Setting Your Rates As A Life Coach

Deciding what to charge for your services as a life coach is a big step in the process of becoming successful. There are many important factors that need to be considered when you decide what to price your services at but it doesn’t need to be a daunting task. Take the following into consideration and you can avoid making any errors that might deter clients.

First and foremost - how are you selling your coaching? By the hour? Per session? Weekly or monthly rates? A session that lasts four hours and involves complicated or detailed processes is going to be priced quite differently than a thirty minute check-in phone call. On the same page, if you’re offering a special package to clients that have purchased a significant amount of coaching in advance your pricing there will be different as well.

Offer Different Packages

Typically the best bet is to have a few different ways to package your coaching; that way you can tailor it a bit to fit each client and their schedule. For some clients weekly calls might be perfect. Other clients may prefer monthly face-to-face meet ups. If you’re willing to be flexible you will have a larger client base and those clients will appreciate your dedication and willingness to work with them.

Be Clear About Your Rates

The next thing to remember is to be clear about what prices you’re charging for each level  of your coaching (hourly, per session, etc) and why. You don’t want to charge extremely high rates - especially if you’re new to the life coaching field as this can deter potential clients who might want to see someone with more experience. However you also don’t want to make the mistake of setting your rates extremely low.

If you set your rates too low you can actually lose potential clients simply because they’ll wonder why you’re priced at such a low rate. It’s the quality/price ratio - typically the cheaper something is the less valuable a customer or client will view it as. If you set yourself at bottom of the barrel rates - you’re essentially telling any future clients that your services aren’t worth paying any more than that for. There’s a fine line between having competitive pricing and selling yourself short - try to stay on the profitable side of it.

Another thing to be aware of is that you need to set rates that you’re going to be comfortable working at for a while. Your clients wont like it if mid-way through your work with them their monthly rate doubles. Typically it’s best not to raise your rates more than once a year unless a tremendous change or increase in value has been added to your products.

Set Your Rates Reasonably

So when you price your services for the first time be clear about what your prices say about you and your coaching and whether or not they’ll work for you in the long run. If you’re prices are ridiculously out of the average person's budget but you’re marketing yourself as “affordable life coaching” your clients are going to roll their eyes and head off to find someone else. However if your goal is to have all of your income produced from your coaching business but your rates average out at less than minimum wage then those prices won’t do you any good in the long run and when you eventually decide to raise them your clients may be upset. So start out with a rate you feel serves both you and your client.

If you’re clear about why you charge what you charge and have the value in your products to back it up your clients will gladly pay that price to work with you.