Ep #169: Double Down or Burn It Down

How do you know what you should burn down and what you should double down on? We rarely have a coach that says, let’s lay it all out on the table.

What if you find yourself marketing towards a group of people only to find yourself with a business that doesn’t light your soul on fire?

One of the best questions you can ask yourself: if my emotional and financial success is guaranteed, what problems would I coach on and what format would I coach it in? If my financial success and emotional safety is guaranteed no matter what I decide, what decision will I make?

The doors to Free to Paid Coach are officially open! If you’re ready to learn the foundational concepts of confidence that get you from being a free coach to a paid coach who makes six figures and beyond, join us right now! 

What You’ll Learn:
  • What it means to metaphorically put your coaching business on the table
  • Why it’s important to do what excites you instead of replicating business models over and over 
  • The hard questions to ask if your coaching business feels like an albatross on your shoulders
  • Why Amy decided to burn down parts of her business to create a more equitable version
  • Amy’s answer to helping so many coaches who are being underserved and left behind  

Listen to the Full Episode:

Featured on the Show:
Full Episode Transcript:

You are listening to episode 169 of The Confident Coaches Podcast, the one where you decide if you are burning it down or doubling down. Alright, let’s go.

Welcome to The Confident Coaches Podcast, a place for creating the self-confidence you need to do your best work as a life coach. If you want to bring more boldness, more resilience, and more joy to your work, this is the place for you. I’m. Amy Latta, let’s dive in.

Hey, hey, hey. Hi coaches. How you doing out there? I’m fabulous and have some exciting news is along the lines of what we are talking about in this podcast episode this week. Of course, I’ve been talking a lot in my social media around getting back to the basics, simplifying. One of the things that I keep seeing in the coaching industry is we keep replicating other people’s business models. I have 100% done this.

In fact, last year I’ve mentioned more than once how I did some anonymous Q and As, and lots of people called me out on this. They said, “I can’t tell the difference between your coaching program and this person’s and this person’s and this person’s. It seems y’all are just kind of doing all of the same thing.”

And it was so funny because at the time I was, “yeah, but no, it’s so different.” And here has been some of my biggest growth in the past year, is the difference between my take on what other people are doing and truly what I’m doing, and in the mastermind level, the Path to 100k, and actually I’ve kind of got some big news to share with you at the end of this episode, working with me.

In Free to Paid Coach, this is, we’re just trying to get you paid, right? What’s the simplest, fastest way for you to build a coaching business that creates the income that you want to create. We are getting you from no clients ever, to a consistent client base.

Once you have that foundation though, did you know, once you have a couple dollars in some clients, and here’s the thing, when you start coaching, before you get those first clients, you kind of don’t know. There’s a lot of unknowns. But once we start getting some knowns, then we can move into what I coach in Path to 100k and one-on-one. Wait? Did she just say one-on-one coaching? I did. I told you there’s big news coming.

Now we’ve got some data to work with, and then we can dive in, and we can focus on what’s working here. What do I love? What’s working? What lights me on fire? What topics do I find myself most attracted to? What do I want to talk more about? What do I want to coach more on?

And then what’s sucking the life out of me? What am I hating about this? What am I doing simply because I see other people did, and it worked for them, so I thought maybe it would work for me, but actually I literally dread it. It feels I’m carrying this albatross on my shoulders. It’s one of those ball and chains on my ankles.

What do I loathe to do over and over again all of the time? This is where we start having conversations about, do you want to double down on the business that you have, or do you want to burn it down? And sometimes it’s actually a little bit of column A in a little bit of column B. And how do you know? How do you know what you should burn down and what you should double down on?

Here’s the thing, I’m going to go into this conversation with you and tell you right out of the gate, a different coach might coach you very differently on this. In fact, I’ve been coached very differently than how I’m going to talk to you and coach you. I’m going to throw some coaching questions out at you for you too, so have your pen and paper.

This is very different than how I was coached on because how I was coached was pretty simple. Pick the thing that you know a lot about or that you feel confident coaching that you want to coach on, and are there are people out there who want to buy it and have the money to buy it? Great, that’s your thing. Now go do that thing over and over and over again until you’ve made six figures, million dollars.

