Coaches: Here’s How to Build Your Coaching Funnel + Free Template
I’ve built hundreds of coaching sales funnels for coaches like you who are looking to grow leads and sales.
But at the beginning, not 100% of those funnels were successful (::GASP!:: —you say— “An honest marketer! OMG!”)
(Closes Gmail, hides the children, keeps reading…)
You see, there were key reasons (repeated patterns) why those coaching funnels that succeeded did, and those that didn’t, failed.
And I’m going to share with you today those key reasons/repeated patterns.
Specifically, here’s what I’ll cover in this article:
- You’ll learn how to create your own coaching sales funnel so that you can get more leads and sales. And I’ll give you all the secrets and strategies that will minimize relying on networking and word of mouth—and ultimately SCALE your coaching business.
- The key sales funnel ingredients that, regardless of your target market, will make your funnel generate more leads and sales.
- Plus you’ll get to download our proven-to-convert coaching sales funnel template fa’ free so you can copy it, take action on it, and see RESULTS.
In return, all I ask is for you to just email me when your coaching funnel starts bringing in better results. Fair?
Ok good, so here’s the first thing you need to know…
Your Coaching Sales Funnel & the Strategy Behind It
A strategy is a plan of action focused on how you achieve a specific goal.
It’s made of steps and thoughtful conversion tactics.
And the strategy behind your coaching sales funnel is to create a series of steps that lead people to convert into qualified leads.
Simple, right?
But why do you need people to be qualified before getting into a call with you?
Because this helps those leads have the right expectations about what they’d be potentially signing up for your coaching service during that consultation call with you.
So qualifying prospects in advance will also help you not invest time in someone who’s not a fit for your service or online courses.
We’ve worked with plenty of coaches specializing in everything from entrepreneurship, real estate, corporate leadership, health and fitness, and more. Because the coaching market keeps thriving, baby!
In fact, according to Statista, revenue in the health and wellness coaching market is projected to reach $3.13bn in 2023. And revenue is expected to have an annual growth rate of 10.69% ($5.20bn) by 2028.
And with all that experience we’ve gotten from working with coaches from different industries, we’ve gotten pretty good at creating high-converting coaching sales funnels for our coaching clients.
Below is one of the highest-converting coaching funnels we’ve created for coaches.
Since personality and human touch play an enormous role in working with a professional coach, this funnel pays particularly close attention to requesting a free consultation.
There are also plenty of nurturing and retargeting elements interspersed throughout the prospect’s journey as well.
For instance, the end goal for most of our clients who are coaches with their sales funnels is to “cause a permanent increase in sales and leads by attracting the right traffic in front of the right message(s), at the right time.”
You see, consumer and buyer behaviors have made a shift over the years. Especially with this economic turmoil.
Their journey through your website is different than it used to be.
So, your coaching funnel must reflect that path of least resistance.
Your sales funnel strategy must align (this is the “Law of Alignment” from the 11 Laws of Sales Funnel Physics) with your prospects’ expectations and anticipate their needs—and do it in a cool, non-salesy way.
By now, you already know that a sales funnel is defined as a series of steps that lead a potential client or customer from awareness to a buying decision.
And now, I will share with you the sales funnel template that should be your starting point when building your own high-ticket coaching funnel.
How to Build Your Coaching Sales Funnel—Start w/ a Simple Funnel Template &...
This sales funnel template will set up the foundations for creating your first coaching funnel from scratch. And building your coaching sales funnel is actually one of the lead gen tactics to grow your coaching business.
It’s got all the key elements your coaching funnel needs to start bringing in leads.
And afterall, that’s one of the most important things—to have all core elements in place.
I recommend starting with this simpler funnel because building a more complex one (like the one I’ll show you in a second), can take as much as several months to complete.
And this type of funnel works perfectly with high-priced physical products and services, for entrepreneurs, coaches, personal trainers, startup businesses, and high-end agencies who do consulting for other companies.
But what I really, really like about this funnel is that it’s simple.
It puts the focus on a couple of core pages to do the conversion “legwork.”
And that’s why if you’re looking to sell your coaching services, this should be your starting point.
Iterate on Your Simple Coaching Sales Funnel & Turn It into a More “Complex” One
I created this coaching sales funnel for 3 different successful coaching businesses.
And most of the tactics and strategies I used to build this sales funnel are the same I teach in my Sales Funnel Blueprint.
One of those businesses I created this funnel for was in the real estate coaching industry.
This client was a professional business/life coach who specialized in helping real estate agents earn more, adjust their mindset for success, and improve their quality of life.
