#145 - If You're Speaking 'Coach Speak' Don't Be Surprised If Your Message Isn't Landing
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[00:00:00] Welcome, welcome to the Heads Together podcast. I'm your host, Gill Moakes, and I am as always thrilled to be here with you again this week. Thank you for tuning in. I've got a doozy of an episode for you today. If you are a coach, any kind of coach, I really want you to listen to this This is something that I see happening all the time, and it's a blind spot.
It's a blind spot for coaches. Today, I'm talking about coach speak. If you are speaking coach speak, do not be surprised if your message isn't landing with your ideal clients. This is something I see tripping up so many coaches, honestly, it's probably happening to you right now without you even realizing it.
I get to get away with this a little bit more because my ideal clients are coaches. [00:01:00] So you guys are speaking my language, but you know what? If your ideal clients aren't coaches and you're constantly spouting coach speak at them, You are making your marketing way harder than it needs to be. You are probably sitting with a website that is not landing with your ideal clients, and you are probably scratching your head thinking, why?
I, my messaging is so good. Why are my ideal clients not resonating with it? Right? So let's dive into this episode and pull this apart. Welcome, welcome to the Heads Together podcast. I'm Gill Moakes and I am obsessed with cutting through the noise when it comes to growing your business. Each week, via intimate coaching conversations and [00:02:00] inspirational stories, I share what it really takes to get the results you want.
in a way that feels right to you. I am all about attracting higher ticket opportunities, building authentic relationships, and creating the abundant, full fat version of your dream business. I mean, how many of us have beavered away creating a light version of what we really want? The thing is, I honestly believe when you're outstanding at what you do, there is no limit to what you can achieve.
So, are you ready to put our heads together and make it happen? Let's go.
Okay, so you're a coach, right? And I'm willing to bet that you have spent a ton of time, loads of energy, and probably a pretty good chunk of money learning how to be a great coach. So that means you [00:03:00] understand all of the coaching models, the mindset shifts, the power of holding space. Breakthroughs, embodiment, transformation, you name it, you get it.
I know that, but guess what? Your ideal clients do not speak that language. They do not wake up in the middle of the night thinking, Oh, do you know what I need? A beautifully aligned coaching container for personal expansion. No one wakes up thinking that. That is coach speak. What they wake up thinking is, Oh God, why do I feel so paralyzed about this?
And why can't I make a decision on this? Why is every decision make feel so hard for me? Oh God, I'm really in my own way. I'm not, I don't know what to do. What's the best course of action. They're the things that go through their heads in the middle of the night. They don't use coach speak. It [00:04:00] makes perfect sense to us as coaches, but it leaves our ideal clients completely confused.
Uninterested, probably not even stopping the scroll. Mostly they ignore it. They will ignore it because it means nothing. It's usually very generic and people are sick of it. People are sick of hearing coaches speaking in that way, in that kind of secret language. And it really does sneak in everywhere, honestly, after this episode, I really want you with your new fresh eyes to go and just take a look at your website, your social media bios, your social media posts, your sales pages, the way you talk about what you do when you're at networking events.
Right. What do you say? Have you ever said something like, um, I help women step into their highest alignment. That's coach speak. I guide my [00:05:00] clients through transformational inner work. Those sorts of things are coach speak. And I do get it. It feels natural to us because it's how we talk in the coaching world.
It's our area of interest as well. So don't forget we're probably reading books, personal development books, et cetera. Written by coaches who also speak coach speak. So it feels completely natural to us, but if you're not marketing to other coaches, they don't want to step into their highest alignment, honestly.
They want to stop second guessing themselves every day. They don't want transformational inner work. They want to stop feeling so stuck and start making progress on the thing that they want or on getting rid of the thing they don't want. This is an actionable episode. I really want you to go back through your [00:06:00] marketing, go and look through all of those things, you know, Instagram, post your website, LinkedIn, bio, all of that.
And be ruthless. Where are you using Codespeak? Where are you making your potential clients work too hard to understand what you actually do? That's just one of the biggest mistakes in writing copy that I see all the time, is that your copy is so clever. But you're making your clients work really hard to understand exactly what you're saying to them in terms of how you can help them.
And so it's not doing you any favours. And then I want you to swap it for real human words. So if your ideal client wouldn't say it, you shouldn't be writing it. So for me, it might be rather than me saying, I help clients create a [00:07:00] mindset shift that leads to transformation. I might say I help business owners stop overthinking and start taking action.
Right. Really simple, you know, so that's not particularly clever copy. It's not, you know, but you get the point. Much clearer. So then I want you to test it. Next time you're about to post something, ask yourself before you post, if my ideal client saw this, would they immediately think, Oh my God, yes, I see myself in that.
That's me. Or have they got to somehow decode what I'm saying to work out what I'm actually talking about? And if it's the latter, obviously you're going to tweak it. You know, we live in a world right now where attention spans are shorter than ever. We know this. So if your message isn't crystal clear within the first few seconds, like forget it, your idle client is moving on.
They're not accommodating you. They're not being patient and waiting [00:08:00] for you to get to the point, or they're not going to indulge you by Analyzing your wonderful, beautifully worded copy, especially if you're using those vague coaching container for soulful alignment type words, they're just not going to do it.
They want to feel seen and heard and they want to feel understood straight away. And that does start with your words, whether you're speaking them on video, on a podcast, or whether you're writing them. It starts with your words, the words you're using. Okay. Really important. Really important. And you know what?
Now that I've shared this with you, you're not going to be able to unsee it. And that's what I hope. I want that to be the result of listening to this episode is that you can't unsee coach speak. Do an experiment. Go and have a look around and see how much of it is out there. And then really think about how can I [00:09:00] use the words my ideal clients would use?
Do I understand my ideal clients deeply enough to know what kind of words they would use to describe their situation, their frustrations, their desires? And if the answer to that is no, you have work to do in terms of talking to ideal clients, getting to know them better, understand them more deeply. So your homework, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to audit your messaging.
Find that coach speak, cut it out, replace it with words that your ideal clients actually use, and then, Stand back and see what a difference that makes, because I promise you it will. Okay. So next thing I want to talk about in this episode is, well, first of all, it's a thank you. I want to thank you so much for the [00:10:00] overwhelming response that I had to the little shout out to see if there was interest in me creating a free course for you to unearth your uniqueness and refine your niche.
so much. Turns out you do want to do that and you do see the importance of that. So I am bloody glad I asked because now I can make that happen for you. No problem at all. So what I'm going to do is post a link in the show notes to this episode where you can register for the free course. It isn't ready yet because obviously I'm going to build it out to share it with you, but if you get in quick, you'll Register, and then it will be made available to you within the next couple of weeks.
All right. So that's exciting stuff. Like I say, I'll pop a link in the show notes. The link will be gillmoakes.com/unearth all right. Well, I hope you've enjoyed this episode and go do your audit, get rid of the coach [00:11:00] speak, and then sign up for the free mini course. Unearth your edge, and I will see you back here same time, same place next week.
Bye for now. I hope you enjoyed this episode and that getting our heads together this week has filled your mind with what's possible. If you love the show, would you do me a massive favour, please? Would you leave a five star rating on Apple Podcasts? It would really help me put more heads together, reach more ears and expand more minds.
Until next week, bye for now.