Keep replicating it over and over and over, don’t let not hitting your goals mean that you should change any of it. Now, that doesn’t mean that you don’t change within the structures. This is very misconstrued. Nobody has ever said never change anything within the structures. But you’re going to keep the basic structures and it’s all problem solving over and over and over.

And here are models that work really, really well. So, unless you are really, really hot about something else, you should be doing these models one-on-one coaching over and over and over again until you move into a group program. And then once you have nailed your group program, maybe you introduced a low-cost introductory program.

Because remember, we think it’s easier to sell something that’s less expensive, and that is true. So, you have to market a lot more and you have to sign up a lot more people, and you need to get a lot more people into your world to make the same amount of money. In 2021, I launched four groups of a $10,000 product in 2022.

I only launched one of those and the replacement was a $1,000 product. Yeah, I made less money. I’m working with significantly more people, but most of those people paid me a thousand dollars, not $10,000. So, there are some basics and most of the coach gurus out there, well say, these are the profitable tracks, pick one.

But what we’re going to talk about in this episode is what excites you. So, I’ve been working with a different business coach for the past three months. I think I’ve talked about this on the podcast already, and I’m hoping actually to bring her on because I think she would be such a breath of fresh air for so many people.

My coach Erica asked me over and over, over the course of the past three months, are you actually excited to do this every day? Is this the work that really gets you excited? Is this the work that excites you. Are these two programs that you’re selling, do they excite you? Are you excited to go sell them?

Are you excited about them? Are you super excited to talk about them? And it was so funny because the first couple times she asked me, I was, “okay, what’s happening here? Starting to get annoyed. I keep answering. You keep asking and I keep answering.”

Here’s the thing, she saw something I didn’t see, because so much of my past was dictated by, this is how you build a coaching business. This is how you structure it. You’ve already structured it this way, you can’t change it.

This is where I really want to be able to provide you some questions where you can actually really think about whether you want to double down where you are or whether you want to burn down where you are.

We rarely have a coach that says, let’s lay it all out on the table. And what if we burn it all down? What if we closed down Free to Paid Coach? I know I literally almost threw up when, when that was put on the table, because I just created it. I’ve got almost all the coaches I’m working with right now are in there. I can’t do that, but let’s just make that an option. Let’s put Path to 100k on the table. You don’t have to do any of this.

So, first thing, put your coaching business metaphorically on the table. Lay it all out. You know, it’s kind of when you’re packing for a trip. I don’t know if you guys do this, but I make my bed and I lay everything out, and then I decide what’s coming with me. That’s what we’re doing here.

Here’s everything I got that I would normally, I don’t literally pull my entire wardrobe out onto my bed, here are my go-tos, here are my comfort levels. Here’s what I would normally take. Lay it all out on the bed. Now, what’s actually coming with me on this trip?

That’s what I want you to do with your coaching business. Lay it all out there and these are the questions that I want you to ask: Do you love who you coach? Now listen, I know we love the individual human beings, right? Love, love, love my individual human beings. Oh my gosh, I got to tell you.

I’m doing some updates to my website. They may or may not be live by the time you hear this episode, but that’s what I’m working on right now and I was creating a list of all of the testimonials that I’ve gotten in the different categories of testimonials and I’m, “holy shit, look at these names I haven’t seen for a while.”

Names that I work with all of the time, people that I love so much. There’s so many. So many coaches out there right now who don’t even listen to this podcast anymore because they are making multiple six figures already, or they have totally changed what they want to do. They figured shit out before I necessarily did.

Some of them aren’t coaching anymore. They’re doing something else that really excites them. Some of them are still doing a hybrid of things. So many of them are in so many different things, and I love every single one of them. That’s not what I mean. I mean, the problems that you’re solving every week, do you actually enjoy these problems?

Are these subjects what you really love? Are you coaching to the people who are coming to you? Or are you coaching on what you really want to coach on? And be really honest with yourself here because a lot of times we will let, “this is what people bring me, so it’s what I coach on,” and then you start marketing towards that group of people only to find yourself with a business where you’re coaching on a topic and a niche that maybe isn’t really what lights your soul on fire.

