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Methods to overcome your sales fears
In this episode, Alanna Fincke and I discuss overcoming your sales fears.
By listening to this episode you will learn how to overcome some of the common fears in sales.
Here we go. Okay, I am here with Alanna. And Alanna is an amazing coach. She is board certified, she’ll tell you all about her background. But I’m really excited to have Alanna here today, because I think that her story is gonna inspire a lot of you who are health coaches out, there are life coaches out there, and maybe you just graduated, you want to hit the ground running, but you feel so overwhelmed with all the things out there and not quite sure what to focus on or how to reach your ideal clients. And so a lot is going to share a little bit about her journey. She’s been one of my clients. And I love working with her because she’s incredibly determined and motivated and fun to work with. But a lot, I’ll let you introduce yourself, and we’ll go from there. Sure.
Thanks for having me. It’s really fun to be here. Yeah, I’m a board certified health coach. And I’m also a resilience expert. I get the privilege of teaching and training people and the skills and science of resilience and health and well being around the world. Both in my day job and my, in my job as a like focused around health coaching and resilience coaching. Yeah, I mean, I can go on in lots of different directions.
Yeah. Well, tell everybody a little bit more about when you first started, you just graduated from what was it? Duke? It was the yeah, do. I don’t know what the program was called. But something like that. Right. What was it called? Duke?
Duke Integrative Health. Okay. So I’m at Duke trained Integrative Health Coach.
Yeah, well, yeah. And you knew you wanted to do health coaching, but you had a full time job. You’re a mom, you have a lot going on. So when you first finished that, and you were like, Okay, I got my certification. I’m ready to go. What were the thoughts running through your mind? And what was kind of the vision you had for yourself?
Yeah, sure. That’s, that’s a great starting question. So when I graduated, I was so excited. I want to start obviously, coaching people right away, and I was kind of like, a Wait, how do I get people to, you know, I love the Duke program, the Duke program is amazing. They give you really powerful skills, to be a very powerful coach that can help people change and transform their lives.
However, they do not give you a lot of coaching on how to start a coaching business. And so I was feeling I’ve never like been an entrepreneur, I’ve never had my own business before. I had no idea. In fact, it’s something that I actively tried not to do. Because, you know, we all have so many self limiting beliefs around that. And so I was really struggling with how to start my own business and how to attract clients. Yeah.
Yep. And I think we found each other on Google or something, and talked and got you going in your business. And since then, you’ve come so far, because I know before you know, you didn’t have your own system, or kind of you had ideas about how you wanted to coach people how you wanted to stand out in the market, but wasn’t sure how that was going to play out. So tell us when you say limiting beliefs from that you had in the beginning? What were some of those that were holding you back?
I feel like I have like every classic, you know, you must Coach, I know you coach on this all the time. But I was I mean, I’m just sort of like that classic person who had all those limiting beliefs like around imposter syndrome. And, you know, like, it’s been an amazing journey, like to building my coaching business because it’s like a journey of life and a journey of your own self discovery.
How to feel confident in sales
I feel like it’s really taught me about having like, more confidence and belief in myself and the value that I deliver and really owning that, and getting really clear on the value I deliver, which has been like, such an amazing process, you know, and doing that with you.
And with your help and your facilitation has just been really powerful in ways it’s like becoming building a health coaching business is more than just like, Okay, I need to have these marketing systems set up. It’s not like we’re selling stuff, widgets or whatever. It’s like you’re selling, you know, transforming people’s lives. And I just feel like I’ve grown in a weighs really owning and getting really clear on the value that I deliver in the service that I deliver to my clients and to the world.
Yeah, totally. Like, the way I explained it is you walk out of coaching a different version of yourself a better version of yourself for the time to come. And when health coaches tell me, Well, I love health coaching, and I do it for free, I’m like, but, but also, you have to understand that the person on the other end is going to be a different person have different skills for the rest of their life. That’s worth something that is worth a energy exchange.
How to realize the price your products or services are worth
You know, if you don’t charge you can’t keep, most likely can’t keep coaching because you have to pay your bills somehow, and you got to, you know, work a full time day job, and you’re gonna run out of time to work on your business. And so my whole passion is helping health coaches and life coaches be able to not quit, not quit coaching and keep doing it and make money doing it. So they don’t feel like I gotta quit, and they gotta get a full time day job and all that stuff. Right? So, um, tell me a little more about, you know, we to, to position your value, you have a really cool system that you call type eight, type H. So tell everybody about that system. And we’d love to hear it.
