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How to Automate Your Online Coaching Business to Save Time and Money

There are many ways to automate your online coaching business, including using software and hiring additional support.

This blog post will consider a few affordable ways to start automating your business so you can focus on the parts you love.

Learning to automate your systems and processes takes a little dedication upfront but can make all the difference in the sustainability of your business.

There are definitely two extremes when it comes to business owners.

There are the big wigs sitting at the top, raking in cash, not knowing or caring about what happens at the lower levels.

Then, there’s the solopreneur that does everything herself, from content creation to client work to bookkeeping and everything in between.

And it’s really hard to find that sweet spot in between.

If you fall under one of those two categories mentioned above and are content where you’re at, and you don’t like free tips that make your job easier, this article isn’t for you.

Here are my favorite ways to automate my business.

The Many Benefits of Automating Your Online Coaching Business

Once you begin automating parts of your business, you’ll see just how essential it is to scaling and growing your company. Here are a few things I’ve noticed.

• Increased productivity – I spend less time on tedious tasks and more time creating content for my business and clients.

• A sense of security – I do all my work from web browsers that automatically save my progress.

*Quick side story about why that’s so important to me.

When I first started copywriting for health coaches, I had an old laptop with a crappy battery that wouldn’t hold a charge. I don’t mean that the battery wouldn’t last long. I mean, the second the computer was unplugged, it turned off completely.

At this point, I was writing everything in Microsoft Word because that’s just what you did! And I was willing to always sit near an outlet to work. (You put up with a lot when you’re business is still in its starting stages.)

Until one day, after I had nearly completed a 500-word (for $5… as I said…you put up with a lot…) article, someone I won’t reveal the identity of sat down on the couch that my computer cord was strung across. The plug lurched out of the wall, and my computer was dead.

Was my work saved? Nope. I was SO focused on finishing the project that I didn’t take the time to save it. I frantically plugged my computer back in, only to find that all my hard work was gone, and I had to start from scratch.

The lesson? Automation can be as simple as using programs that have autosave.

Ok, back to the list…

• Better performance by your whole team – when you have a process and your team is familiar with it, you spend less time answering questions, and you never have to worry about steps getting missed.

• Improved collaboration – It is SO easy to keep my team on the same page. I use Trello to keep us all organized, forcing us to work together because we all see the same tasks and how each task relates to the next. (Not that we need “force”… I have an amazing team that works great together!)

• Faster delivery to clients – Automating things like sending freebies when someone subscribes to my list means that my audience instantly gets exactly what they requested.

• Cost savings – The amount of time I save from automating my systems is phenomenal. That means I have more time to work on client work, create my content, and reach out to new prospects – the things that actually make me money.

Automation benefits you, your team, and your clients in countless ways. These are just a few things I’ve noticed personally.

How to Automate Your Online Coaching Business and Save Time

There are a million tools out there, some are free, some are paid. I’ll cover a few of both, and I’ll only recommend the ones that I truly believe are worth the price.

• Scheduling Out Your Content Using a Social Media Calendar

There are countless calendars you can use. I really like both Canva and Meta Business Suite.

To start, I batch out (or have my VA batch out) all the graphics and captions for the entire month and the beginning of each month.

Then I can directly schedule those graphics from Canva to Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn. I think even Pinterest, but don’t quote me on that.

Once that’s done, all I have to do the rest of the month is engage and enjoy the content of accounts I follow or explore new pages.

I find I enjoy social media more this way when I don’t have to be constantly giving, but I can just relax and have natural interactions with different accounts.

The only downside to the Canva calendar is that you can’t schedule carousels.

That is the reason I switched to Meta Business Suite. Unfortunately, I haven’t figured out how to schedule to LinkedIn directly from Meta Suite, but for me, the carousels on Instagram are more important since that’s where my target audience is.

• Saving Your Brand On Canva

You do need the paid version of Canva to use this feature, but it has definitely made my life easier and improved the aesthetics of my brand.

It allows you to save brand colors and fonts without wasting time searching for templates.

This feature is a must if you have a social media manager or virtual assistant to plan and design your content.

• Reaching Out to New Leads

If you don’t already, please include some form, freebie, or SOMETHING to collect emails for your email list. You already know my strong stance on this!

But don’t go manually collecting emails one at a time.

Take advantage of a form or capture system that collects new contacts and then directly drops them into your email list on whatever email marketing tool you use.

Some websites include these forms, as do most email marketing platforms.

• Warming Up New Leads

You Just got a new subscriber! Now what?? Don’t let them get cold.

Prewrite a welcome email sequence of four or five emails that will automatically send (at intervals of your choice) to new subscribers!

Once it’s all setup, you can be confident that any new leads get a proper welcome to your list and get consistent value delivered.

Not sure what to include in your welcome email? Drop me a line to learn more!

• Planning, Creating, and Posting Content

One way you can simplify your business is by working with someone who plans, creates, and posts content for you every week in your unique style and voice.

Some forms of content like Podcasts and YouTube videos obviously need your literal voice, but even having someone to plan out and script your videos will cut back a lot of the time you could be spending elsewhere…like on vacation in the Maldives….

Or you can hire an editor you trust to edit and upload that content once it’s completed.

The less time you spend on tedious tasks, the more present you can be with your audience.

What are the Best Online Tools for Automating Your Online Coaching Business?

There are countless tools you can use to automate your business, including calendar links, CRMs, email marketing platforms, and tools like Zapier that connect them all.

I recommend starting slow. I made the mistake of taking on ALL the pretty tools at once, and if you don’t have a super extensive clientele, some of these tools can complicate things.

But if you’re at the point where you’re getting more inquiries a day than you have time to respond to or, at the moment, small manual tasks start getting in the way of bigger tasks; then these tools can definitely help.

How Will You Automate Your Business This Year?

Whether you start with a free tool or invest in contracting out some of your backend work, the more you can automate this year, the better.

I’m all about systems flowing smoothly and my business running even if I’m sick, on vacation, or off grid for a few weeks. Consider making this your goal, too, so you can have a sustainable, thriving business in the long run.

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