What lights your soul on fire? What are the problems that you love solving? Maybe you started out coaching real estate agents, but really what you love doing is coaching relationships. Or maybe you started out as a relationship coach, but all of your clients ended up being real estate agents and you actually find out, “you want, I really, really love coaching real estate agents on how to make more money.” It could be any number of variations of that.

We’re not talking about do you love the human beings we’re talking about, do you love the problems that you’re solving every week. Which ones do you love? When you think about the stuff that, if you and your best friend are sitting down and they were to say, what was the favorite stuff you talked about this week, what would that be?

Go make a list of the top five things that you love talking about the most. I’m also working with a life coach. Her name is Bev, and it’s so funny because she will ask me these questions and she will go, look how you just lit up. My business coach Erica does the same thing.

Both of them will be, “I’m not feeling you right now, but look how you lit up when you started talking about this over here. Makes me wonder.” So, what do you really love? What lights you up to coach on? Now, if you were a brand-new coach in Free to Paid Coach, you may not have the answer to that problem, and that is okay.

Get in Free to Paid Coach so that we can get you enough clients and get you started working with enough people so you can even answer those questions. When you’re a new coach, you don’t know what you don’t know yet, and it’s totally fine. We’ve all been there. You all know how many different variations of Amy; lot of coaching have existed in the past 10 years? It’s a lot.

So then do you love your format? Now, this is where, this is where having a business coach by your side is super, super important. You need a coach by your side no matter what. It really does help you to have somebody to bounce these conversations off with. But do you love the format?

Did you build an entire member site and all of these video modules and all of these things because you thought that that would be simpler, but really you just want to coach people one-on-one because that’s what you really love? Or is it the other way around? Do you see yourself more as a teacher? And running classes is more of what actually lights you on fire?

Maybe you don’t fall into that traditional life coaching. I work one-on-one with people, and that’s all I do. Maybe you’re actually I want the more classwork style, the more teaching style, or I have lots of people and I’m teaching them lots of different things. Maybe that is more your jam.

Listen, it is true. I do want to offer to you that the fastest path to the most amount of money as a coach really is coaching one-on-one. This is the Prosperous Coach 101, by Steve Chandler and Rich Litvin.

It’s really, really basic. You don’t need anything. You just start telling people. I can help you make as many one-on-one offers as possible. You don’t need a website; you don’t need nothing. You just need to go tell the people and you just work with them one-on-one, and you never stray from that. Hugely popular. Hugely successful for a good reason.

But is that what you really love? Understand that selling masterminds and group coaching and memberships require different marketing? They tend to have extra costs. That’s a terrible reason not to do them. But make sure that doing that extra marketing, doing that extra work, and bearing those extra costs is something that you really want to do.

And make sure that you have a coach who can coach you through making these decisions. And are you deciding that you want to sell something different? And this is where we’re, this is the nitty gritty, right? Are you deciding that you want to sell something different because you just haven’t hit the results that you want selling this thing, right?

You don’t change your niche every three to six months because no one’s booking consults. It’s all the other work that we do here in Confident Coaches. It’s all the other work that I’m bringing particularly to Path to 100k and definitely what I’m introducing to you in Free to Paid Coach, which is how to become a more unleashed version of you.

Really removing all of the filters off of your voice and really telling the people out there what they really need. Really what you want to do. One of the best questions, and this question came from Susan Hyatt, who is a coach that I worked with back in 2019, and I believe it came from her coach Martha Beck, but I can’t be sure.

One of the best coaching questions you can ever ask yourself, if my emotional and financial success is guaranteed, what would I decide? What problems would I coach on and what format would I coach it in? You cannot go wrong with that question. If my financial success is guaranteed, if my emotional safety is guaranteed, if I will be safe, no matter what I decide, I cannot make a wrong decision here.

What’s the decision that I make? So, if you’re really unsure, if you should burn it all down, here’s some fun questions to entertain. Do you love what you’re doing? For real. When you get up in the morning, do you get excited to go to work? And I realize that go to work means for me, it’s literally just walking out of one bedroom and into another and sitting at my desk.

