Use Your Articles & Blog Posts To Get More Clients In Your Programs

Do you find that writing new content – whether it’s a newsletter article or a blog post – is one of the first things to fall off your to-do list when you’re tight on time?

I totally get it. Writing is a big time commitment and it may feel less important than other things you’re working on.

In the past, I’ve written about the importance of having a blog and touted benefits such as driving traffic to your site and growing your list.

An even more significant benefit is that your newsletter articles and blog posts can be a great marketing and sales tool for your coaching and group programs.

In order for this to work, you need a plan!

If you’re writing content without a plan, you’re likely missing huge marketing opportunities for your health coaching business.

If you’re winging it when you sit down to write, you’re probably feeling that your writing time isn’t worth all of the effort.

Now it’s time to turn this around!

 
Today I’m sharing how to create a strategic plan for your newsletter and/or blog that creates interest in your programs and increases your sales.

Creating a Content Calendar

A content calendar (a.k.a. an editorial calendar) is a schedule of the content you plan to write and publish. This calendar can contain your blog posts, email newsletters, marketing campaigns and launches. It can also include your social media posts. Your calendar can be on a sheet of paper, in a spreadsheet, or in software designed for this purpose. Whatever works best for you!

What are the benefits of using a content calendar?

• Keep your marketing content and ideas organized in one central place
• Ensure that you have a consistent publishing schedule to keep your list and audience engaged
• Coordinate your content with your marketing campaigns and launches to be more strategic about what content you are sharing and generate interest in your programs and services
• Easily see what you have coming up so you always know what you have to write or create

Using a content calendar is going to help you to wrangle all your blog post and content ideas and keep your marketing organized and on schedule. It will also help you stay on track with all the writing you need to do, so this important piece of your business doesn’t slip.

Now that you know WHY you would use a content calendar, let’s talk about HOW to set one up and use it to be more strategic with your content.

As I mentioned, there are many ways to set up a content calendar and you can choose whichever method feels best to you. My team uses a Google spreadsheet so that we can update it on the go and everyone can always see the latest version. I’ve created a template that you can steal to create your own content calendar.

Generating Blog Topics That Will Help Promote Your Programs

In a previous post, I shared my favorite ways to come up with blog topics that your audience will love. Drawing from client conversations, your own experience, and content you’ve created in the past, we are going to set up a calendar of posts that support your next promotion!

Step 1: What are you promoting?

To plan out your calendar we are going to start with the most important piece: your promotions!

The content leading up to the start of a program you’re promoting should support getting more people to sign up. The content you send out during a launch is a great opportunity to build up interest and anticipation in your program or service.

To demonstrate exactly how this works, let’s use an example of a health coach launching a “Summer Slim Down” program on June 1.

Using this example, we’ll fill in the content calendar with the dates the program will be promoted and the start date of the program.

Step 2: Create newsletter article/blog topics

We always want the content leading up to (and during) your promotions to directly support the program or service you’re offering.

The content you write should do 3 things:

1. Give value
2. Educate your audience
3. Generate interest in your program or service

While we want your articles and posts to generate interest in your program or service, they should NOT be purely promotion. The articles/posts should offer content that is RELATED to the program and can then include a short promotion at the end of the article.

Here are a few ways to come up with your article or blog topics:

• Brainstorm the most common questions people have that relate to the program you’re promoting
• Make a list of the common misconceptions or myths your audience believes
• Think about the 3 or 4 biggest problems your clients have that your program solves
• Is your program split into sections or modules? What are the main lessons of each module?

Without giving away everything you teach, you can come up with 4 or 5 ideas that directly relate to your program and give your readers some insight into your expertise and process.

Let’s keep going with our example:

Topic based on a common question:
Your clients seem to always be asking you why the weight won’t come off even though they’ve made x change in their diet.
Blog post: Why changing X doesn’t get you weight loss results.

Topic based on a common misconception:
Your clients think that they need to eat a low fat diet in order to lose weight.
Blog post: Eating MORE fat will speed up your metabolism.

Topic based on a problem your clients have that your program solves:
Your clients don’t like running or cardio. What are the exercises you tell them to
do instead?
Blog post: Hate running? 3 alternative exercises you can try for weight loss.

Topic based on a problem your clients have that your program solves:
After you teach your clients about x, they always have breakthrough results.
Blog post: The one change that ALWAYS helps my clients lose 10 pounds fast.
(Bonus if you can use real examples and testimonials in this one!)

Topics based on the main lessons you teach in your program:
Let’s say your program contains 4 modules – Mindset & Motivation, Slimming Meal Plan, Get Fit Plan, & Superfoods.
Your blog posts could be:

• The Most Important Step in Your Weightloss Journey Starts in Your Head. Here’s why.
• The 3 Foods You Absolutely Must Cut From Your Diet/ 3 Recipes You Must Try This Summer.
• What Is The Ideal Exercise Plan For Weight Loss Results?
• Why x Should Be In Your Fridge At All Times (And my favorite recipe to
  use it!)

As you can see, between the three methods for coming up with topics you should be able to create plenty of blog ideas!

Some ideas that you come up with based on client conversations and past experience might not directly relate to your launch, and that’s ok! These blog post topics can still be used in your calendar before or after your launch promotion period.

Step 3: Creating A Schedule

The last step in creating your calendar is to schedule everything.

I recommend that you email your list with an article or blog post once a week. If you’re not accustomed to writing this often, you can start with every other week and then work your way up to once a week. Pick one day that your free content will go out each week and stick to that schedule.

Emailing your list once a week will allow you to build trust, credibility, and remain “top of mind” to your audience. Focus on GIVING more than SELLING by sending free content more frequently than direct promotional emails.

If you’re promoting a program or service, I recommend that you start sending out blog posts or articles that relate to the offering two weeks before you start promoting. This “pre-launch content” will whet people’s appetite (so to speak :), start educating them on why they need what you’re offering, and show that YOU have a solution.

With the example of the “Summer Slim Down” program starting on June 1, the pre-launch blog posts/articles would be sent May 3rd and May 11th – since this is the two weeks before promotion starts.

Then, promotional emails would be sent from May 18th-31st. During this time, you’ll continue to send free valuable content related to your program (in the form of a blog post or article) once a week.

As you can see in the example calendar, the blog and email content work together to provide a ton of value and information to the reader, while building up to the launch of the program. This approach is going to build trust with your audience, while also leaving them wanting to know more. You can also see in the calendar template how we continue to provide the audience with valuable content after the launch from topics we brainstormed in Step 2 above.

Hearing terms like “editorial calendar” or “strategic blog plan” might make your head spin! But taking this simple approach to creating content that supports your launch can have a major impact on your sales and help you to land more clients.

 
Now I’d love to hear from you!
What is one topic you can write about to help support your next promotion? Share your ideas and questions below so I can support you.