7 Steps To Start A Life Coaching Business

Maybe you are looking for a new side hustle. Maybe you are trying to determine if becoming a life coach is something that would be a good fit for you. Maybe you are already a life coach, but not quite sure how to actually start a life coaching business.

Well, it is actually easier than you may think. The goal for the sections below is to give you a step by step guide & rundown of everything required to start your new coaching business and take the overwhelm & guesswork out of it. Let’s start your entrepreneurial journey with ease. 💆🏻‍♀️

What Is A Life Coach Business?

A life coaching business is anything that falls within the categories of general life coaching, health & fitness coaching, spiritual coaching, career & leadership coaching. While there are more niched down sub-categories of coaching, these are the top 4 broad categories for coaches. A successful life coaching business occurs when you are able to take your skills, get yourself in front of your target audience, help your clients get results so you can receive client testimonials, and then do it all over again. Your life coaching career is dependent upon turning it into an actual business.

Be advised that simply being certified & calling yourself a life coach does not automatically make that a business. There are some other areas you will need to work on & some other areas where you are already an expert that will need to work in tandem with your life coaching skills for your life coaching to become a business & a successful one at that.

More on what those areas are below. ⬇️

Are Life Coaches Worth It?

The answer to this can vary, but overall the answer is… yes. Many factors go into the decision to get a life coach, and their success as small business owners. Some of these things include, but are not limited to:

💜 the type of coach you are looking to work with

💜 your credibility & results as a coach

💜 your training

💜 your niche

💜 demand for you as a coach

Quick Fact is that 80% of the population that have used life coaching were satisfied with their coaching experience & at the very least gained more self confidence.

You can get a more in-depth look at whether or not life coaches are worth it & get some insight into the types of coaches, and their process by reading Are Life Coaches Worth It? Take This Self-Assessment To Find Out. 

How Much Do Life Coaches Make?

In short, the national average for a life coach is about $61,000 a year with the biggest places seeing & using coaches coming from the Los Angeles, Denver, & Boston areas. If you do not LIVE in any of those areas, do not be discouraged. This is the beauty of having an online coaching business. But, if an in person coaching program is more speaking your language, every state within the U.S. has a need for coaches. So, whether you are wanting to make your life coaching business a full time job, or a part time side gig… you are needed! 🧘🏻‍♀️

You can read more about how to price yourself & determine how to have a more profitable business by reading How Much Does A Life Coach Make? Around $5k+ A Month

How To Start A Life Coaching Business In 7 Steps

Starting a business can be a little bit intimidating, especially if you are someone who has never started or been a business owner before. So, below you will find a comprehensive guide filled with effective strategies & a blog post or two 😉 to take you down the rabbit hole of ensuring your business will lead to a successful coaching business & successful career. If you are anything like me, you will read through all of this & immediately start to feel anxious thinking you need to do everything all at once. You are being given permission to NOT think that. Girl, your mental health matters, and that is why you are being given a list. Rather than get overwhelmed, bookmark this post and come back. That way you can focus on one step at a time, get it completed, and come back to start the next step. Be patient with yourself & your business.

Should you find that it is still challenging for you to not get overwhelmed, take a break and do Brett’s Uplifted At- Home Retreat. This 2 day retreat you can do in the comfort of your home, at your own pace, and allow yourself a reset before you jump back into working on building your coaching business.

1. Become A Life Coach

The first step to starting a life coaching business is to become a life coach. While there is no governing body regulating requirements for a life coach, it is still recommended that you go through a certification program.

Why certification matters

Yes, you could still say you are a life coach without any formal education. But, without a certification you will be doing yourself a disservice by not getting the additional knowledge about business & coaching sessions that would be greatly beneficial to you. Your credibility will also be lacking, unlike students coming from certification programs. Your paying clients want to trust you as a coach before choosing to work with you. Having a certification will help prove you are the real deal. 💁🏻‍♀️

How to choose the right program

There are an abundance of training programs out there, and it can get pretty overwhelming trying to choose one. But, one thing to keep in mind. If you want to start out in your coaching businesses being a great coach, make sure you choose a program or programs that are accredited through the International Coaching Federation. While being a part of ICF is not a requirement as a coach, it will also add to your credibility right from the start. Not to mention your network of fellow coaches will automatically be larger.

I personally have graduated from the Dharma Coaching Institute as a spiritual life coach, and I will be starting the Transform Coaching Academy in February 2024. Transform will allow me to get my own ICF merits, and DCI is considered continuing education credits, which will put me one step closer to becoming a master coach through ICF.

If you’re already a yoga teacher, then Brett’s Embodied Yoga Life Coaching certification course is a beautiful marriage between somatic yoga and life coaching:

Becoming a specialized life coaching business

If you are like me, and want to be more than just a general life coach, you can use the same database in the above section to find your continuing education credits to specialize in / choose your coaching niche and start a life coaching business that is a bit more specialized.

