How to Become a Life Coach: Follow This 7-Step Process

Deciding to become a life coach is a truly inspiring choice, especially now that the industry is becoming increasingly mainstream. It’s a career that offers you the chance to make a real difference in people’s lives by helping them grow and achieve their personal goals. 

You might have seen other life coaches promoting their services online or seen them in roles beyond traditional settings, such as yoga instructors offering personal, spiritual, or professional guidance. If you’re passionate about helping others reach their full potential and are excited about starting your own business, exploring a career as a life coach could be a great fit. 

With this 7-step guide, you’ll gain the knowledge, skills, and ethical foundation needed to excel in this rewarding profession.

What Does a Life Coach Do?

As a life coach, you work closely with individuals to help them identify and reach their personal and professional goals. While therapy often focuses on addressing past traumas, your role is all about the present and future. You empower clients to make positive changes in their lives.

In your role, you act as a motivator, mentor, and guide. You provide the support and accountability needed as clients tackle life’s challenges and opportunities. Whether they’re looking to boost self-confidence, improve relationships, or achieve career success, you’re there to inspire and support their personal growth. Basically, you will be making significant improvements to their overall lives.

Here are some key duties and skills you’ll be using:

• Interpersonal communication: You ask the right questions to understand your client’s goals and needs.
• Goal setting: You assist clients in making life decisions and developing actionable plans to achieve their objectives.
• Motivation: You inspire and encourage your clients to stay committed to their goals.
• Validation: You provide positive reinforcement to help clients feel supported, especially when they lack other sources of encouragement.
• Strategy building: You create effective strategies that guide clients in transforming their lives and reaching their desired outcomes.
• Accountability: You keep clients accountable and ensure they remain focused on their goals.

Watch this video to learn about the 11 life coaching techniques and skills you should know as a life coach!

How to Become a Life Coach: the 7-Step Process

Becoming a life coach isn’t just about acquiring knowledge; it’s about developing a persona that resonates with and motivates others. It involves a combination of formal education and inherent personal qualities that together forge a successful coach.

Finding your niche

Before you embark on your journey as a life coach, it’s helpful to identify your niche and build your reputation within that area. Many of you may choose to specialize in guiding clients through professional, personal, or romantic challenges, while others might focus on areas like health, providing support with nutrition and exercise, or assisting clients in exploring their spiritual growth.

To thrive as a life coach, it’s crucial to clearly define your niche. Instead of simply saying you “improve people’s lives,” aim to deliver specific results. For example, you might help clients “discover meaningful careers” or “find a life partner without relying on dating apps.”

Here are some of the most common fields for life coaches:

• Scholastic goal setting
• Building/maintaining relationships
• Nutrition and exercise
• Aging with grace and purpose
• Careers
• Religion and spirituality
• Finding the proper work/life balance
• General wellness

To discover your niche, look for the intersection of your skills and experience with what people are willing to pay for.

Try a quick Google search to see if others are offering similar services. If they are, it’s a good sign that there’s a demand for what you have to offer.

Get qualified and certified

You don’t need any formal education or certification to become a life coach, unlike professions like psychology or medicine which require years of formal training by law. What matters is having the right experience and being able to deliver results for your clients. Integrity is key—you need to have the experience necessary to guide others effectively, even without a certification.

That said, certain niches, especially those related to mental health or wellness, might require you to get certified. If you’re considering certification, look for a well-established life coach training program. Make sure the program is approved by an organization that sets industry standards, like the International Coaching Federation.

For starters, here are a few life coaching certification programs you can consider:

• iPEC Coach Training: An ICF-accredited program that guides you through three stages of coaching mastery.
• Coach U Coach Training: This program covers two phases of coaching within 6 months. You can progress at your own pace.
• Coach Training Alliance: An ICF-accredited six-month program focused on business, marketing, and coaching skills.

Establish your online life coaching business

As you embark on your journey as a life coach, you’re not only stepping into the role of an advisor in professional, personal, or spiritual matters but also becoming a small business owner. This means you’ll need to manage essential business tasks, such as:

• Setting up your business structure
• Developing your brand
• Deciding on a coaching business model

Start with setting the right business structure.

When establishing your life coaching business, the first step is to choose the type of business entity that best fits your needs—whether it’s a sole proprietorship, LLC, or corporation. If you opt for a sole proprietorship, you won’t need to register your business formally. However, for other entity types, you’ll need to register your business with your state. Using a secretary of state business search can guide you through this process.

In simple words,

LLC: It involves more paperwork but offers protection against personal liability.

Sole Proprietorship: It is easier and requires less paperwork to start, but it doesn’t shield you from personal liability.

Next, put together a business plan that covers your startup expenses, including certification costs, any overhead for renting and setting up a space if you plan to meet clients in person, and possibly business insurance to protect yourself in case of legal issues. If you’re curious about learning how to bill insurance as a life coach successfully, you can find that information here.

