Digital Marketing Fundamentals: Beyond the Coaching Bubble
If you’re a coach, you’ve likely invested heavily in learning how to guide, hold space, and transform lives. You’ve likely invested thousands in certifications, workshops, and personal development. However, here’s the uncomfortable truth that no one discusses in coaching circles: Without marketing fundamentals, your message will remain hidden—even if it’s absolutely brilliant.
I see it all the time. Coaches with incredible transformation stories, powerful methodologies, and genuine hearts for service… struggling to fill their practice. They’re posting inspirational quotes, sharing vulnerable stories, and pouring their souls into content that gets three likes and zero inquiries.
The problem? They’re focusing solely on content and coaching without mastering the basics of marketing. It’s like building a beautiful car with no engine. It might look stunning in the driveway, but it won’t take you anywhere.
Why Marketing Fundamentals Matter More Than You Think
Most coaches view marketing as synonymous with posting relatable quotes on Instagram or running Facebook ads when they’re in need of clients. However, there is an entire strategic foundation underlying successful marketing that most coaches never learn.
Here’s what happens when you skip the fundamentals: You create content that feels good to you but doesn’t resonate with your ideal clients. You waste money on ads that don’t convert. You burn out from constantly creating without seeing results.
Buyer Personas & Empathy Mapping: The Foundation of Connection
Knowing who your ideal client is, what they think, feel, struggle with at 2 AM, and emotional resonance and efficiency to every single piece of content you create.
Buyer personas help you identify motivations and inform targeted content. When you truly understand your ideal client, something magical happens. Your content starts feeling like you’re reading their mind. This approach shifts your work from “generic messaging that could apply to anyone” to precise resonance that makes people think, “This coach gets me.”
Creative Briefs
A creative brief is your North Star for every piece of marketing you create. It keeps everyone, from your copywriter to your VA to your graphic designer, on the same page about what you’re trying to achieve.
A solid creative brief defines:
- The specific goal of your campaign
- Who you’re talking to (and who you’re not)
- Your brand voice and tone
- Must-have elements and messaging
- Success metrics and KPIs
A creative brief can prevent the trial-and-error marketing that wastes both time and money. Instead of creating content and hoping it works, you’re creating with intention and strategy.
KPI Measurement
Without measurable goals, you’re not marketing, you’re just hoping. Think conversion rates, email open rates, ad click-throughs, discovery call bookings, and actual client enrollment numbers.
These numbers aren’t vanity metrics designed to make you feel good. They’re feedback mechanisms that tell you what’s working, what needs tweaking, and where to invest your precious time and money next.
Most coaches avoid tracking because numbers feel cold or because they’re afraid of what they might discover. However, those numbers serve as your roadmap to serving more people and expanding your impact.
Common Pitfalls That Keep Coaches Stuck
Persona Blind Spots
“I want to serve everyone who needs help,” sounds generous, but it’s actually selfish. When you try to speak to everyone, your message gets diluted, and no one feels truly seen. Crafting for everyone means crafting for no one.
Starting Without Strategy
Hitting ‘go live’ on Instagram or launching a program without a clear brief or goal? You’ll waste your creative energy and confuse your audience. Strategy isn’t the enemy of creativity: It’s what makes creativity effective.
Skipping Metrics
If you’re not tracking anything, you have no insight into what’s working. No insight means no growth. You’ll continue to repeat the same ineffective strategies, wondering why your business isn’t growing.
Build Your Marketing Foundation
Try this:
Craft Your Buyer Persona
Most coaches create surface-level personas: “Sarah, 35, wants to lose weight.” That’s not enough to create resonant marketing.
Instead:
- Interview 5–10 current or past clients, prospects, or colleagues in your target market
- Use surveys or social media polls to gather deeper insights
- Analyze for shared demographics, pain points, emotional triggers, and purchase drivers
- Document specific details: job role, age, goals, fears, values, content preferences, objections
- Identify your “Negative Persona”: those you specifically don’t want to target
Example Deep Persona
Olivia, 32, was recently promoted to management at a tech startup. She’s dealing with impostor syndrome and feeling overwhelmed by back-to-back Zoom calls. She seeks clarity about her leadership style, support for her new role, and an identity beyond just her work achievements. She scrolls LinkedIn during lunch breaks looking for leadership content but feels like most advice is either too corporate or too woo-woo. She values authenticity and practical strategies over theory.
