring content, whatever. Nowadays with social media and the internet we just have so many opportunities to provide value before we even meet somebody, and as long as it’s authentic and it’s real and it’s genuine it’s a huge opportunity to create a relationship with a lot of people in a very short period of time.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, wonderful. And that’s how we met – you reached out to me on Facebook because we’re in the group, a Facebook group of Rich Lipton, right?
Ricky Goodall: That’s right.
Sasha Raskin: So that’s a combination of both methods, right?
Ricky Goodall: Absolutely.
Sasha Raskin: And you never know, right? You might have hope that I’ll become your client or maybe some collaboration will happen. And I don’t know if you were thinking that, like a podcast and blog conversation will happen, but it just it’s kind of easy for things to be created when you just connect to people without expecting anything, just knowing that something cool probably will happen.
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, whether it’s a conversation or something else. I mean, the conversation is the only … if we asked for just that and that’s what we’re hoping for, then it can only get better from there.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, wonderful. One tip for coaches who are just starting out or counselors and growing their business, what’s the one thing they need to focus on the most?
Ricky Goodall: Just you don’t even have to believe in yourself, just take action.
Sasha Raskin: Oh, yeah, wonderful. All right, Ricky, thank you so much.
Ricky Goodall: Thank you, Sasha.
Sasha Raskin: If people want to find you, how do they do that?
Ricky Goodall: Yeah, so they can just go to Rickygoodall.com or just look me up on social media, I’ve got lots of pages, business page, Instagram page, etcetera. Just look up my name, it’s pretty unique, you’ll find me.
Sasha Raskin: Do they have to be a CEO to work with you?
Ricky Goodall: No, they just have to be inspiring. So that’s something that they can ask themselves, “Am I inspiring?” And if so, if they’re an action taker, if they’re inspiring, if they’re a leader that wants to make the world a better place then it’s at least worth a conversation.
Sasha Raskin: Awesome. Take care, Ricky. Thanks so much.
Ricky Goodall: Thanks, Sasha.