Now, that the business structure is set, let’s see how to develop your coaching brand.

Just like these well-known coaches with personal brands like Tony Robbins or Brene Brown, you need a strong, distinctive identity that attracts your ideal clients. To define your brand, think about what sets you apart—your unique qualities, values, and beliefs. Consider how your approach differs from others, what makes your services special, and what makes your audience unique.

Next, decide on your life coaching business model:

Start with one-on-one coaching. This approach allows you to focus on individual clients, helping them achieve quicker results, which means you can charge higher rates for your services compared to other models. Once you’ve gained experience with private clients, you can expand by offering group programs and online self-paced courses.

Marketing your life coaching business

Starting out as a life coach without any clients is like an earth without oxygen to breathe—it just won’t work! That’s why it’s super important to have a solid marketing plan right from the get-go. Many of you might feel a bit uneasy about self-promotion at first, but it’s a skill that grows with time and practice.

Most service-based businesses thrive on word-of-mouth referrals. So, begin by offering free, mini, or discounted sessions to people you already know—friends, family, and their connections. If they’re pleased with your coaching, ask them to spread the word and even provide a testimonial for your website.

You might also want to connect with other life coaches in your area, get involved in local conferences, host free webinars, or explore online advertising options like pay-per-click.

Make sure you do these:

• Perform regular updates
• Set up a professional email account for all your life-coaching communications
• Maintain a blog and business website
• Try more scalable strategies, like YouTube and search engine optimization
• Build your presence on social media platforms where your ideal clients are active, such as LinkedIn, Twitter, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, or Reddit. Engage with these communities by offering valuable insights or support

Here are some cool life coach business card ideas to attract clients. For more useful strategies on landing your first life coaching clients, click here.

Pricing your life coaching services

Your earning potential as a life coach can vary widely depending on your experience, expertise, location, and the number of clients you serve. If you work independently, your income might fluctuate based on the demand for your services and the rates you set. 

When it comes to pricing your life coaching services, you have a few options: hourly rates, packages, or retainer fees.

We recommend starting with hourly rates as a new life coach. This allows you to build experience and earn your clients’ trust. As you gain more experience and establish your reputation, you can transition to offering package rates and retainers. Packages often appeal to potential clients because they focus on the results they’ll achieve rather than just the time spent.

Allow us to help you pick the best pricing model!

Our ‘Pricing Strategies for Coaches’ guide has helped many coaches. Get your own copy right away!

Download the free guide

How you structure your packages is up to you. For instance, you could include weekly calls and additional support in between sessions.

For more tips on crafting a compelling coaching package, check out our guide on creating a package that sells.

As your reputation grows and your client base expands, your earnings can increase, making life coaching a potentially rewarding and lucrative career path. Curious about how much you could be earning? Check out our detailed blog on life coach pay rates here.

Start your online life coaching

Once you have clients, the next step is to start coaching them. First, you’ll need to onboard them properly. Here’s how:

1. Coaching intake form: Send this form to new clients before your first session. It helps gather important information about their goals and needs. For a smooth onboarding process, check out our guide on vital questions for effective life coaching intake forms. It’s packed with insights to help you get the most out of your client interactions.
2. Coaching contract: Provide a contract to your clients to set clear boundaries and expectations for your coaching relationship. Here’s a complete checklist of what makes a good coaching contract to help you create a proper agreement.

Next, schedule your first coaching session with ease using Simply.Coach. This platform supports every aspect of your coaching business, from creating and executing contracts (and getting them signed) to running intake forms and onboarding clients. It also helps you manage their goals and track progress seamlessly. Plus, with Simply.Coach’s Zoom integration, you can automatically generate meeting URLs and share them with your clients, streamlining your workflow from start to finish.

As you work with clients, break down their main goal into smaller sub-goals. This way, each month has a clear focus, and every session helps them progress toward these sub-goals.

During sessions, ask questions that guide clients to find their own answers and solutions, drawing on your experience to support them. This approach blends coaching with consulting.

Before you go, here are some great resources you might find useful:

• Life coaching tools and resources
• Best Life Coaching Website Templates Examples
• Popular life coaching podcasts

Conclusion

Committing to a career as a life coach is a significant, rewarding endeavor that requires dedication, adaptability, and a genuine passion for helping others. As you contemplate beginning this journey, remember that your commitment to professional and personal growth will be the cornerstone of your success.

For those ready to take the first step, consider accessing the online coaching tools provided by Simply.Coach – a life coaching platform offering the best coaching solutions and features. Their online coaching tools can provide you with essential insights and practical tools to start your career on strong footing.

To learn why Simply.Coach is the ideal platform for your life coaching needs, click here.Schedule a demo today!