Is Your Company Ready to Introduce Coaching to Your Staff?

Many companies and organizations have begun adopting coaching as a way to improve productivity and performance of heir employees. Multiple studies have shown that this model helps companies retain their staff longer and avoid the expense of recruiting and retraining, increase productivity, profits, and customer service, and skyrocket job satisfaction and slash lost time and costs due to sick days. But, how do you know if your company is ready to introduce coaching to your staff? And what are the first steps to do so?

Consider the following questions:

1. Are you sufficiently committed to your employees’ growth and development to dedicate both dollars and time to a career development initiative?

2. Do you know your staff’s current level of satisfaction and morale?

3. How aware are you of any barriers to employee development?

4. Have you done a climate survey recently?

5. Have you implemented any other successful employee development initiatives? Any unsuccessful ones? What are the ramifications of overcoming those results?

6. Is the culture of your organization one more of entitlement or career self-reliance?

7. Is your industry experiencing increased competition such that leveraging your human capital is not just a luxury, but a critical issue?

8. Is your staff, as a general rule, open to change and committed to growth?

Your answers to these and other similar questions will help you determine if your company is truly ready for coaching. Career Coach Institute and its Master Career Coaches can work with you to both answer these questions and develop a customized approach to implementing career coaching that will be welcomed by your staff. Contact info@corporatecoachinstitute.com or call 866-226-2244 x 4 to discuss how we can help you achieve your objectives.

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Retirement Coaching One of Fastest Growing Specialties

Retirement coaching is one of the fastest growing specialties in coaching today. Over 10,000 people turn 60 each day in the U.S. – that’s one every 7.5 seconds! The "Coaching Authentic Retirement" elective class - as well as our full training and certification as a Certified Professional Retirement Coach - introduce you to the “retirement wave,” and how you can profit from it in a flexible new business as a coach.

As people transition into this new phase of their life, they will need retirement coaches to help them design their retirement the way that’s right for them.
1) the traits you need to be a successful retirement coach,
2) what areas retirement coaches do and don’t address,
3) pros and cons of independent versus internal retirement coaching,
4) how to make money as a retirement coach, and more.

Visit: http://www.retirementcoachinstitute.com

Marcia Bench

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LIFE COACHING, CAREER COACHING: CAN THEY MIX?

Stacy was at a career crossroads. After 15 years in the telecommunications industry, she was dissatisfied. The industry had lost its “personal touch,” and she had been promoted to the top position in her company that was available to her. “There must be more to life than working this hard and not really enjoying it,” she kept thinking. “But what else can I do with my finance degree besides crunch numbers in the industry I know?” In addition, her company had just announced a pending merger, and she was afraid that her job may be eliminated once the merger went through.

You may have had a client like Stacy. But many therapists and or life coaches, when faced with this type of client, find that they wish they had more in-depth knowledge of the job market and the job search process to assist them. We know that a coach should refer anyone with mental illness to a therapist. But how does the life coach know when to refer a client to an expert in another coaching area, such as a career coach or career counselor?

Following are some key indicators that a referral is necessary or that the life coach should obtain specific training in career coaching:

1. Does the client’s issue involve primarily personal/life issues or primarily work-related issues? Career coaching is defined in Career Coaching: An Insider’s Guide as “an interactive process of exploring work-related issues – leading to effective action – in which the coach acts as both a catalyst and facilitator of individual and, in turn, organizational development and transformation.” “Work-related issues” includes anything from resume preparation and interviewing skills to career choice and life/work balance concerns. Career coaches and career counselors are trained in these subject matter areas.

2. Will the client’s issue likely require a Job Search Marketing Plan? Another area in which career coaches are specifically trained is development of an appropriate Job Search Marketing Plan for that individual. This plan will incorporate a suitable mix of published job market strategies (job boards, advertised openings etc.) and unpublished job market avenues (networking, targeted mailings, etc.). If the life coach is not trained in those areas, a career coach could be used in tandem with the life coach for the more technical aspects of the client’s job search.