See the difference? Now you can create content that speaks directly to Olivia’s 2 AM worries and her lunch break scrolling habits.
Write a Strategic Creative Brief
Create a 1–2 page document for every major campaign or content series:
- Objective: Be specific. Not “get more clients” but “Launch new group container for emerging leaders and enroll 8 participants within 30 days.”
- Audience: Your detailed persona(s) with demographics, challenges, motivators, and communication preferences.
- Message pillars: 3-4 core themes that will run through all content (e.g., Purpose, Clarity, Confidence).
- Call to action: One clear next step. “Book a free discovery call” or “Download the Leadership Clarity Guide.”
- Creative requirements: Format preferences, visual style, tone, and any must-include elements.
- Timeline & KPIs: Launch date, target metrics (email open rates, applications received, click-through rates).
- Brand alignment: How this campaign reinforces your overall brand voice and positioning.
A solid brief gets everyone transparent, accountable, and aligned before you create a single piece of content.
Create Empathy Maps for Deeper Understanding
For each persona, map out their internal and external world:
- Think & feel: Their private fears and hopes (“Will I fail as a leader?” “What if I’m not cut out for this?”)
- Hear: Influences from friends, bosses, media, other coaches
- Say & do: What they voice publicly vs. what they hide or do privately
- Pain & gain: Their current frustrations and what success would feel like
Empathy maps help you craft messages that feel personal and intuitive, not generic and salesy.
Execute & Measure Your KPIs
Track metrics that actually matter:
- Reach and Awareness: Impressions, followers, website traffic
- Engagement: Clicks, comments, replies, saves, shares
- Conversion: Discovery call bookings, email opt-ins, program enrollment
Set realistic benchmarks (e.g., 20% email open rate, 3% click-through rate) and evaluate monthly. Don’t just collect data, use it to make decisions.
Optimize and Scale What Works
If email open rates dip below 20%, test different subject lines or personalization strategies.
If conversion rates are weak, revisit your messaging or clarify the pain points.
When you discover high-performing content or campaigns, consider reinvesting in them through paid promotion or strategic partnerships.
What Happens When Coaches Skip Marketing Fundamentals
You end up in the spray-and-pray cycle: posting everywhere, hoping something sticks. It’s inefficient, ineffective, and absolutely exhausting.
Your content lacks direction, resulting in mixed messages that weaken your brand’s memory. People often struggle to remember what you do or why they should care.
You chase every new trend instead of building long-term authority and audience loyalty. You’re always starting over instead of building momentum.
Your coaching certification alone doesn’t drive business growth. You need strategy, structure, and measurement to turn your skills into sustainable income.
Why This Transformation Matters
When you master marketing fundamentals, everything changes:
- Get more ideal clients without spending more money on ads or marketing tools
- Make every initiative informed and intentional, aligned with who you actually serve
- Build genuine trust because prospects feel like you truly understand them
- Stop plugging leaks in your marketing funnel and start driving consistent growth
- Create content that converts instead of content that just gets likes
Ready to Master Marketing Fundamentals?
If you’re ready to break out of the coaching bubble and build a business rooted in clarity, confidence, and sustainable growth, I’ve created something specifically for coaches like you. The course: Branding and Marketing for Coaches.
- Learn more about detailed buyer personas
- Building marketing systems that work while you’re coaching clients
- And more!
£333
Branding and Marketing for Coaches (Life, Health, Wellness)
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Use the coupon d0bb4481e2bbCOACH until June 26 @10:00 (UK time)
Your Message Deserves to Be Heard
You’ve got the skills, the heart, and the transformative work that can change lives. You’ve invested in your coaching abilities, your personal growth, and your capacity to hold space for others.
Now it’s time to add marketing fundamentals to your toolkit and watch your reach, reputation, and revenue expand in ways that feel authentic and sustainable.
Success in coaching isn’t just about who you help. It’s about who knows you exist, trusts your expertise, and chooses to work with you over every other coach in your space.