Sure. Yeah, that’s great. Thanks. So, I mean, I have to go back a little to get to how I got to this system of type A to type age, but I’ve been, as you know, a type A driven, perfectionist, I’m like a card carrying founding member, somedays, I, like my whole life.
So I you know, I’m super hard on myself, like, so many of us are always moving that goalposts, you know, so I’m never there, you know, just, you know, just really every cliché around that, that driver and that, that driver in my life, and that really led me too in my life.
You know, I like I had on the outside, everything was great. You know, I had amazing job two great kids, awesome husband, you know, wonderful life, very connected to my friends and my family, you know, on the outside, my life seemed super great. But on the inside, I felt like everything was falling apart, I felt horrible, to be honest, I had anxiety, TMJ, digestive issues, like all that type of stuff, always moving the goalposts to the point where it was just like, you know, it was burnout, I was just feeling kind of resentful and angry in my life and just didn’t feel good.
And then I got, as you know, got diagnosed with breast cancer. I don’t know if the two are connected, I’ll never know, I don’t know. But for me, it was an opportunity to and a wake up call, but as a alarm that could not have been any louder that I changed things in my life. And, you know, part of that journey was becoming a health coach. And for me, I found my ideal client and this person, there are so many of us out there, those successful executives and professionals who are doing really well or but like, it’s at the expense of our own health and well being and the Taipei’s, it’s like anxiety, anxiousness, always on, you know, we never turn off.
Then the journey is to type eight, which courses I made up. But type eight is, you know, feeling healthy, happy, bringing that positivity into our lives that we lose along the way, healed, healing those mindsets that keep us, you know, functioning, and the ways that we’ve always worked and hot, which is, you know, more just about feeling lit up inside, but your own beauty and grace.
Yeah, type a to type, ah, everybody anxious to healthy, happy and hot, which I love. And it just helps you. This is something we always I talk about with my clients is, rather than saying I do health coaching, it’s as funny sessions, it’s as much money, you have a framework and a system and you know, a story to to position, hey, this is what I went through, this is where you, you could go from point A to point B, and here’s how I help you get there.
Suddenly, the value of your offer just increases because I’m not just thinking well dollars for hours per session. So what does that look like? You know, AI gets me out of that mindset.
So when it comes to, you know, taking the risk on yourself, so you you were like, Okay, how do I get clients? And I’m sure you felt really hesitant at first about well, what do I invest in first, and who do I trust and what do I do like so what caused you to invest in coaching and to take that risk? Initially?
Yeah, that’s a good question. I, um, well, I mean, I think through the process So becoming a health coach, I kind of, you know, figured out what I want to do when I grow up kind of, you know, we spend a lot of time trying to find our, like, our zone of genius as from the big leap, and I feel I read that book.
But, you know, I think I’ve been working in my zone, there’s like zone of incompetence, zone of competence zone of excellence, and zone of genius. I think I’ve been working my zone of excellence for a long time, really good at what I did.
But with coaching, I think I really found a zone of genius for me, like where my natural talents could shine through and serve others. And so when you’re operating in that zone, it just was so clear to me, that this was the time to invest in myself. I’ve done other things in the past even wrote a book, I wrote a trashy romance novel, when 50 Shades of Grey came out, as I’m a writer and an editor.
So like, I’ve done other things, I felt like I didn’t fully invest in the, like marketing and promotion of that, and the set because I know deep down inside, like, I like turned out this one book, but I was never gonna be like, be able to turn out a book. Like, if that wasn’t my zone of genius, being a writer or being like a trashy romance novel writer, but finishing the coaching program doing that experience, I knew that this, this was the thing. And you just know,
you know? Yeah, definitely. So you took that investment in yourself. And we’ve worked together in a couple different ways. You know, you were in one of my programs, small group setting, and then privately we’ve worked together. So when, like, before we started, you didn’t have to kind of what were you dealing with? You were unclear on your niche, you know, stuff like that. And then versus now, most recently, when I heard from you, it sounds like things are, you know, you’re booking the clients and rubbing up. So tell me kind of what that looked like for you.