3. Is the client seeking a new career direction or facing a more general existential crisis? If the former, a career coach such as those trained at Career Coach Institute can assist in designing an Authentic Vocation™, using 8 key elements that blend fulfillment, the client’s talents, and desirable financial rewards. This often requires thinking creatively and/or blending past experiences and skills in new ways.

Career coaching is the one coaching specialty that is recession-proof, since people change jobs in any economy (sometimes voluntarily, sometimes not). If you enjoy linking people’s life purpose with its expression through their work, career coaching may be just the addition to your skillset that you have been seeking!

Click here to attend our preview call “Career Coaching Secrets” Tuesday April 17, 2007 at 8 pm ET: www.careercoachingsecrets.com/preview.html

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Marcia Bench is a Master Certified Career CoachTM and Certified Business Coach with over 21 years’ experience in the career development field. A frequent speaker, Marcia is a former attorney and is Founder and Director of Career Coach Institute, LLC and Retirement Coach Institute. She has authored 18 books including Career Coaching: An Insider’s Guide, Don’t Just Survive, Thrive During Transition and Retire Your Way! Her primary web site is:
http://www.careercoachinstitute.com/


ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Marcia Bench is a Master Certified Career CoachTM and Certified Business Coach with over 21 years’ experience in the career development field. A frequent speaker, Marcia is a former attorney and is Founder and Director of Career Coach Institute, LLC and Retirement Coach Institute. She has authored 18 books including Career Coaching: An Insider’s Guide, Don’t Just Survive, Thrive During Transition and Retire Your Way! Her primary web site is:
http://www.careercoachinstitute.com/

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Should You Incorporate Your Coaching Business? Part 5

SELF-ASSESSMENT: SHOULD YOU INCORPORATE?

Taking all of the factors in our previous installments into consideration, use the following checklist and advice from your business attorney and your CPA to decide whether incorporation is right for you:

SHOULD I INCORPORATE? Yes or No on the following questions:

1. Do I have substantial personal assets that need to be protected from creditors’ claims or lawsuits?

2. Is there high risk of injury or damage resulting from my product or service? (not true for most coaching businesses)

3. Is it worth the extra cost of organizing a corporation?

4. Do I want perpetual existence for my business so that it will continue after I die?

5. Am I willing to observe the necessary formalities of the corporate form?

6. Do I want the management of my business centralized in a board of directors?

7. Do I want ownership of the company to be easily transferable?


If you answer to most of these questions is yes, a corpora­tion may be appropriate for your business, subject to the advice of your attorney and accountant.

You will want to compare the options of sole proprietor (if you are the only person in your business) or partnership (if two or more) with corporation.

In addition, you will want to consider Limited Liability Company as an alternate filing status with somewhat less formalities but the same protection, and the flexibility of being treated as a sole proprietor or corporation for tax purposes.

If this topic is of interest to you, be sure to check out my book Launch Your Practice! Visit:
http://www.careercoachinstitute.com/books.htm#Launch for more details!

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Should You Incorporate Your Coaching Business Part 4

Formalities and Cost

Paperwork and formalities is one aspect to be considered in deciding whether or not to incorporate.

A corporation can be formed for from $500 to $2000 in filing and legal fees.

The initial filing is articles of incorporation, filed with your state’s Corporation Division. Then, an organiza­tional meeting must be held and shares of your company issued. At this meeting, bylaws are adopted, requisite stock certificates issued, corporate agree­ments executed, and officers and directors elected. Your attorney should assist you with preparing the necessary documents for this meeting.

After the initial meeting, you can largely maintain the records yourself. However, you must ensure that meetings of the shareholders and directors are held at least annually, with minutes kept in proper form to document the meeting, and you must file annual reports with your Secretary of State’s Corporation Division. These will help keep your corporation "alive" and validly maintained. Funds of the corporation must be kept entirely separate from personal funds of any of the persons involved in the business.

Part 5 tomorrow!

If this topic is of interest to you, be sure to check out my book Launch Your Practice! Visit http://www.careercoachinstitute.com/books.htm#Launch for more details!

