Why Your Discovery Calls Aren’t Closing New Clients

Are you having trouble getting people to say yes on your discovery calls and then they don’t enroll in your coaching programs?

In this article, I’ll share with you 3 things:

• How you can attract clients who can pay for your coaching?
• The best ways to make your offer on your calls
• How to stop feeling salesy and nervous when talking about your prices?

Attracting Budget-Conscious Clients

So let’s begin with the first problem on enrollment calls: you attract clients who can’t afford your coaching.

So as coaches, we’ve all come across potential clients who are motivated and ready to change their lives. We have an amazing conversation. Everything seems to go smoothly, but things change when it comes to talking about coaching fees.

Here’s what often happens:

• The potential client goes silent
• Their enthusiasm fades
• And to make excuses like I really want to do this but I can’t afford it right now

I know it can be really frustrating and this might surprise you but guess what? Money isn’t really the thing that’s stopping them. I can’t tell you how many times somebody has told me that they can’t afford coaching right now but then later,

• They join a different program
• They buy a course
• Or even hire a different coach

So clearly, money wasn’t the issue. What is it then?

Most of the time, it’s trust. They made excuses because they didn’t truly believe that working with me would help them achieve their goals.

Now, while trust is a common reason there might be another one that can be the issue, getting coached is too intimidating.

Many times, people know that if they start working with a coach, they will have to make real changes in their lives. They will have to give up old habits and they might just not be ready for that. And sometimes I’m just not the right coach for them that can also be the case.

Either way, money was just an excuse because we didn’t build enough trust and rapport with each other.

So how do we fix this problem? Three things helped me get better at building trust and rapport with the right people.

1. Attracting prospects who have already invested in coaching or other types of training. Such people already understand the value of that investment.
2. Being patient. I don’t just mean being patient on the call because sometimes it can take several calls to build trust and rapport. Your job is not to convince people to sign up for your coaching right then and there. Your job is to talk to as many people as you possibly can and enroll those who are perfect fit.
3. The third thing that really helped me is to have real conversations Now, what does it mean to have a real conversation in the first place? Fundamentally, it’s a natural back-and-forth between two people. I found an interesting study on gong.io and here’s an Illuminating stat.

The top performers on discovery calls spread their questions evenly throughout the call. This creates a balanced and engaging conversation.

Interestingly and also according to this study, average salespeople with worse results tend to frontload their questions at the beginning like their ticking off a checklist but the successful calls have a natural back-and-forth dialogue while still focusing on the goals of the prospect.

In this study, they also measured how often the speaker switches per minute and it shows a strong correlation with success. So the more interactive the conversation, the better the outcome, and here’s how I like to sum this up: Make the other person feel understood not interviewed.

And that brings us to a second big problem that many coaches have on their enrollment calls.

Smooth Transition to Pitch

The second big problem is that you don’t know how to transition smoothly from conversation to your pitch.

Here’s a story that I hear quite often, I was on a discovery call and everything was going great. We were having a nice conversation but when it came time to talk about my coaching, I got nervous and fumbled. The call ended awkwardly and they never signed up.

Let me ask you, does this happen on your calls? If it is, you’re not alone. If you check on Reddit, Quora, and even on social media, many coaches are facing the same issue.

To help you with this, here are my favorite strategies to make a smooth transition from conversation to asking for the sale.

1. The first thing you can try is to set expectations at the start of the call.
   • For example, you could say something like this: “If I think we’re a good fit then at the end of this call I would like to share with you how my coaching can help you achieve your goals.”
   • This way they know exactly what to expect and you’re not dropping it on them suddenly.
2. The second thing that really helped me is to clarify what I’m understanding.
   • Here’s how they do it, every time they’re done talking, you repeat back to them what you understood and you get confirmation from them.
   • You might say something like this: “So what I’m hearing is that your challenge is XYZ and you’re looking for so and so strategies to improve it, is that right?“
   • This ensures you’re listening and that you’re on the same page.
   • Now, here’s the key, if at any point coaching them is the logical next step, then it’s going to feel very natural to follow up with that question.
3. The third strategy is the Three Why’s Strategy.
   • Whenever you’re not sure if now is the right moment to ask for the sale or offer your coaching, you can use the three whys to make sure now is the right time. It’s such a simple framework that you can start practicing this right on your next call after you’re done reading this article.
   • So here’s what you do together with your prospect, try to answer the following three y’s:
     • The first why is, why do something? Let them explain to you why they need to achieve the goals that they described to you.
     • After that, you will move on to the second why which is, why now? Ask them what they might miss out on if they wait and ask them why they need to take action now.
     • You can move on to the third why which is why you ask them, why they booked this call with you specifically. And if they think you would be the right person to help them.
   • If you and the prospect can’t answer these three why questions, then stop and figure out the answers first. Sometimes that might involve booking a follow-up call but when your prospect has clarity on all three whys, then making your coaching offer is a very smooth transition and that leads us to the third common problem that coaches have on enrollment calls and that is feeling nervous or feeling salesy.

Overcoming Nervousness On Sales Calls

Here’s what often happens: You’re on a call, everything seems fine but when it’s time to discuss your services and prizes, you start to feel uneasy.

It happened to me many times and it also happens many times to my coaching clients. Now, if you’ve done everything right up to this point, here’s an uncomfortable truth you might not like to hear: you just need more practice.

It might take you dozens of calls before you start to build the practice and routine to be comfortable and at ease on your enrollment calls. If you’ve only done a handful of enrollment calls, then it is only natural for you to feel nervous or even salesy sometimes.

In that case, you don’t need more strategies, you just need to practice on more calls.

Want to know how I practiced? Here’s how:

1. I didn’t pitch or sell anything. I didn’t even think about it or plan for it on my practice calls instead I focused on getting them a result. Any kind of result no matter how small.
2. I treated them as if they were already my coaching client not worrying about whether I would get paid or not.
3. And after a few of those practice calls, what happened was that some people started asking me if they could work with me.

I know it sounds crazy but if you do what I did then you can get clients without pitching or selling them
anything because they will ask you if they can work with you. It’s a wonderful feeling and a great enrollment call experience.

In my case, once it had happened a couple of times, I lost all my nervousness overnight and I started to feel very comfortable with my enrollment calls.

The key really was that I had a huge shift in my energy and other people could feel that so stay positive and be patient and you’ll notice your energy shift as well with each practice call that you make.

But even though I finally started getting better at enrollment calls I still made plenty of mistakes. If I could go back in time, I would tell myself to avoid these five mistakes on my enrollment calls.

Click here to read that article next and if you enjoy my articles and you’re considering working with me, go to my website and book a call there.

My Three Takeaways

1. You know what? I’ve realized that when potential clients say they can’t afford coaching, it’s often not really about the money. It’s more about trust or readiness for change. I need to focus on building that trust and showing the value of what I offer.
2. I’ve learned that having real conversations is key. It’s not about firing off a list of questions but creating a natural back-and-forth dialogue. I should aim to make the other person feel understood, not interviewed.
3. I love the idea of treating practice calls as if the person is already a client, focusing on getting them a result rather than selling. This shift in mindset could really help me feel more at ease and even lead to clients asking to work with me without a hard sell.

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