This blog’s been inside me for a long time. I myself was on my way to being credentialed up the wazoo and still had no clients. If this is you, then maybe you’ll be able to make the change you need. That’s all I ever hope for when I write these things.
I Don’t Know Enough
The Credentialed-To-Death consultant/coach/engineer, (you name it) is sure about one thing: that they need more letters behind their names, more accreditation and to obtain more certifications. They do this partly because they like learning but mostly because they delude themselves that they’ll get more or bigger clients this way.
I was that person once. When contemplating leaving a decade-long corporate career, I didn’t know how to make the jump into self-employment so I went out and got a coaching certificate. Then, I went and got another one and another one. Each subsequent one got more expensive and more involved and yes, it taught me more but none of it actually got me any clients.
Investing in the Wrong Thing
To help more people or to make more money, what most people in the Credentialed-To-Death camp don’t know is that it actually doesn’t work that way. Knowing more about your subject matter isn’t the same as knowing more about selling and marketing your subject matter. It astounds me that every time I meet a coach or a consultant who is starving for new clients, they are gearing up to spend another chunk of significant cash on yet another certification course or another program that is not about getting clients.
Unfortunately as I found out, if you can’t get them, you can’t SERVE them. So if you’ve launched your business in the hopes of helping people, you are an unknown entity to them until you sell and market yourself.
Somewhere, (probably in your childhood) someone taught you that it’s sleazy to sell but honorable to learn. Look inside yourself to find the source of your patterns. Awareness of your patterns makes you more powerful.
End Of Rant
So if you’re suffering from the Credentialed-To-Death-but-Starving-for-Clients syndrome, stop the cycle now and start investing in giving some serious care and attention to actually GETTING the clients.
Need more chicken soup for your biz? Follow me on Twitter, friend me on Facebook, watch me on YouTube or connect with me on LinkedIn –and let’s talk