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Should You Incorporate Your Business? Part 3

Pros and Cons of Incorporating

There are two primary advantages of incorporating your business. First, you become surrounded by the legal protection of the “corporate veil,” which limits personal liability of you and any other sharehol­ders for business debt. If you have substantial assets, this reason alone can be important – although coaching insurance can also ameliorate your risk.

A second advantage is the corporation’s perpetual existence, which means it continues to exist after the death of one or more of the shareholders.

Its primary disadvantages are the requirement of maintaining the necessary formalities and the additional cost of formation. However, these may be a small price to pay if yours is a high-risk business or for other reasons the advantages of the corporate form are desirable for your business.

Part 4 tomorrow!

If this topic is of interest to you, be sure to check out my book Launch Your Practice! Visit http://www.careercoachinstitute.com/books.htm#Launch for more details!

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Should You Incorporate Your Coaching Business?

Installment 2: Types of Corporations

There are two types of corporations: C and S (named for the sections of the Internal Revenue Code pertaining to each).

a) C Corporation. This is the "regular" or "typical" corporation. It has all of the features and requirements listed above. It files its own tax return and pays its own taxes. The shareholders only report any dividends (and wages, if any) that they receive from the corporation on their individual tax returns. Thus if you are the sole shareholder and only employee of your corporation, you will pay a double tax on part of the corporate income: corporate tax on net corporate income, and individual tax on the portion of corporate income paid to you as wages.

b) S Corporation. The S corporation is a mix, or hybrid, of the corporation and the partnership. It eliminates much of the "double tax" effect of the C corporation. The S corporation exhibits all of the characteristics and carries all of the requirements listed in the general description above, but it does not pay its own taxes. It files an annual informational return, but all net income or loss is distributed to the shareho­lders in proportion to their ownership, who then report it as income on their individual returns. Thus income to the C corporation is taxed at corporate tax rates (currently higher than individual rates), but income to the S corporation is taxed at the individual rates of the respective shareholders. Because the corporate tax rates are higher than individual rates, many C corporations have converted to S status, and many new businesses are choosing to be S corporations. To be treated as an S corporation, a special form electing S status must be filed with the IRS. Your accountant will be able to provide and assist you with that form, or you can locate it online at www.irs.gov.


If this topic is of interest to you, be sure to check out my book Launch Your Practice!Visit http://www.careercoachinstitute.com/books.htm#Launch for more details!

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Should You Incorporate Your Coaching Business?

Whether your coaching business is new or approaching a new plateau of growth, it may be time to consider incorporating. (And this topic seems especially appropos with tax season upon us!)

What is a corporation? Simply put, a corporation is a separate taxable entity that has perpetual existence. When a corporation is created (whether by one person or many), it assumes its own identity separate and apart from the shareholders (i.e., those with an ownership interest in the corporation). Because of this separate identity, shareholders in the corporation are shielded from personal liability for business debt by what is called the corporate veil (assuming the corporation is validly formed and maintained). This is the primary advantage of the corporate form. Manage­ment of the corporation is centralized in a board of directors.

The corporation requires more formalities than the other forms of business to form and maintain. Failure to comply with these formalities can result in the loss of corporate status. Upon formation, articles of incorporation must be filed with your state registry (usually at the Secretary of State’s office). The necessary forms to obtain a taxpayer identification number with the IRS and identification numbers with the state employment and revenue authorities, now available online in most jurisdictions, must be filed for the new corporation. The taxpayer identification number for a business is akin to a social security number for an individual. See www.irs.gov for details.

Installment 2 Monday!

If this topic is of interest to you, be sure to check out my book Launch Your Practice!

Visit http://www.careercoachinstitute.com/books.htm#Launch for more details!

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10 Low Cost Ways to Generate Leads for Your Business

Today, we would like to thank Terri Levine for an incredibly valuable blog!

You can hear more w/Terri TOMORROW Tuesday April 3rd at 2PM ET

Visit www.justaskterri.com to sign up and you don't have to ask a question, just enter
"signup" in the question box and you will be provided all call information!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As a small business owner, it’s vitally important to continually generate high quality leads for your business. This report focuses on 10 low cost, highly effective lead generation strategies for your business.