She helped them reach their true potential by providing reputation-boosting strategies to turn real estate careers into a massive and lucrative success.
She’s one of our best case studies so far (she actually changed her business model not so long ago).
Her lead magnet offer used to convert pretty well. Here’s the lead magnet design we created for her.
139 people had opted in to download her checklist (lead magnet), and 4 people had requested a consultation with her.
This happened in a very short span of time.
We saw 18% conversion for this coach when we first launched her funnel. And this is particularly great because in a survey by Databox, 30% of people said a good conversion rate for a funnel is between 3 and 5%. So 18% is way better .
And for the first quarter of 2023, conversion rates for eCommerce sites were the highest in the food and beverage sector according to Statista.
Impressive, huh?
Ok so, I’ll now share with you the secrets that have made this real estate coaching funnel successful.
And if you want to digest the content from this article through video, I recorded this video walk-through of the article not so long ago in case you want to check it out.
Key Sales Funnel Ingredients That Make this Real Estate Coaching Funnel WORK
The way this real estate coaching funnel was set up was, after people downloaded the checklist, prospects were redirected to a Thank You page.
On this landing page, there was a video recorded by the coach incentivizing prospects to request a consultation with her.
We were basically selling the consultation call here rather than the video. The video was meant to create rapport with leads and make them “get to know a bit better” the coach before booking a call.
So if prospects would proceed to book the call, then they were asked a couple of qualifying questions.
This was meant to qualify leads and filter out the bad ones.
Then, prospects were redirected to a Booking page where they could select the date of preference for their call with the coach.
This simple funnel converted leads by 18% right after we launched it. And 139 people opted in to download the checklist.
Now it’s time to go through each of the key ingredients that will make your coaching sales funnel work (the same way it did for this client).
#1. Coaching Funnel Ingredient: Lead Magnet
Your lead magnet is the entry point for your coaching sales funnel (or any eCommerce sales funnel, or online courses sales funnel, or SaaS sales funnel).
As you can see in the funnel diagram below, we created a landing page for people to download this real estate coach’s lead magnet.
We set up the checklist as the lead magnet because checklists are perfect for converting leads—especially in the coaching industry.
Also because downloading a free checklist doesn’t represent a big commitment for your prospect. It’s something they get for free that adds value to them.
So offer your prospects any checklists on how to solve or do something (“how-to” checklists).
For example, give an 11-step checklist on how to “adjust your diet and lose weight in the first 2 weeks” if you’re a health/fitness coach.
Or a “7-figure income real estate agent checklist” for real estate agents to earn more, adjust their mindset for success, and improve their quality of life.
Or a simple checklist on “how to automate your business growth and your marketing and operations needs”.
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#2. Coaching Funnel Ingredient: Retargeting Ads
Adding retargeting ads in your coaching sales funnel make people come back to your site if they don’t initially convert with the lead magnet offer. And it also tightens the conversion rate.
Here’s an example of a retargeting ad for a photography business.
#3. Coaching Funnel Ingredient: “Congrats or Thank You for Downloading Your Lead Magnet” Page
You can either call it a thank you page or a congrats page.
Here you reaffirm people’s decision to opt in to download your free lead magnet in the first place.
It’s important to write a short copy of 1 or 2 sentences with a transition statement like in the example below.
Just thank or congratulate your website visitors for downloading your lead magnet. Then, add a video where you are on camera.
This will help nurture the relationship with the prospect because they’ll see your face and they’ll know who’s behind the brand.
Communicate with your prospects so they can empathize with you and your business.
Tell them how the lead magnet offer they just downloaded works, how they can get value from it, and tell them a bit about you and your company.
Then, add a clear CTA button below the video to keep moving your prospects through your funnel and convert them into customers.
You can also treat this page as a sales page (the every page rule).
At this point, the people who land on this landing page will be interested in whatever you’re selling (coaching services, online courses, etc.).
They’re ready to potentially make a buying decision. So be specific with your offer, clarify their questions.
For instance, offer the different packages of your service. Educate your prospects with your price anchor. And let them know what’s the opportunity cost of doing nothing, what’s the value of their time, what’s included in the different packages.
When they book a consultation in the next step of your funnel, they’ll be asked some qualifying questions.
#4. Coaching Funnel Ingredient: Confirmation/Booking Page
You can combine here both opt-in form questions with the confirmation and booking page.
We’ve actually seen this convert better.
For instance, include a booking widget (like Calendly) to schedule a call.
This works because it removes some of the friction of scheduling calls at a time that works for both parties.
