3 Steps To Finding The Right Business Coach For You

business coach

Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn. ~ Benjamin Franklin (Tweet this)

Mentorship is an absolute must when it comes to running a business. In fact, I would argue that some sort of business coach is the FIRST person you should hire. That way, you can learn the ropes and get coached to reach the point of being able to afford assistants and other kinds of team members.

The problem is there are lots of business coaches out there and not all of them are good. I’ve had to actually correct much of what my clients have learned from other coaches’ training. Or, maybe it’s not that some coaches aren’t “good” per se, but rather the information they have is outdated. And even still, some coaches just aren’t a good fit for your personality and style.

If you’re going to be spending a nice chunk of money on a business coach (let’s face it, coaching is not cheap), you’re going to want to make sure the coach is a good fit for you and your business. In this guide we’re going to show you some steps to finding the best business coach for you. This will help you avoid what so many have experienced in firing coaches and losing money.

But first, we must address the issue of cost.

You can’t make a decision about coaching based on how cheap or expensive someone is. Quite frankly, coaching is not a blue-light special at K-Mart so you can’t use the same logic in choosing a coach. Coaching is expensive—and it should be! Coaches are giving you the two most valuable things they have: their time and their brain. These two things cannot be reproduced and for this reason private mentorship and coaching is expensive.

Besides, if you find a good coach you’ll make your investment back in one way or another. According to research studies curated by the International Coaching Academy, 86% of companies who’ve hired coaches said they’ve made their investment back. Professional coaching has also shown to improve time management by 57-percent, work performance by 70-percent and business management by 61-percent.

Tips to finding a business coach

As you can clearly see, coaching is an investment that will make you money back exponentially for years to come. Now the question becomes how do you find a good coach? Here are a few tips.

1. Ask for referrals

Referrals are probably the best way to find a good coach. This is also how I found my first coach when I had just committed to building my business into a full-time venture.

Because I had several colleagues online who were doing amazing work, I started asking them who their coach was. This made the decision a lot easier because I already knew and respected individuals who had undergone coaching with this particular person.

The proof was in the pudding. I knew these colleagues were doing well and I wanted to be where they were; so naturally I would want the coach who helped get them there.

2. Find a coach who understands your business

One way to ensure you find a great coach is to find one who truly understands your business.

For example, if you are a freelance writer, find a coach who is (or was) also a freelance writer. Note that in this case web designers, copywriters and creative types would work as well because the process of running the business is similar.

I once had a client come to me because her former coach did not understand how she made money. She was a blogger who wanted to run an online business, and her coach had a better understanding of how to run brick-and-mortar businesses.

While there are similarities between the two, she was better off finding a coach who understood how to make money online rather than at a store front. For instance, online businesses rely heavily on social media and online tools for scalability where as store-front businesses use different tools.

Another great point is to find a coach who is in your kind of business. By that I mean do you sell products or services? Products deal with inventory whereas services do not—they have different issues. As such, if you’re a service provider find a coach who is also a service provider (and vice versa).

3. Check in with your gut

Sometimes your gut is a better decision maker than your brain. When it comes to a coach you’ll want to make sure you work well together, that your personalities mesh and that it’s a good partnership. When it comes to those kinds of things your intuition may serve as a better barometer than your intellect.

Your brain may be saying, “Go for the coach that will help you reach millionaire status” while your gut may be saying “There was something about that coach I didn’t like and I may not be ready for that level of success yet.” Always make sure to check in with your gut before hiring someone. Your gut never lies.

Bringing it all together

Here’s an example of how to use the steps mentioned in this article.

I am a part of an international entrepreneurial group for women and the founder happens to live in my city. By going to the events I was able to meet her and get some valuable mentorship from her. She helped me bust through mental blocks when I was hiring my virtual assistant and she referred me to a great trademark attorney.

I applied all three of the aforementioned steps as well. I’d been referred to her organization, she ran a business similar to mine and we hit it off at the event. By taking those three things into account I knew I’d found a great mentor.

Mentoring is: Sharing Life’s Experiences and God’s Faithfulness. ~ Janet Thompson (Tweet this)

Do you have a mentor or a coach? How did you find them? Tell us about it.

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About the Author

Amanda Abella is an online business coach, speaker and author of the Amazon bestselling book - Make Money Your Honey. She is committed to helping individuals have a better relationship with work and money through entrepreneurship, online marketing and money mindset. Her work has been featured in Forbes, The Huffington Post, and more.

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