1) A-Z List
The A-Z list is a creative technique designed to help you keep track of all the contacts you’ve made or would like to make. It helps you gather, in one place, a complete list of possible sources for well-qualified leads. Creating the initial list might take some time, but after this, you will have a continual source of people, places, and companies to connect with and with whom you can share your products and services.

In order to begin the list, you’ll need a three-ring notebook. You will label the first page with the letter “A”, and then place a few empty filler pages behind this letter, then label another page “B”, and add some empty pages, then label another page “C” and add some empty pages- continue this for the entire alphabet. Once you’ve set it up, it’s time to start filling it in.

Starting with any letter, begin to write down all the people, places, names of companies, cities, anything and everything that begins with that letter- aim for an exhaustive list.

For example, for the letter “A”, you might have: Acme stores, Alan (my cousin), AT&T, Adidas, Air Jordan… etc.

Generate a similar list for each letter of the alphabet. Once you’ve completed this, you’re ready for the next step.

Now, each time you meet someone new, add his/her name to your A-Z list. It’s wise to spend about 10-15 minutes, faithfully, each week, adding to your list. In this way, you begin to amass an ongoing, growing database of people you know, companies you might do business with, and people you’d like to meet.

Very soon, you’ll have an extensive list of potential leads.

The A-Z list is a wonderful, creative tool for expanding your thinking about how and where you might generate new business. In fact, in the process of explaining it, I had several new ideas, myself.

2) Mind Mapping

This is another creative lead generation technique to help you solve any problems or blocks around generating more leads. It can be a fun, inspiring process.

In order to mind-map a solution, you’ll need a piece of paper and a pen or pencil. You might want to save your mind maps in some kind of binder or folder as they are good resources to refer back to periodically.

Once you have a piece of paper, write the ‘problem’ or ‘question’ in the middle of the page. For example, “how can I bring more customers into my business?” You place a circle around this question, and then draw a series of spokes moving outward from this circle (like the sun rays in a child’s drawing). At the end of each sun ray, you quickly and easily write out a possible solution- or, in some cases, a word or phrase that comes to you. Once you have written a word or phrase, you then circle that and draw additional sun rays from that circle and repeat the process. So the page will end up looking like a series of suns, each connected by a line or idea.

Mind-mapping is a good technique for accessing your creative/intuitive possibilities and can provide a roadmap of next steps to take.

3) Email Newsletter/Ezine

Starting an email newsletter or ezine is both a marketing and a lead generation technique. In order to set up a newsletter, you basically need to figure out a name, find people to subscribe, and make it a point to offer relevant, useful, informative and valuable content.

An email newsletter is most effective if it’s sent out at least monthly- this enables you to continue to educate your current customers, potential customers, and new prospects about your business and the value you can provide them. Remember, your customer/prospect always wants to know- “what’s in it for me?”- so you want to keep the focus of your email newsletter on solving your customer’s problems. You don’t want to use the whole publication as an advertisement for your business. Instead, and much more effective, would be to subtly showcase your expertise. Use case studies, client examples, occasional testimonials, and your own expertise and knowledge to make your newsletter one that people eagerly sign up for and can’t wait to receive.

The advantages of email newsletters are that they are inexpensive to produce, easy to send out, and offer a means for customers to click through to your website or sales pages if they would like more information. The downsides, though, are that they can be seen as somewhat impersonal (maybe not good for businesses which focus on high touch service- like salons, spas, etc.) and people might feel overwhelmed by email and quickly unsubscribe. If you are providing good, usable content, though, very often your subscribers will stay with you for years. Be sure to highlight customer appropriate changes to your business- i.e. did you just recently extend hours? Did you hire a new manager? Are you doing some charity or volunteer work that they might like to know about?

4) Contests/Giveaways

Contests or giveaways can be a really fun way to generate interest and excitement in your business. The majority of people enjoy obtaining something for free, and the higher the perceived value, the more excited people are to participate. A great way to use this to generate leads is to offer an item for free if people take a specified action (i.e. visit your website, sign up for your newsletter, know the right answer to a question).

