IMPORTANT NOTE Folks, after much debate, I’ve totally revamped my coaching offerings and am, for the foreseeable future, no longer offering hourly coaching. I’ve gotten much, much better results when I’m with a client for six months or more… and honestly, when I know I have said client under my thumb for that amount of time and can therefore implement a very specific curriculum. Because of this, I now take a maximum of five clients on for a six month period. These slots open periodically, so if you’d like to be notified when I’m accepting new clients, please join my Advance Discount List. However, so that you can get a feel for how I work, I’m leaving the info below!

So, you’re thinking about getting coaching? Good for you.

I’ve had many coaches and mentors as I’ve grown my business, and I think it’s safe to say that I wouldn’t be where I am now without their help. In life and in business, you can approach something new by trying things randomly, or you can piggyback on the knowledge of people who are already succeeding and shorten the journey. (I can say from experience that the latter is more productive, although the former can be fun if you’re a big fan of confusion and terror.)

So because it seems the logical place to start, let’s begin by delving into the root of what I’m thinking is your current set of challenges.

Let me ask you…

• Are you having trouble standing out?

• Does marketing and sales drain you? As in, you don’t really like it, you feel it’s a little sleazy, and you also kind of suck at it?

• If you put yourself in your client’s shoes and if you’re totally honest, is it hard to imagine — given the way you currently promote yourself — why any prospective client would choose YOU over the other people out there doing the same basic thing as you are?

That’s a tough situation to be in. You know why? Because everyone tries to get out of it — to stand out from their competition in an attempt to get more business — in the same way: by using brute force.

You’ll amp up your service offerings. You’ll lower your prices. You’ll advertise, and try to get your stuff in front of as many people as possible. Even though you hate it or suck at it, you’ll force yourself to be in “sales mode” more often. To sell harder. The world doesn’t know about your great products and services? Man, screw those guys. You’ll make them know about your stuff, whether they like it or not.

Sound familiar?

Well, let me tell you a secret: The problem isn’t that your services aren’t good enough or cheap enough or advertised widely enough. The problem is that people aren’t interested enough in you.

You need to have good stuff, yes. You also need to provide good service, be professional, and know what you’re doing. But the marketplace is filled with good, professional subject-matter experts who never make a dime. Being good at what you do is not enough.

You want to stand out and actually get hired? Then it’s all about you, baby.

Not sure how to become more likable and interesting in a way that will actually drive sales? Well, that’s where I come in.

Let me tell you about my business.

I started my online life by doing the rather mundane service of setting up blogs. That’s a commodity service, so I didn’t really do them any better than anyone else (and couldn’t — a blog is pretty much a blog)… and luckily — and I do mean luckily — I had no idea what I was doing.

Because I often didn’t know which end was up, I didn’t know that you were supposed to have a marketing plan. I didn’t know the correct way to sell, the correct way to launch a product, the correct way to market to an email list, the correct way to advertise, and a billion other things that comprise the “right” way to do business.

If I’d done my research and read the rules, I probably would have done things that “right” way. If that had happened, I doubt I’d be here today… and I sure as hell wouldn’t be having as much fun as I am.

What happened instead was this: In my naiveté (and because I defaulted to doing what I liked best), I “advertised” only by writing on various blogs. Because I’m a storyteller, many of these posts appeared to have nothing to do with anything. They were sometimes about punk rock, sometimes about tattoos, sometimes about things like the turkeys that had moved into my barn. I didn’t buy any ads. I did zero cold calling or cold emailing. Hell, I didn’t even optimize for search engines. I got out there and worked it on the blogs (that’s the technical term), hung out on Twitter… and waited for customers to come to me.

And they did.

Using this kind of cutting-edge, advanced marketing strategy involving turkey posts and ignorance, I made $3000 in my very first month. And by the end of that year, I was making over $10,000 per month.

People stopped asking me how to set up blogs, and started asking me how to build a business. Folks wanted to know how to do what I had done — what I had done in (honestly) a fairly boring field, doing something that just about anyone could do.

I told them the truth.

I did it by being a personality instead of an unremarkable listing among thousands in a phonebook, or a Google search.

I did it by not selling products, but instead selling the stories behind the products — true stories that had the feel of fiction, and that engaged first so that they could sell later, under the radar. I told stories that people were able to see themselves as being a part of… and were willing to buy to remain a part of.