Do you love what you’re doing? Why? Why do you love what you’re doing? What about it do you love? What about who you are currently working with, the problems that you are currently solving? The format with which you are running your business, what do you currently love about it? And then what don’t you love?

What don’t you love about the problems that you’re solving, about the way you’re delivering the solutions, about the format with which you are coaching and running your businesses? What don’t you love? Do you have to do those things? Are they required? bookkeeping, paying your taxes that’s required. That might fall under one of your, “I don’t love, but you gotta do it,” right?

So how can we think differently about those things and or can we outsource what is necessary, but you don’t love? And if it’s not required, so let’s say for instance, You run a free group, a free Facebook group, as a means to get more coaching clients in. It’s not required, and it was fun at first, but the more that it’s going on, it just kind of feels a slog. It feels a heavy burden.

You got all those people in there, but you know they’re not really interacting. It just feels there could probably better use of your time. The time that you’re spending in there trying to get those people to interact with you. It could be time you could be making reels or learning about TikTok or some other format or mastering something else at this time.

What are you afraid will happen if you let something go, whatever you don’t love, whatever feels heavy in your business and is not required? Now, you might need a coach to help you distinguish what’s actually required and what’s not required. I do a blanket statement just because a coach said I have to do it this way, does not mean I have to do it this way.

Write down all of the things that feel super heavy and go, “do I have to do this? Why do I think I have to do it this way? Who told me I have to do it this way? Are they right? What if they aren’t right?” Do you see how important it is to take every single thing through that line of questioning so you can really decide?

Remember, we’re throwing it all out on the bed and we’re only taking with us what we really want, and I don’t necessarily love taking my retainers with me when I go on vacation, but I need them with me. I don’t love taking EpiPens with me when I go on vacation, but I want to make sure should something happen that I need them.

But I probably don’t need to take five pairs of pajamas, just because one expert said the best thing you can do when you go travel is to sleep in a different pair of pajamas every night. I literally just made that up. By the way. I can decide whether or not that’s actually for me. I can decide if that expert’s traveling tips are for me, right?

You can decide if the business expert’s tips are for you. Do you agree with them? Why? Why not? What are you afraid might happen if you choose something different? This is where we get into the nuance of, is that coming with me? Is that what I actually love? Why or why not? Because here’s the super fun question you get to answer once you really start.

Here’s everything that really weighs me down that I’m only doing because some guru told me that I needed to and now I’m starting to see that it’s possible. I don’t need to do it that way. What opens up when you let it go, when you cut off the ball and chain when you decide? Just because I have a thousand people in this Facebook group, working this Facebook group and trying to get clients out of it feels like a heavy albatross.

It’s energy I could be spending over here on Instagram. But I’m afraid to let it go because I have so many mentors who made so much money by having Facebook groups. So, I kind of think I should keep it, but I don’t really want to. Now, what happens when I let it go? Well, I had to deal with the discomfort that I’m going to feel by letting something go that I’ve put a lot of energy and effort into, but then that opens up so much more.

And in that lightness, how many more new ideas come to you? So, these are the questions I want you to consider when you’re talking about, do you double down on everything that you have? Do you cut out just a little bit or do you decide. This entire program, I’m coaching problems I don’t love. It’s in a format that has gotten away from me.

It’s turned into a thing that doesn’t even reflect anything that is me, and I don’t think I want to do it anymore. So, I have done something similar in my own coaching business because I have a program that I know and that I love, but there were parts of it that didn’t. Here’s the thing, it wasn’t the mastermind itself that I didn’t love.

What it was: my mastermind fitting what I saw missing in the market. That I had created a coaching container, meaning the way I deliver it, the attributes of the coaching container that were replicating the business models that were taught to me. Not because it’s the best thing for my client, but because that’s what I had experienced and it was all I really knew, and that was what was being modeled and that’s what I replicated.

That’s not necessarily the best reason to do something. So, within my Path to 100k Mastermind, I actually did a little bit of a combination of burning down and doubling down. And I did this to create a mastermind that does not currently exist in the marketplace, and that is a high-level business mentorship for coaches who’ve made $10 to $50,000 who don’t want to take all of those $10 to $50,000 and invest it in that mentorship.