Contests are most effective when there is some element of challenge- too easy and people quickly lose interest, too hard, and people don’t want to play anymore. Also, it’s best to kind of spread out these types of offerings. A contest every month might be too much, but a contest once a quarter (perhaps tied to the season, or a theme) might be just perfect. Be sure to get pictures of the winner and/or written testimonials about your contest. This will encourage more and more people to participate. Since they will be entering the contest to win a prize, you can also make some educated guesses about what kinds of products/services they might be interested in. Once you’ve held a contest or giveaway, you can also follow up with people and ask them what other products/services they might like to see offered for a contest or giveaway. This will tell you what your customers really want and need, and you can then step in to address this need.

These are really fun, and people love to win- so you might create a tip sheet or small product/package to give away and start holding contests/giveaways to increase your customer base.

5) Updates to Your Website

Updating your website is an important lead generation technique, and is a way to retain your current customers or clients. The main purpose of your website should be to educate and inform the consumer; to encourage him or her to stay aware of your business and to take the next step when s/he has a problem you can solve. The more current you keep your website, the more likely you are to have a flow of new leads and potential customers coming into your business.

Many people forget that people searching the Internet are often looking for information to solve a problem or answer a question. The more relevant content you have on your website, the more likely customers will come to you to solve their problems. You will want to continually update your offerings, sharing new, relevant links, resources, articles, products- anything that will serve your customer. You can announce these updates in your email newsletters and/or in any direct/print mailings. Give people a reason to visit, and they will. Give them frequent valuable updates, and they will keep coming back.Of course, the more they come back, the easier it is to gain their trust, and to build your visibility and credibility. Once a customer has visited your website, s/he is more likely to sign up for your email newsletter. Once s/he has read your email newsletter for a while, s/he is more likely to attend a free informational call or seminar. Once s/he has attended a seminar or requested more information, s/he is more likely to purchase a product or service. Once s/he has purchased a product or service, s/he is more likely to purchase another. And so on.

So providing good, solid website content is a great way to generate repeat business and new leads- plus, it’s generally very cost-effective, and gives you a great deal of credibility and visibility with your target customers.

6) Storyboarding

Storyboarding is another creative lead generation technique which can aid those of you who are visual thinkers or visual planners. In this process, you will take a series of sticky notes (like Post-It Notes) and you create space on a blank wall in your office. At one end of the wall you put where you are now (Point A) and, at the other end of the wall, you put your desired outcome (Point B) - for example: 10,000 new customer names. Then, with the remaining Post It Notes, you chart out (map out) all the steps which go from Point A to Point B. It’s good, in this process, to just let the ideas flow- get as many sticky notes up on the wall as you can.

This is a great visual brainstorming technique because it not only allows you to generate many ideas of how to get from Point A to Point B, but it also then allows you to move the sticky notes around to define the next steps and the next set of actions you’ll take to move from Point A to Point B.

This works especially well for defining processes that are complex, and those which might involve input from other sources. It can also be a great tool for defining and diagramming your lead generation strategies and noting how/where each strategy will drop a lead into your marketing cycle, so you can plan how much follow up is needed and track time to completed sale.

7) Free (Tele)Classes or Workshops

Offering a free “sample” or “taste” of what you can do is a great way to showcase your experience and generate interest in your business. A free (tele)class or (tele)workshop enables you to easily make contact with many interested prospects at one time, saving you the time and effort of arranging individual meetings. These classes or workshops can be on any topic you feel is valuable and informative to those you wish to serve.

Use these classes as a platform for sharing your knowledge, helping build your visibility, and increasing your credibility among your target market. It’s a proven psychological fact that the more people know you, the more they will like you (if they are predisposed to do so)- so the more you have contact with people, the more they will like you, and ultimately, will buy what you’re offering.

It is very easy to arrange a telephone-based class or an in-person class. For telephone classes, you’ll need to obtain a teleconference line (also known as a phone-bridge) and these can be had inexpensively from various services providers on the internet. Once you have obtained the bridge, you will set the class date, decide on a topic, develop it, and invite anyone who might be interested in attending. Participants pay their own long distance charges into the phone line. Have some way of tracking who attends, and offer something valuable as a “thank you” for attending- this will activate prospects and move them further into the sales cycle.