I did it not by creating customers, but by gaining fans.

And I can teach you how to do it, too.

The Ninja Coaching plan: How we’ll work together

My friend Chris Guillebeau once told me an expression that he’d heard from someone else, who had possibly heard it from someone else. It was the notion of being “famous among dozens.” The idea is that within a very small circle, you can be very well known… but can remain totally anonymous and unknown outside of that circle. But in that little world, you have devotees. You have your own little fan base, your own little army. Like a rock star inside of a small biosphere or something.

The way I’ve described it often is: “Being internet famous is like being famous at the Denny’s on the corner of 8th Street and Broad.”

We don’t literally want to make you a celebrity. (You probably don’t believe that’s possible anyway.) What we want is to make you famous among dozens — to make you loved and respected and interesting to a relatively small group in the corner of the world or of the internet. We want a minor group of devoted people who resonate strongly with you, who will sing your praises far and wide, and who are eager to work with you.

Here’s what that looks like. Here’s what I’ll help you to do:

• Develop your own story, as if you were a character in a novel. People rally behind great characters, and great characters all have a series of attributes similar to the ones you have right now and/or that I can help you develop. (To address that objection you have in your mind: Think you’re not interesting enough? Think again. You are, to the right people.)

• Build an army. I once had a client say she’d like to have a T-shirt that read, “I’d follow Johnny B. Truant into the pits of zombie hell.” I put that out on Twitter as a joke and a dozen people chimed in that they’d want that shirt too. Zombies and hell aside, that’s a pretty nice sentiment. Would people wear your shirt? Most people who sell stuff can’t claim that their customers would, but we’ll work on that, too.

• Proudly alienate the wrong people. Yeah, you want this. You want to “proudly alienate” people — a Derek Sivers term I keep borrowing. You want people who aren’t right for you to walk away from you. Think of it like panning for gold: there’s a little bit of shiny gold in the riverbed, and also a whole lot of mud. If you’re to get what you want out of that riverbed, you’ll want a nice sieve so that you can wash away all of the junk… just like how in your business, you actually want the wrong people to leave you. (Or am I mistaken about that? Would you rather work with people who argue, nickel-and-dime you on prices, ask for special treatment, and complain?)

• Reward the right people. I believe in the cliched, antiquated, and time-tested policy of “win-win.” Most people think about how they can make the most money in their business, which is to say, “how I can take the most?” I believe in flipping this around. How can you give the very best stuff to your people — the stuff they need the most? How can you give above and beyond? Because here’s where the second “win” in “win-win” comes from: the more you give to people and the bigger problems you solve for them, the more they’ll give back to you. (In short: The best route to profit is a very limited kind of altruism. Really.)

• Change the world. I’m overstating this for dramatic emphasis, but in line with the above bullet point, the way to succeed the most is to do the most good. I’m not even a little bit kidding. As we work together, I’ll keep urging you to find ways to make lives better and change your own little corner of the world, because what goes around comes around.

• Challenge your assumptions (and bring your goals closer to you). Most people move toward their goals. That’s all well and good, but the truth is that almost always, what you REALLY want out of your goals (the “ends” of your goals instead of the “means” to get them that you’re probably shooting for now) are probably closer than you think. So in addition to helping you move toward your goals, we’ll also work on moving those goals closer to you. (You’re making assumptions right now about the way things “have to be” that I’d wager aren’t totally correct. So let’s find a shorter path.)

• Have fun. I work hard in my business, but not as hard as you’d think — mainly because there’s a lot to my business that is fun and awesome if I allow myself to enjoy it. We have this engrained perception that if something is fun, it must be wrong, and that you should feel guilty for neglecting your “real work” — i.e., “the stuff you don’t like.” That’s bullshit. We’re entrepreneurs because we want freedom, so we’ll work together on claiming that freedom.

Details! Details!

You know that list of technical specs that’s in a closed tab when you look at electronics on Amazon? The list that tells you all of the little pieces that are in the package, what kinds of data ports are on it, what geeky extra features are included? Yeah, I’m the guy who always opens that closed tab because I like reading that list and seeing what exactly is included with what I’m getting.

