The Step-by-Step Guide to Get More Clients with Coaching Books

As a business owner, writing coaching books is about more than just personal achievement; it’s one of the most powerful marketing tools at your disposal. However, many authors fall into the misconception that simply publishing is enough to attract clients. The truth is, your book’s real revenue potential lies in leveraging it strategically throughout the entire writing and publishing journey.

In this guide, we’ll walk through step-by-step how to get clients before, during, and after writing your coaching book. You’ll learn to validate your concept, build an audience, nurture relationships, and ultimately turn your book into a sustainable engine for generating new business.

Part 1: Getting Clients Before Writing Your Book

Crafting a compelling book is only half the battle when it comes to using it to grow your business. Even before putting pen to paper, we recommend taking strategic steps to validate your concept and build an audience eager to work with you.

Identifying Your Target Audience

The first crucial step is pinpointing exactly who your coaching book will serve. Getting laser-focused on a specific niche audience like teachers, nurses, or real estate agents makes it far easier to connect with the right readers. Generic books on happiness or life struggles make it challenging to find and reach your people.

READ MORE: How to Write a Good Book: Dr. Angela’s Top 5 Tips

Offering Value in Exchange for Interest

Once you’ve identified your target audience, it’s time to give before you ask for anything in return. Reach out to organizations, communities, or leaders tied to your niche. Offer to provide a free, valuable training or presentation in exchange for being able to survey the attendees about their interest in your book concept.

Collecting Leads and Nurturing Relationships

During your free training, be upfront that you’re hoping to get feedback to shape your upcoming coaching book. At the end, provide a survey or questions like:

• What was the most helpful part?
• What did you want to see more of?
• Would you be interested in working with me further on these topics before my book launches?

Depending on your audience targeting, you can often get 25 to 50% of attendees to express interest in continuing to follow your book’s journey. Collect their contact information and start nurturing relationships through consistent value and communication. These early leads become prime candidates to be among your first coaching book clients.

By investing time upfront to validate your book concept, deliver value, and build connections with your target audience, you’ll be miles ahead when it comes to monetizing your coaching books.

Part 2: Getting Clients While Writing Your Book

Even as you’re in the midst of crafting your coaching books, there are powerful opportunities to simultaneously build relationships and generate revenue. The key is to continue providing value and nurturing the connections you started before writing.

Giving Away Draft Chapters for Feedback

As you complete draft chapters, share your in-progress work with the interested leads you collected earlier. You can post about newly written chapters on social media, send email updates to your list, or directly share the drafts with engaged prospects.

Be upfront that these are rough, unedited versions and that you’re looking for candid feedback to improve the material. Offer a limited window of time when you’ll send the chapter to anyone who requests it, creating an urgency incentive.

For example, “I just finished drafting Chapter 3 on [topic]. I’ll send it to anyone who messages me in the next 3 hours while I have a break from writing.”

Now, important to remember is that you aren’t actually looking for feedback on your chapters. If they knew how to write the best chapter, they’d be a book editor. The goal, rather, is to create a dialogue with someone who has the problem your book helps solve in hopes of turning them from lead to paid client.

Building Relationships and Making Offers

As you share more sneak previews of your coaching book’s valuable content, your prospective readers become more invested. Those who consistently engage with your draft materials have self-identified as having a keen interest in the topics and solutions you provide.

This is your opportunity to build genuine relationships through feedback conversations and listening to better understand their specific challenges or desired outcomes. When the relationship develops to a point where you can offer a paid service or program to help them achieve what they want, they’ll be primed to say yes!

By leveraging your coaching books as audience-building opportunities throughout the writing process, you can generate revenue while preparing for an even bigger launch and continued post-launch success.

Part 3: Getting Clients During Your Book Launch

While many authors put all their focus on writing and publishing their coaching books, the real money lies in leveraging your book launch strategically. With the right virtual event, you can generate excitement, provide value, and turn attendees into clients.

Creating a Juicy, Engaging Virtual Event

Don’t make the mistake of thinking your book launch needs to be a simple webinar or podcast interview. To maximize the potential for attracting prospective clients, craft an engaging, interactive virtual experience:

• Recruit a celebrity host or emcee to increase perceived value
• Include technology like live polls, Q&A, and gamification
• Plan fun contests, giveaways, or other incentives to attend
• Share exclusive sneak peeks or behind-the-scenes storytelling

The goal is to make your book launch event feel like an unmissable, premium experience that your ideal clients will beramped up to attend.

Personal Follow Up and Relationship Nurturing

While you’ll want to capture email addresses from every registrant, don’t make the mistake of immediately pitching attendees on working with you further. Instead, focus on personalizing your follow up:

• Record custom video or audio messages addressing each person
• Reference personal details to make it feel individualized
• Ask about their biggest takeaways and what resonated most
• See if they know others who could benefit from your book’s message

By nurturing genuine relationships and personal connections first, you’ll organically uncover opportunities to have sales conversations with the most engaged attendees. Don’t skip this crucial step of personally following up – it leads to your first coaching book clients.

A well-executed book launch does more than celebrate publishing your book. When done right, it sets you up for a steady stream of prospective clients ready to work with you.

Part 4: Leveraging Your Book for Ongoing Client Acquisition

While launches are powerful for an initial influx of leads, the true potential of your coaching books lies in establishing them as a permanent lead generation engine for your business. Consistent audience outreach is key.

Consistently Getting in Front of Your Target Audience

Identify all the different channels and platforms where your ideal readers spend time. This could include:

• Niche podcasts, blogs, and media outlets
• Organizational meetings or events
• Online communities or forums
• Speaking opportunities or webinar hosts

The more frequently you can get featured as an expert source providing value through your coaching books’ message, the more potent your lead generation becomes. Don’t just chase after these opportunities once – systemize it into your regular marketing efforts.

Using Your Book as a Lead Magnet

While you can absolutely sell your published coaching books, the bigger revenue opportunity comes from using your book as a lead magnet to attract prospective clients into your nurture sequence. Offer your book for free (or at a heavily discounted “shipping only” rate) in exchange for someone’s contact details.

Nurturing Relationships and Making Offers

From there, develop automated nurture campaigns through email sequences, retargeting ads, or sales funnels. As you consistently provide more value, you’ll reactivate that initial book interest. Those who engage become warm prospects to have conversations about your coaching services or programs.

With a smart system for getting in front of fresh audiences while nurturing existing book leads, your published coaching books become a sustainable engine for generating new clients on an ongoing basis.

How Will You Make Money with Your Consulting Book?

The power of coaching books extends far beyond simply publishing – when leveraged correctly, they become a perpetual engine for attracting your ideal clients. From validating your concept to nurturing relationships to making offers, your book is the ultimate lead magnet.

We encourage you to craft coaching books hyper-focused on your target audience. By aligning your content to their specific needs and interests, you’ll ensure a steady stream of prospective clients excited to work with you further. Don’t let your book’s potential end at publication – make it the gift that keeps your business growing.