To arrange an in person class, you’ll follow very much the same process, except you’ll need to reserve physical space- a location- instead of a telephone line.

Workshops and classes are a great way to create a fast inflow of new leads into your business.

8) Direct Mail

Direct mail refers to any promotional or business item you will mail out to prospects. It might include business cards, postcards, brochures, advertisements, etc. This strategy is especially useful for those of you who work in a well-defined geographic location and/or can tightly segment out your market population.

In this process, you directly mail potential customers/prospects and invite them to visit your store, visit your website, sign up for a contest, or give them something for free.

The action you want them to take is one that will bring them into your business- so, at minimum, you want to have a way to capture their interest level (like having them go to a special page on your website and entering a promotional code so you know they came from your direct mail piece), and some way of following up in the future. Give them some valuable information, invite them to a free class or workshop, have them stop by for a free sample, or join a contest or giveaway. Encourage them to leave their comments, to call you if they have questions. In short, start to build a relationship with them.

In this example, you’ll find that lead generation can become even more effective when you combine various methods. Most businesses would benefit from some combination of direct mail and another lead generation strategy.

9) Coopetition

Coopetition is a term coined to define a mix of “cooperation” and “competition”.

This concept refers to the idea that you can partner with your competitors to increase your leads and sales. There are various ways to accomplish this, but one approach might look like this: You have customers in your database who have not bought from you, or who have expressed interest in products you don’t carry- but your competitor does. Your competitor may have similar names in his database. In a coopetitive arrangement, you both agree to share the names of customers which would benefit the other business, and, in an ethical, appropriate manner, you begin to market to these prospects that your competitor could not convert.

So you cooperate to trade names, and then serve your own business by marketing directly to those people. Another way to apply this concept is to partner or link with a firm that works with a similar group- but not exactly the same. For instance, let’s say that you sell products/service to companies under $25million in sales- you might partner with a firm that works with companies over $25million in sales. You each agree to share appropriate leads- you would send all $25m- customers to them, and they would send all $25m+ customers to you. This means, essentially, that you each work together (cooperate) to build your own businesses (compete).Coopetition is different from a joint venture (discussed below), because coopetition really encourages you to run your business for yourself and you won’t necessarily share the profits. Again, there are many other ways to use this strategy, but coopetition can be very powerful when used intentionally and thoughtfully.

10) Joint Ventures

Joint venturing is another way to team up with other businesses. In this model, you team up with another business which offers products that are geared to your target market. For example, a joint venture might be created between a company selling vitamins and one selling fitness equipment (based on the supposition that people who buy vitamins also exercise). Customers who purchase fitness equipment might be given a coupon for a free bottle of vitamins- or people who buy a particular brand of nutritional supplement (let’s say for joint pain) might be given a discount coupon for a piece of fitness equipment that relieves joint pain and/or strengthens your joints.

What separates a joint venture from coopetition is that, in a joint venture, people are partnering together and there is some compensation traded for the arrangement. In a coopetitive agreement, this might not be the case. A coopetitive agreement is, often, a “trade in kind”- I give you one name, you give me one name. A joint venture, however, is more of a partnership- where the participants split or share the profits resulting from the joint venture. An affiliate program might be another type of joint venture arrangement- affiliates sell for you, and you each share the profits. In essence, you have created a type of “joint venture” to sell the product.

Joint ventures are powerful because they use the concept of multiplication- when two people come together, each bringing their networks and spheres of influence, the synergy that is created can generate exponential growth for both partners.

Joint ventures are a great way to get out in front of a related, but separate, group and showcase your products and offerings. By joint venturing with another company, you are leveraging your marketing efforts and will be gaining more possible customers with much less effort. Some skilled joint venturers will create 3, 4, 5 way links- where each partner links to the 4 others. Again, joint ventures can be great lead generation strategies and their scope is limited only by your own creativity.

So then, this is a list of 10 very effective lead generation strategies for your business. If you want to build your business quickly, implement and follow through on as many strategies as you can. Get out there and happy leading!

If you want more tips like this go to:

comprehensivecoachingu.com/swsk/selling-without-selling-kit.htm.

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