This is the model that’s been replicated over and over again. Listen guys, this is what I did. I signed up for a $25,000, 12-month long business mentorship. Now, technically, when I signed up versus when the Mastermind started, I had actually surpassed that point and I actually went on to make 100k that year, 25k Mastermind or not, right?

But at the time, I didn’t have that money in my business. What I had was money that I inherited from my grandmother that I could have used for my family, but I chose to use it for my business. Not everybody has 25k because dearly beloved grandmothers just passed away. Nobody has that sitting in a bank. Not everybody has somebody that they can borrow that money from.

Not everybody has the credit line that they can access that will give them that, and it does not mean that they are less dedicated. It doesn’t mean that their why isn’t hard enough. So, when I looked at Path to 100k Mastermind over the past month, this is coming off of three months of my coach continuously asking me, do you actually love what you’re doing?

Do you actually love the programs you’re putting out into the marketplace? Do you actually get super excited? And I was “yeah, I get really excited. Yeah, I do.” You can hear that excitement? Here’s what I couldn’t articulate that took me three months of coaching. Was that it wasn’t the Mastermind.

I love it. I love what I teach in there. I love the human beings that pass through there. Trust me, I love having live events and those bonus one-on-one calls and running a member site that’s easy to navigate and totally customizable. Also, half the shit I just mentioned cost me a lot of money, and if I streamline it, if I burn parts of it down, that don’t move you forward in your business when you’re in that range. And then I double down on the parts of my mastermind that do.

Do you want to know what I came up with now? That’s a mastermind I’m excited about …that lights me on fire. Holy shit. So, by reconfiguring the container, and really what I mean is, I burnt the container down and said, “what do they actually need?”

You know what you need? You need the materials. And you need to be able to have access to my brain to coach you every week through those materials. That’s what you need when you’re in that 10 to 50k. You need to know how you are going to take what’s already happening in your business and grow it to 100k.

That’s in there. It’s been in there. I have been able to articulate it a little bit better. So, the materials that are coming with this next round of Path to 100k Mastermind are simpler and easier than I’ve ever delivered them before. But then I was able to say, you want to know what? We don’t necessarily need a live event.

We can build amazing community and 25, 1-hour coaching calls. And an active Facebook group. We can build tons of continuity, community support, love adoration for one another. Y’all are grown women. If you want to see your life coach, friends in person for a weekend of leveling up, you can schedule yourself at a coaching retreat or a yoga retreat.

Save the money. You’re not paying me to go book that. Go rent a big ass house somewhere and have an amazing coaching time. In fact, I’m not above saying that I might offer something like that in the future, but right now there’s so many coaches out there who are being underserved because they haven’t saved up the $10 or $20 or $25 and even $50,000 that they are told that they need.

And then we get to really focus on what truly matters … identifying what’s already working in your business and replicating the hell out of that. Identifying what’s sucking the soul out of you every time you walk into your office and really questioning, do I have to keep doing that? And either eliminating it all together, refining it, delegating it, and then creating an epic action plan.

Where you actually figure out what things have you not yet done? What have you not yet tried? What crazy brilliant idea do you have that you’ve been too scared to implement and put out into the market? And let’s test it. We’re going to have the foundations of how to do that and not beat the crap out of yourself when it doesn’t work, so that you’re adding more to that.

What’s not working and what is working. These three steps right here, I guarantee. They set you up for a business that creates anything that you want to create, any income level that you want. You know those three things. You know how to do that right there. There’s no place you can’t go. And then we’re going to work on how to unleash your voice, how to make a 100k by telling the patriarchy to fuck off.

How to nourish your nervous system when this stuff gets just a little too scary. Work on your money love. Tactical, practical marketing strategy, messaging, branding, copy that sets fires and gets people so excited to work with you. Consults that feel delicious for both of you. That’s in there too. Some of you might need some of that.

Some of you may not need any of it. Some of you might be solid gold in some areas. Everybody needs the three. What’s working, what’s not working, and what’s your epic action, and then you take what you need from those extras and leave the rest on the table. It’s simple, it’s graceful, it’s elegant. It’s exactly what you need and nothing more, and I couldn’t be more excited because it’s available to you literally right now.