So, here’s the “technical specs” of our coaching journey together:

• All calls are recorded. I’ll send them to you after our sessions so that you can listen to them over again if you’d rather not feverishly take notes while we’re chatting. (Because it is a chat. This is COACHING, not a download of my brain into yours. And a bonus of that? The calls are usually fun, like we’re sitting in a cafe drinking coffee. Or beer. Whatever metaphor you’d like; it’s your dime.)

• I’ll remind you about stuff you may be neglecting. I’m blatantly stealing this from Charlie Gilkey, who bugged me about a few things on my to-do list until I did them. It has a great way of actually making people act and implement.

• Assignments between sessions. I resisted this for a long time, figuring that people didn’t like assignments. But what does “like” mean? I’d say that you’ll “like” getting results from our sessions more than you’d “like” hanging back and doing nothing, and that means I’m going to assign you a few to-dos at the end of each session that you’ll need to do before our next session. That way you’ll “like” your results more.

• Between-session email support. Have questions between sessions? That’s what email is for! I’ll ask you to keep these reasonable in scope (there’s nothing quite like writing a novel via email to answer a seriously deep question), but otherwise feel free to email me as often as you’d like when you have questions or would like me to look at something for you.

Now for some proud alienation

Remember how I said that we’ll work on getting your wrong people to leave so that you’ll only work with the right people? Well, I do that too.

So, please don’t hire me…

… if you aren’t a “do-er.” My reputation is tied in part to your success, and I’ve gotten great results (and a great reputation) with clients so far. If you never implement any of the strategies we talk about, you’re not going to do well and you’ll mess up my whole record.

… if you’re selfish. Look, I want stuff too. But thanks to that win-win thing I preach, I’m always looking to help my clients win as much as I win. If you aren’t devoted to making your customers’ and clients’ lives better and/or making the world more kick-ass in some way, we’re not a good fit.

… if you expect me to do it for you. I’m a guide, and I care deeply about your success and well-being, and I’ll help you to the best of my ability. But it’s your show, and I only work with people who take full responsibility for making their lives happen.

… if you don’t have a good sense of humor. I want to have fun in my work, and hopefully you do too. So, if you’re totally serious all of the time, we’re not going to be a good fit. I don’t turn coaching calls into comedy sessions, but they’re not all dry and numbers, either. (Hint: If you read and like my blog, we’ll be fine.)

… if you expect a quick fix. Building something new always takes time. It’s extraordinarily rare that someone will become an overnight success, and it’s nerve-wracking to work with clients who are desperate to make it happen RIGHT NOW. Obviously a shorter timeframe is better in most cases, and we’ll work to make things happen as quickly as possible… but PLEASE do not hire me if you’ve taken money out of your kids’ college fund to pay for our sessions and won’t be able to pay your rent if this doesn’t happen immediately for you. I’m serious about this one: PLEASE DO NOT HIRE ME IF YOU SEE COACHING AS A “TAKE ONE SHOT AND MAYBE HIT THE JACKPOT” KIND OF LOTTERY.

… if you are negative or pessimistic. I am an incurable optimist and I FUCKING HATE IT when people tell me why something can’t be done. I know a guy who climbed K2 and Mt. Kilimanjaro after losing both of his legs, so I don’t want to hear anyone play the victim regarding things that are actually their choice. Please do me a favor and read this post. If you agree with it, then you’re my kind of person and we can roll.

… if you’re inflexible. Successful entrepreneurs roll with the punches and adapt their approach as they go. You have to be willing to ditch your current direction and move in another if the wind starts blowing that way. I think of this point like a Mitch Hedberg joke: “I think Pringles’ original intention was to make tennis balls. But on the day the rubber was supposed to arrive, a truckload of potatoes showed up. But Pringles is a laid-back company, so they said, ‘Fuck it; cut ‘em up!’ ” (Note: Flexibility is a fine line. While you want to be flexible, you don’t want to be weak or prone to the distracting “shiny object syndrome.”)

… if you are totally unwilling to fail. People who try new things fail. I won’t sugar-coat it; it’s a fact of business. Please read this post and if you vehemently disagree with it and will be crushed if you fail once or twice, we’re not a good fit because I can’t coach in fantasy-land.

Made it this far? Great! Let’s do this thing!

Sorry, but I’m no longer doing coaching on an hourly basis. Please see the note at the top of this page.