Most beneficial feature?
‘The feature that I found most beneficial for me as a coach, is the fact that the scheduling of all your appointments is completely taken care of. The Zoom links are created for you. You simply have to go in, you click on it. It’s there, it’s ready. If there’s a change or an amendment made, you also get an email notifying you of that. It notifies the client of that. And that’s something that can be quite time consuming for a coach, especially if there are changes and amendments made. Also, the fact that you can view your calendar in a full week or a month, so you can schedule your appointments far in advance. Your clients can also see your calendar and have access to that. And it’s not something that you constantly have to be going in and update. So it frees up your time for other aspects, which are far more important than the scheduling of appointments. Even with Zoom, Zoom is fantastic, but sometimes if you’re not okay with it or it’s not your area of expertise, it can be a little bit fiddly. So to have the experts on the other side, that can take care of all of that. It’s priceless to me’.
Benefits from Upskill Coach?
‘Well, the big one for me is I am a self-professed Luddite when it comes to all things technology. And I am a technophobe and unfortunately, I have no desire to improve in this area at the moment. So the fact that anything technical that arose at all as regards the system or Upskill Coach in general, all I had to do was simply email the team and say, you know, ‘how do I fix this’? ‘How does this work’? ‘What’s the best way to look at this’? They were on hand straight away to be able to fix it, which is the most important thing. And just to give me some direction, if it was something that I needed to address myself. Technology for me hasn’t been my friend, and people who have that area of expertise and they can do all of those things for you as a support in your business’.
‘A second benefit is the handling of payments with the clients and the clients can see all that as soon as they go on the website. So it takes any awkwardness that you may have as a coach having that conversation about payment and the structure of payment. It’s also processed, at the end of Upskill Coach. So it’s not something that you are worried about. It’s not something that you are chasing. It’s there, it’s on hand. Your notification comes through when the payment has taken place, and it also saves you having any awkward conversation with the client during the course of the coaching session. You get online, you’re on your Zoom call straightaway, your hour or your hour and 15 minutes or whatever your allocated time is, is fully taken care of and you can go straight into coaching. There’s no need for a conversation about any kind of financials. So I loved that’.
‘And the other one was, I suppose the area when you’re self-employed as a coach and trying to put yourself out there and market yourself, it’s wonderful to have a team on hand where again, that’s their area of expertise. This is what I’m a firm believer in employing the experts for everything. I do what I do, I coach. That’s my area of expertise with Upskill Coach. They have a team on hand marketing technology structures, all of those other things, that’s their area of expertise. So for me, it’s a no brainer, you know, why would I not have a support group in place? It’s like having my own little mini team on hand, so I knew I could call on them and I knew nothing was ever too much trouble. Even the simplest, or if I felt it was a stupid question, I was never made to feel that way by the team. They really were incredibly supportive. So I would highly recommend it from that basis.
Worried about coaching online?
‘The only thing would be would you have enough clients to justify the payment when you’re paying it out? For me that’s going to be a trial and error element. So you’re going to see, am I covering costs, am I going to get the volume of clients coming through that I need? That would be the only thing that would make me have a slight concern I suppose’.
Would you recommend Upskill Coach to other coaches?
‘Well firstly, yes, I would recommend that the coaches work with Upskill Coach because it provides a platform for you as a coach to reach your target clients. It also provides you with a support network, which can be invaluable. Again, as a coach, it can be quite a solitary, lonely business when you’re working on your own. And it’s wonderful to know that you have somebody at the other end of the phone or at the other end of the email that if you have any concerns, any issues, that they have the expertise there to help you out and give you whatever you need. I found that hugely beneficial and I enjoyed working with the team and I liked the system. I liked like how it was structured and it really worked for me as a coach’
What did you like the most?
‘The most satisfying part for me is to watch the relationship build with my clients and to see their breakthrough moments and to see the change and to watch them as the coaching actually starts to really have a benefit in their life, which is the same for any coach, I’m sure. It’s just very satisfying to be in an environment, as I had previously said, not having to in the course of your coaching call address any issues about money or be involved in technical issues. Where you’re fundamentally tuned into them for the full 60 minutes. Their time is the time that you’re speaking to them. It’s all about them within that time frame. There are no other elements that are distracting you. There’s no other part that you’re worrying about, like setting up the call for the next time or you’re worrying about is the payments coming for the next time. All of that has gone so you can truly be in the zone of coaching. And I think that provides a proper authentic service to the clients, which can make a real difference to the relationship with them too’.