Then, make prospects answer the qualifying questions to affirm their commitment to get into the call with you.
#5. Coaching Funnel Ingredient: “Thank You for Booking” Page
After people answer the qualifying questions and book a call with you, thank them or congratulate them for that step they just took.
#6. Coaching Funnel Ingredient: Email Follow-Up
For this step in your coaching sales funnel, create a follow-up email sequence for people who dropped off before booking the consultation call with you.
And each email sequence should follow our proven VACUUM formula:
- V – Value (give your readers value)
- A – Authority (show why your subscribers should listen to you)
- C – Call-to-Action (get your readers to act on your offer)
- U – Unique (show your subscribers why you stand out from the other guys)
- U – Urgency (tell your readers why they should act now)
- M – Make a Decision! (give a final hard push for the sale)
Other Industries We’ve Created Sales Funnels for & Have Succeeded w/ Our Coaching Funnel Strategy
We’ve not only created successful sales funnels for coaches. We’ve also created funnels for agencies, eCommerce, SaaS, professional services, and more.
And here are some of those industries where we used the same (or similar) strategy used for the coaching funnel:
- Health: We used the same coaching sales funnel strategy as the base for a high-ticket sales funnel for a hyperbaric chamber. This is a type of medical treatment used by athletes and children. The strategy behind the coaching sales funnel worked perfectly for this industry.
- Software agency: Another type of business this sales funnel strategy worked for is a software agency. Our former client was selling services that helped larger companies to streamline their operations.
- High-end agencies: High-end B2B agencies who do consulting for other companies have also benefited from our coaching funnel template.
- Startup: Entrepreneurs and/or startup businesses who sell high-value and high-priced products or services have also used our coaching funnel template to bring in leads to grow their new business.
- Personal trainers: This funnel is working for one of our current clients. He’s a life coach who teaches people how to make success their second nature through some expertly-crafted training programs. And so far, we’ve helped him convert leads by 87%.
That’s pretty impressive, right? It just goes to show that one single funnel strategy can do wonders for different businesses in different industries.
Bonus: High-ticket Coaching Sales Funnel Example
Here’s an example of a coaching sales funnel that has worked for a high-ticket coaching business.
Winning International was a coaches-to-coaches service that assists leaders in growing their businesses. The company was created in 2014 by Ryan Magdziarz.
He worked with dating, finance, fitness, health, life, and business coaches.
This company’s sales funnel relied heavily on paid Facebook ads. These drove people to their website where they could then opt in and become customers.
Let’s take a look at this high-ticket coaching sales funnel…
- Landing Page: When prospects arrived on this page, they were encouraged to download their lead magnet that was a template.
- Free Consultation: On the top right corner of the lead magnet landing page, prospects could see a call-to-action button that invited them to check out the “Free Training”. After clicking, people were redirected to a landing page with outstanding CTAs to book a free call.
- Thank You Page: After downloading the lead magnet, prospects were taken to a thank you page. On that page, there was an offer for a free call along with a CTA to watch a video. The end goal here was to convert the prospect into a paying client.
Their lead magnet offer is what made this sales funnel so unique. Because it then led to an offer to become a coaching client, which is a great upsell technique.
Conclusion
When you download our coaching sales funnel template, the next step is to go level by level in the funnel, take action, and launch.
But remember, building a coaching sales funnel takes time and expertise. Even if you don’t see results right away, it’ll work. And this coaching funnel template it’s meant to help you do that.
So don’t be discouraged if you don’t see results immediately.
Our coaching funnel template will help you:
- Understand your prospects and clients’ journey.
- Empathize with your prospective clients (what do they need, not what they want) and present your offers in a logical order. This order needs to anticipate your clients’ needs—tailoring the message based on where they’re at.
- People will drop out of your coaching funnel (that’s normal) so take action. Go niche with targeting for your ads (traffic), along with thoughtful on-page copy, design, and of course, follow-up via retargeting and email automation.
We’ve seen already great results for clients who are using our sales funnel strategy to sell their coaching services.
And I’m sure it will bring results for you too now that you know the “why” behind each ingredient of your coaching funnel.
This will help you better understand your prospects and clients’ needs and give them what they’re looking for.
And if you need help building your coaching funnel or want to delegate all your digital marketing and operations tasks, then join Growbo’s waitlist here. We are the future of your business growth automation .
Now tell me something, have you ever created a coaching sales funnel before?
Let me know in the comments below.
And by the way, congrats! By downloading our coaching funnel template you’re one step closer to converting leads like crazy!
Keep funnelin’, stay focused.