Yeah, I mean, it’s, so I, when I started working with you, I knew nothing about anything. I, you know, I think, as you know, so well, that our instinct always is to be like, I help people. And I don’t, and you don’t want to like, niche down, you don’t want to get specific because you feel like you’re gonna lose people.
But you know, I really was able to internalize that message around like, I’m getting clear on the value that I deliver on who my ideal client is, that’s actually really important is you want to book your ideal clients, you want to book the people that you’re going to serve the best, there’s so many people out there and people that maybe aren’t a match for you, and they’re not going to have a good experience. And you aren’t either. So it is really important to get clear.
So we’re able to do that get clear on, you know, who I serve who my ideal client is, and then start to set up systems and learn. Like, it’s all new muscles. For me learning new muscles around, like, it’s always been so hard for me as it is for so many of us is putting yourself out there and selling yourself that’s totally as a coach you are selling yourself. And that was a muscle that I really needed your support and to to build and get comfortable with. But yeah, to where I am today, where I feel like finally things are starting to click.
And I have like, I feel like I’ve sort of gotten to another level. Generally my business, which has been so exciting, like I had some individual clients, and I’ve transitioned them all into a group program, while it’s actually a hybrid program with that group and private one on ones that I’m so excited about. And so are my clients, like they’re super pumped about it.
And we’re kicking off the first group a session on January 3, it’s all about intention and goal setting and like I’m so and then I’ve signed a couple of new clients into that. So all my existence clients are now transitioned into this hybrid program. All new clients are going into this hybrid program. I created the program, which I didn’t have before. I have some marketing stuff that I’ve done that works. And I feel like I’ve got some systems in place and around. Yeah, around that.
Nice. Yeah. And I remember when you booked your first high ticket client, you made a little purchase for yourself, do you mind sharing what that was?
actually wasn’t that small. This was when I bought my first high ticket client. I went straight to the Louis Vuitton store. And I bought myself a Louis Vuitton bag. It was like for me it was like I have a day job and Yeah, and so this was like, you know, I would never allow myself to purchase Something so like, it’s not needed. And I’ve got two kids, one that’s about to go into college, whatever, you know how it goes. But I was just like,
This is amazing, like, I have this money and I’m going to just treat myself with it. And it felt really good. And yeah, not all the money’s good. But I did. So enjoy every moment of that going in the store and choosing it and I carry it with pride. And it for me, it symbolizes that you know, I’m doing some of the some work that I love to do.
I love it.
I love No, like entrepreneur, CEO, business owner like that baller,
yes, you got to celebrate the win. I love that story. I think it’s so fun. Because I totally know, you know, that you, you have, like, you’ve already you already are a person of excellence. But at the same time, you’ve even just seeing you transitioned to being like, No, you know, I am going to charge high ticket for this and it is worth it. And I don’t need the clients quote unquote, and, you know, I’m gonna serve and I’m and then I can use my free stuff for the people who don’t want it my free value, my free Instagram, my free lead magnet, etc.
So that’s like a cool transfer transformation for me to see. And also just your, your ability to speak and lead people like, I know that you kind of leverage that a little bit by doing some networking groups and be good things and things like that. Um, so what would you advise to some health coaches out there, when it comes to like putting yourself out there and get your confidence up and speaking? Like, tell us a little more white wedding advice you’d give?
Yeah, that’s a good question. I am lucky in the sense that I do have like, I have a lot of experience speaking and training. And I do I do a lot of that all day long for people around the world and fortune 500 companies. And so that piece I’ve always felt confident in like, being able to coach and train and I have so many, like, so much knowledge and skills, and I just love to be able to share that with others. You know, it’s so so that’s, that’s good. But that’s a really important piece that you need, you need.
And that, you know, and that’s actually something I had to build, I was not. Let’s see how I want to say this. I wasn’t always didn’t always feel super confident in my ability to speak and train and teach. And that takes like, that takes some skill and practice. And but it’s but it’s one of those skills like growth mindset that you that you can learn, and anyone can learn. We tend to get in our own way about that a lot. You know, my kids are the same way shy about speaking and stuff. I use the same skills that I use on myself with them.