This might be useful for you if you want to do something like:

• energy healing
• health/ fitness coaching
• relationship coaching
• mindset coaching
• spiritual coaching
• career/ business coaching
• higher self coach
• identity coaching
• self love coaching
• AND many more

✨ NOTE: Even if you are going to exist more in the health and fitness coaching arena, I advise still becoming a certified life coach. This is simply because you will get skills to help your clients with mindset shifting, overcoming past behaviors/beliefs, and so much more on the mental side that will also help your clients within the area of health and the physical body.

⭐️⭐️ For more on how to become a life coach with a more specific breakdown, read How To Become A Life Coach.

2. Choose Your Niche

So, now that you have gone through your coaching program, you may be thinking about what area you would like to specialize in, or what type of life coaching you want to do. This is the group of people you WANT to help. These will be the people you are marketing to.

Your clients want to believe the coach they are working with is an expert at what they do, and a coach that is trying to pass themselves off as an expert in everything is not fooling anyone.

To determine your niche, you will need to:

• Decide who it is you would like to help: women, men, teenagers, couples, etc.
• After you decide who you help, decide what you help them do: find inner peace, lose weight, hear their intuition, etc.
• You then need to be clear about how you help them achieve results: bridge the gap, define your narrative, listen to your body, etc.

The formula for this is: 

Target Client + Problem they Have + Your Unique Coaching Method = The Transformation 

These are things you should be talking about & addressing in every chat you have, every discovery call you get on, & every time you make a post on social media.

Being clear on who it is you work with, what you help them achieve, & how you help them do that will also help you in the long run in your life coaching business. Having this knowledge in your life coaching will make it really easy & really fast for you to come to conclusions about who you can & cannot help.

If you need to play with this a little bit before committing, go for it. You want to be the best at your own life coaching business, so if you need to play… PLAY! I had to play around with my personal niche for quite some time before I felt like I had found where I was supposed to be.

A great way to help you decide your niche is:

• Get Beta Clients: you can either offer free or very discounted coaching to people in the niche or niches you are looking to claim. By working with them in real life coaching sessions, you will be able to easily decide if this is the niche you belong in.

💝 PRO TIP: You may think you can help everyone, and I am sure you can. However, your clients want to feel special & like you are speaking directly to them. So, get very specific when it comes to your niche & the group of people you would like to help. Remember that if you are trying to help everyone, you are actually helping no one.

3. Choose A Business Name

Your business name should reflect who you are as a coach. Mine is simply my name, and you will find that is the case for many life coaches. However, my sub- text to that is that I am a Woman Rising. I chose to add this moniker because those are the people I coach currently…women who want to upgrade every facet of their lives & step into their higher selves.

Another reason I chose to use my name is that as I grow & potentially want to move to a different demographic, all I have to do is change the moniker; not the whole name or feel trapped into a specific group simply because of the name I chose at the very beginning of my coaching business.

Perhaps, however, choosing a name that reflects the transformation your life coaching business offers is more suited for you. In this case, you still have some wiggle room as far as your audience. But, maybe the transformation will be the same. For instance, I have a friend that is an Ascension Coach and her business name is A Divine Dream. She lets her clients know simply from her business name what her transformation looks like.

Lastly, maybe you fall into the ranks of people like Kathrin Zenkina. She does, has done, and will probably always do manifestation work/ coaching. Hence her name Manifestation Babe. While she continues to expand how & what she teaches about manifestation, the core value is still the same. So, if you know you coach on one subject, but know there are many different branches of those life coaching services, this method will work best for you.

4. Develop A Business Plan

Try not to be intimidated by the fact that this is about a business plan. It is not as scary as it sounds. Especially if you want to make your life coaching business profitable. Think of your business plan as more of a life coaching business checklist, and it will be less scary. 🧚🏻‍♀️ Your business simply needs to have a plan of how you are going to make money including how much life coaches charge based on your end goal.

Your business plan, and your marketing plan will work together to bring your potential clients. Your life coaching business plan should include these 5 things:

• Business Identity & Branding
• Define your Target Client
• Address Client pain Points
• Your Unique Solution/ Transformation
• Competition Analysis
• Developing an Effective Life Coaching Website or Landing Page

To learn what all of these components are made of, take a read about it on How To Make A Life Coach Business Plan. To get started, download Brett’s Yoga Business Plan template and fill it out with life coaching in mind:

5. Market Yourself As A Coach

Believe it or not, marketing yourself as a coach is more than just creating a social media profile & using social media platforms to be posting on stories or on timelines somewhere. See below for a quick rundown of steps/ideas for how to market your life coaching business. You need a marketing plan, and these items listed below are just a few examples of some things that can be included in that plan.

1. Define your target audience
2. Make an appealing program package
3. Attend workshops and industry events
4. Differentiate yourself from your competitors
5. Organize events
6. Which Social Media Platforms Should I Be On?
7. Use social media to establish a strong presence
8. Have a clear brand identity

For a more comprehensive look at each of these items, please see the post, Life Coach Marketing: A Comprehensive Guide For Long Term Growth.