Right now, is January 31st. The Facebook group opens tomorrow, February 1st, and our very first call is February 7th. It is not too late to join us. www.amylatta.com/mastermind I lay it all out on the line.

Everything that you could possibly wonder, it’s waiting for you in there. Fill out the application, schedule a quick call with me.

It’s $5,000 or 3 payments of $1667. You heard me, right? It’s $5,000 guys. There’s no other mastermind at this high level at the price point right now. And it’s not because I want to super discount myself and I’m not valuing myself. No, it’s because it’s what’s not out there in the marketplace and there’s too many coaches being left behind and it stops right here, period.

If you want to go more deep with me, you can hire me for one-on-one, fill out the same application, and when we get on the phone, we’ll have that call. If you want my eyes on more of your stuff, if you want to deep dive into one of those things that I’ve mentioned, fabulous. Guys, this ability to double down on what you’re super passionate about and burn down what you aren’t will change everything because I want you fully excited about your business.

When I look at this model, if you’re a brand-new coach, you joined Free to Paid Coach. Once you’ve made 10k, you join Path to 100k. At this point, you’ve spent $6,000. If you want to deep dive with me, you can spend $10,000 more. You’re going to get me for six months with my eyes on your business.

This is equitable, it’s inclusive. All that stuff I’ve been talking about in my past few podcast episodes. It’s also for those people also, not everybody’s going to qualify for it because this is for people who are … I don’t fit in a formula. I tried. It didn’t work. I got ideas to scare the shit outta me and I don’t know how to put them out there.

I really do want to be a person who takes up all the space in all of the rooms. It scares me, but I know I know that’s what my future is. I know that I was not made to fit into somebody else’s plan, and I know Amy knows. That this is the room where you’re going to become the wild successful coach that you are.

And listen, in the future, I might host some fabulous retreat. I might introduce a mastermind that’s a higher level that includes all of those fabulous things. Right now. This is what’s missing in the industry. I could not be more excited to be the coach that’s bringing it to you. This is how you double down. This is how you burn it down. It will change how you view your business, it will ensure that everything you’re doing lights you on fire and totally excites you. What do you love? What do you not see being served in the marketplace? Create that. If you don’t know how to create that, hire me. www.amylatta.com.com/mastermind You in? Let’s go.

And every week when you see this podcast episode, hit social media. Share it into your stories. What did you need to hear today? What did you hear today that you’re going to implement? Share it in your socials. Tag me at @iamamylatta. Let people know how this work is changing you and how it will change for them.

I can’t wait to hear. I am so excited to see what you’re going to create in the world, and I’ll talk to you next week.

Coach, it’s time to sign your first free client, your first paid client, your next client, and to learn how to do it consistently and having a hell of a lot of fun along the way. This is exactly what you’re going to do in Free to Paid Coach. It’s the only program giving you step-by-step what to do to become a paid coach and step-by-step how to handle the roller coaster emotions that come with doing what you need to do to become a paid coach.

If you know you can’t not do this life coaching thing, but believing that you can do it, handling rejection and remembering how to do all of those things shuts you down, the Free to Paid Coach Community is waiting for you. Find everything that you’re looking for inside. It’s only $1,000. Payments are available, and then you’re in forever.

Visit www.amylatta.com/ftpc to join us right now. See you inside. Let’s get paid, coach.

Thanks so much for listening to The Confident Coaches Podcast. I invite you to learn more. Come visit me at amylatta.com and until next week, let’s go do epic stuff.

 

 
Enjoy the Show?

Share this post

Hi, I’m Amy.

For years, I took a ton of action to sign clients.

I learned to create self-confidence and powerfully believe in myself first, and then built a multiple six-figure coaching business.

And I can help you do it, too.

Scroll to Top

Ready to take the actions that sign clients?

Despite your certification and investing in business courses, no one taught you what you really need. The self-confidence needed to take the actions that consistently sign clients.

I am sharing the three secrets I learned about creating self-confidence, right here.