But, you know, I would say investing, if that’s something that’s like a blocker for you investing in that and getting that those skills and comfort around using your voice and speaking and training is like, super important. Question. I feel like maybe I did, yeah,
yeah. I mean, I think investing in that skill set is important and practicing. And you had the ability to practice in some pretty big high pressure situations. But obviously, you’ve done it so many times. Now it feels natural. But really, I think it comes down to the probably the first time you did it, you felt scared and you did it with fear. The formula for this, you could practice in front of a mirror, you can train your skill sets by working with a coach or working with somebody, but at some point, you just have to do it. And all right,
you do. Yeah, no, just like move beyond the fear. And I will tell you some of the tricks or what you’ve just said, like, practice, practice, practice, practice, do it in front of the mirror, do it in the shower, go take a drive in your car and say it so many times that you know it back and forth so that when you’re sitting or standing in front of an audience or on Zoom or webinar, that you don’t have to worry that you’re not going to know what you’re going to say and so then you can kind of relax and then all the goodness kind of comes out so yeah,
I love it. Cool. Now what’s some of your favorite things that about having a private coach when we’ve worked together like what um, you know, I’m sure you’ve done courses and stuff too in the past but like what’s what about private coaching in particular Did you like
yeah, I really felt like especially Hailey our last round when I did some of that private coaching with you really, really helped kind of just like everything kind of like gelled and clipped. I felt like I had so many, as you know, questions about things. So many documents. Like I was making around, like what my offering is, and some messaging around that. Or is my website and like, you were so great and just responding to, like messaging stuff. Website, you know, all of those pieces, it was like, I just felt like I, I don’t know, it just gave me so much comfort in having your eyes on it and your feedback and having that, having that partner to help me.
Because I felt like for me, those were blocker, I was like, I don’t know, before. I know, my messaging is I don’t know, like, what my offer is, and like, should I change it, you know, all these, like, sort of foundational pieces, you need to move forward. I felt like, I could just like boom, boom, boom, you know, work through all of those with you. Yeah, it’s just like, it was just like, allow me to just move forward.
And I didn’t have any excuse to have blocked Well, I don’t know what my offer is. I don’t know. Like, if that’s good enough, you know, it kind of like removed all that. So it was like, Okay, well, I got all that. Like, I got an offer. I got like stuff I feel good about my website’s rolling. And you also were so great. And introducing interesting marketing ideas and people in your network that you partner with, which is also super helpful. So
yeah, love it. And one of the things too, that I think we do as individuals who care so much about our work is we add extra things, or to our plate or to our program, or, you know, we think we need to add all these extra steps. And one of the things I noticed when we were working together was like, I wanna This is ready, like, this is done like this. You don’t need to have like this extra little tiny thing. You’re like, Let’s go like, let’s make you some money. Let’s get this out in the market.
To be honest, yeah.
Right. So. So. Anyways. I think sometimes having that objective view of somebody who’s not, you know, so close to your business, but is seeing it outside of you can say like, What do you mean, this is done? Like. This is great.
So awful. It’s so true type a driven perfectionist, like, all day long me being like, you know, moving 10 steps to heaven. I don’t have a law or whatever. This is like, all of that stuff. Yeah.
yYeah. Oh, good. Well. What would you say? One of the biggest mindset things that’s shifted for you or that you’re excited about when it comes to changing a belief?
Yeah. I’m so okay. Mindset beliefs that have changed? Yes. Okay. So many. Um, one is that it doesn’t have to be perfect. Before I put it out there, in fact, it’s probably better if it’s not that, you know, that I can just go you know, that Matt, is there named Mel Brooks or Mel. Mel Robbins, you know, she has that 54321 thing? Yeah. Super valuable in these cases for me, because it’s just like, Just do it. Just like, yeah, you know, just start promoting it, it’s ready, you know, just go. And so like, just letting go of a lot of that those perfectionism beliefs it like, it’s not perfect, I’m not going to do it at all.
And you know, that I don’t have to have everything figured out. Because it’s not possible for me to have everything figured out. That and then bigger beliefs around like, I can create the life of my dreams. Yeah, like, I can build the life of my dreams, like I can do that. There’s nothing in the way of that. And I, you know, that’s like, super powerful. And I can, you know, we all have beliefs around money, too, that’s can really get in the way when you’re starting to build your own business, whether you didn’t talk about money in your family, or whether you don’t value it, or whether there’s expectations or what have you. But I’ve definitely worked through some of that stuff.