🎯Quick Tip: If you have multiple social media accounts, your name on all of them should be the same so your potential coaching clients do not get confused.

6. Get Clients

You have developed your business plan, and started marketing yourself. Now, you need to actually call in clients. The coaching industry as a whole has A LOT of potential clients for your coaching practice. When you are looking to get coaching clients, you need to first understand the coaching industry. A thorough guide to the industry and this step is available by reading How To Get Life Coaching Clients. But, there a a few things you can do right now to get your first coaching clients aka your dream clients:

• Attending Life Coaching Niche Specific Events or Support Groups
• Public Speaking, Join Toastmasters, Clubs & Chambers
• Hire A Business Coach (some of my personal favorites are in the blog post linked above)

7. Develop Life Coaching Skills

The 10 best skills to have, practice, & enhance are:

1. Listen Actively
2. Receptive Body Language
3. Effective Communication Skills
4. Awareness
5. Live What You Teach
6. Be A Mirror For Your Clients
7. Effective Questioning
8. Eye Contact
9. Wait Time
10. Support

Are you better at some of these than others? Check in with yourself here & see where you shine with these skills & where you can improve. Remember that part of having an effective life coaching business is to be aware of self. So, get in touch with yourself & start work towards being better at your weak spots. Your clients will love you more for it! 🎉

Be mindful that your client’s overall well being should be at the forefront of your mind & your main focus. If you begin your coaching practice with new and potential clients, and you start to hear them talking about things that are either out of your wheelhouse or involve needing to see a mental health professional, it is your responsibility to let them know that. As a business owner, you should be aware of where your coaching services can help or harm someone. Should you come across this situation as you start a life coaching program, you need to communicate to your client that you cannot help them at the moment. 

A simple phrase you can use is: 💖 “I have loved being your coach & hearing how I can help you expand. However, due to XYZ, I have to recommend we pause our time together until you see someone who specializes in XYZ. Once, you are cleared with them, or they say it’s okay to continue life coaching along with their help, I will be happy to start your program back up.” 💖

To coach clients on their personal life, and help make them expansive & literally feel a million bucks everyday is a privilege that should not be taken advantage of for any reason.

If you are more curious about the skill set you may need, take a read of Life Coaching Skills.

Not a yoga teacher yet? I’ve got you. I have personally graduated from Brett’s 200 Hour Yoga Teacher Training, and I can tell you how wonderful it is. With an easy to access online library, weekly practice, weekly live calls, & a very attentive support team… you will NOT find a better yoga teacher training out there.

Life Coaching Business FAQs

How much does it cost to start a life coach business?

This varies. You’ll have to consider costs like business filings with your state and insurance costs. Coaching businesses, just like yoga instructors, need to have business insurance as well. While you will have business contracts, having insurance & personal asset protection will help you in the long run as your business grows & you get more clients. Then you have to factor whether you’re going to have a website or advertise. There can be a lot of moving parts, but you don’t have to do it any particular way. Don’t let this deter you, do your research, it may not be as much as you think!

Can I start my own business as a life coach?

Yes! Starting a life coaching business doesn’t have to be difficult. Once you have your business structures, you will be ready to find & help your life coaching clients. Your first step from here would be to determine if you are wanting to only operate business online, or if you want to do it in person, or a combination of both. Then, you need to actually set up your business. You will need to do your research, but in Texas (where I am located) it is more feasible to start your business as a limited liability company as opposed to a sole proprietorship for tax purposes. Your state may also require you to have a business license. Once you have your business set up through the state, you will be ready to open up your business bank account & any other necessary business accounts.

More information on how to set up your business can be found in How To Become A Life Coach: For Yoga Teachers.

How much should I charge for life coaching?

That depends! There are a number of factors that can affect how much you charge, like your location or experience level. Check out How Much Does A Life Coach Make? Around $5k+ A Month to get a better idea of how to charge.

Closing Thoughts

Starting a life coaching business is something most life coaches dream of doing, and they also want to get more clients. You are capable of both. Make sure you have good internet access if you are looking to only coach online, and a backup method of internet access just in case. 😉 (trust me, I have been there). Overall, get really clear on what you want your business to look like now, tomorrow, & 10 years from now. It is perfectly fine for that vision to change, but having initial knowledge of where you want it to be will help you maintain focus, clarity, & keep you working towards your success in your life coaching business.

At this point, you may be experiencing that aforementioned sense of overwhelm. Brett’s book Yoga Life: Habits, Poses, & Breathwork to Channel Joy Amidst the Chaos can help you get centered, come back to you, and be ready to take on the challenge of starting this life coaching business. 😍

All you have to do to start is take the first step. You’ve got this! 🎊

Next Steps

• If you’re interested in practical kriya yoga as a way to improve your daily life and relationships, check out my Yoga for Self Mastery course.
• Order my Yoga Life book for a practical guide to creating balance in your life through yoga.
• Check out my YouTube channel and find some yoga classes that you can try out for yourself!