And get into like, I’ve always got, like, avoided those discussions or even having those thoughts for myself, but kind of owning that money conversation in my own head and really, like getting more comfortable around that. And that allowed me to get more comfortable with having with selling. Yeah, because you have to talk about money, right? Because it’s a money exchange, but I feel like I’m in like, somewhat of a better place around I’m exchanging value for I’m delivering value for somebody in exchange for money and that actually feels really good. Yeah, both for both of us.
Right. Right. Yeah. And your your program is is gotten, I think you feel more confident to about the program itself because it’s changed and evolved over time too. And it’s hard not to feel good about oh, really good offer. Right? Yeah. Love it. So really good. And. What about when it comes to what you’re working on next, any other wins that you’ve experienced? Tell us more about what what that’s all about.
Yeah. I mean, I’m launching this program in January, it’s, I’m calling it everyday health and resilience. And it’s this program that I’m trying out. And it’s really around like, for me, I know that how you build your health, how you build your resilience to life’s challenges is all about the little things you do every day. So I mean, so not a. So that’s why I call it that, but I’m super excited about it. Because it’s this combination, as I was saying before, a group coaching and one on one private coaching.
And I think I found my lane like, and I have different levels for different folks, like, you know, for my clients that are we’ve worked intensely private one on one together already, they sort of have a they’re not they need to have a lighter touch we can do with the group, and maybe not as much one on one private coaching.
But for some new people that are coming in, there’s more private one on one, coaching, in addition to the group to get you moving and get you where you want to go. And I think there’s so much benefit to group coaching to learning together, but also to private because people have specific stuff. Especially for my clientele. That’s been around for a while a lot of these beliefs been hanging around for a while, and they just need some one on one support to so feels like the best of both worlds. So I’m so excited about this program.
No, we’re excited for you. And is there anything else you want to share for any health coaches listening? Who are like, Yeah, you know, I want to grow this business. But I can’t, I can’t, I don’t know if I should reach out or ask for help or whatnot. Anything you tell them?
Do it. You know, it’s the new year coming up. And you know, what do you think about for 2022? Like, what do you want to let go of? And what do you want to bring into your life? And you know, what do we wait, I can say, personally, as a breast cancer survivor, you know, it’s just changed my outlook, and you don’t have to go through breast cancer to get where I am. But what are we waiting for? Just start now, there’s no reason to wait. You don’t need to wait till some other moment in time when everything is said. And then you can do that. Just do it now. And then you’ll start bringing in all that stuff you want. You’re like,
yeah, I love it. I love it. And waiting has a cost whether we realize it or not, you know, and, you know, it’s not to say you can’t be comfortable waiting, waiting can be very comfortable. But at the same time, is that stagnant and comfortable? Or is it is it just you know, growth is on the other side of discomfort and making a move and changing something. So at least you have that to look forward to and you’re going to come uncomfortable and try something new. So yeah, I would say that it is uncomfortable.
Like you definitely have to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Because everything is new. Everything is different. You haven’t done it before. And it feels very uncomfortable, but get used to it. Because the other side of that exactly to your point is growth.
Yeah, that’s your training. And that’s your curriculum. And I love the way you connected how your business has been almost like a life curriculum for you like, Okay, this is the next level. This is the thing that’s going to teach me how to be the next version of myself a better version of myself. Keep improving, keep growing, keep working through beliefs, all that stuff. So thank you so much Alanna, for being here today. Where can people connect with you? Oh,
yeah, of course. Well, please check out my website. It’s Alanna fink.com And you can spell it right there. You can see my name. I am very active on Instagram @wellbeginwithalanna, I am on LinkedIn, Alanna, I think and those are my my main places not so much on Twitter. Not a lot on Facebook. But those are those are the main places that you
can find me. Awesome. Well, thank you so much.
Thanks. Thanks for having me.
About Alanna Fincke
Alanna Fincke has combined her training as a board-certified health coach, a resilience expert, a yoga teacher, and her experience as a breast cancer survivor, to create and share The Limitless Method. She helps her clients break through their limits and go to great heights!
Resources
- Complimentary Business Consult
- Health Coach Nation: Marketing, Business, & Mindset for Health Coaches
You can find Alanna on her website here.
