Ep #116: Not Another Business Coach with Nina Lacher

Hey, this is Lindsay Dotzlaf, and you’re listening to Mastering Coaching Skills episode 116.

To really compete in the coaching industry, you have to be great at coaching. That’s why every week, I will be answering your questions, sharing my stories, and offering tips and advice so you can be the best at what you do. Let’s get to work.

Hey coach, thanks for being here today. I have something so fun lined up for you today. And before we dive in, I wanted to tell you that if you’re listening to this in real-time, one thing that we’re going to do today on the podcast is I’m going to talk to one of my clients who is in Coaching Masters.

And if you feel inspired after this interview to find out more information, I just want to let you know that we are currently enrolling, only if you’re listening in real-time, like the day it comes out or maybe the day after we are currently enrolling in the Coaching Masters mastermind. The doors close tomorrow, Wednesday, January 18th.

So if you listen to this and you’re like, “What? This is amazing. I need to get in there,” yes, you absolutely do. We can’t wait to have you. Go to my website, find the information, and find the application.

Find me on Instagram; you can find it there too. And, of course, we will link it all up in the show notes.

So today, I am having a conversation with one of my clients, one of my stu-dents. Her name is Nina, and she is so fun. You’re going to learn so much from her. On Instagram she calls herself not another business coach, which I love.

She drops so many nuggets of amazing information for you for all coaches. She is a personal branding coach, and she teaches soulful marketing. And because I’m really bad at saying her last name and I had to ask her, and she’s told me ten times, I’m going to let her introduce herself.

I already know that you’re going to love her as much as I do, so with no fur-ther ado, here we go.

Lindsay: Hello, I am so excited to have you here today. Tell everyone who you are and what you do.

Nina: Hi. Thanks for the invitation, first of all. My name is Nina Lacher. I am a business coach. Actually, I introduce myself as a personal branding coach for coaches and service-based businesses. I am German, and I’m living in Spain. And I have been a member in your Coaching Masters group since last summer.

Lindsay: Yes. Okay, I love that you said I’m a business coach, and then you kind of redefined it because I think business coaching is very general, very broad, right? There are so many types of business coaches, and you do something very specific.

So let’s dive into that. How did you get into coaching? What’s your background? When did you decide to be a coach? Anything that stands out to you in that journey.

Nina: Yeah, So I became a coach, I’d say, two years ago. I certified at the Life Coach School. And basically, I wanted the training for myself. I was always super interested in self-development and people.

Basically, I love people. And I have a marketing background. I founded a company. Before that, I had been working as a project manager. I had been working as a model long ago.

So I have always been working in marketing. And at a certain point, I felt so drawn to coaching. I think it started when I really dove into that during the pandemic. I first found Brooke Castillo, and somehow I was really attracted to everything related to mindset. And like there was a new world opening up for me. And yeah, and if I do something, I like to do it for real.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: I signed up for the coach certification. And I really wanted to do it for myself, and I started coaching right away and never stopped. So here I am. I got fully booked during the first year of my coaching business. I was pretty much really surprised about how quickly everything went. Yeah, this is how things started.

Lindsay: That’s so fun. I’m sure I did know this because it was probably on your application. But I guess I didn’t remember that you were certified through the Life Coach School. And the way you just described that sounds so much like me. Like if I’m going to do something, I know I’m going to just be all the way in, so I might as well just commit now, upfront, go all the way in. This is just what we’re doing.

Nina: Yeah, yeah. And I never regretted it because it was like, you know, having the model changed everything for me. It took me a while to really, really get the idea and to really integrate it into my thinking. But when that happened, bam, things were different. And yeah, I learned so much about myself and my thoughts and what I could create for myself. So this was the starting point of everything.

After certification, I pretty much dived into other coaching schools and other systems. I really put my head down and studied a lot of different kinds of coaching techniques and then followed experienced coaches. Steve Chandler, for example, for me is a hero. I absolutely love him.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: Rich Litvin. And yeah, this is how I then almost educated myself further on. And then I followed Stacey Boehman and her podcast, and this is how I met you.

Lindsay: Yeah, so we were chatting before we started recording, and you said I want to share like how I first met you. And you said you don’t know how you met me, like in air quotes. And I don’t know what that is. So let’s talk about that now.

Nina: Yeah. So as I have a marketing background, for me, of course, the marketing part of coaching and how you create clients and how you actually present yourself and the work you do has always been a major part of my interest.

And I was listening to a podcast of Stacey’s, and I remember you were on that. It was a pretty long episode. I was in the horse stable, and I’m riding; we have horses. And I was taking out my horse, and I picked an episode. I don’t even know if it was new or a little older, and you were on.

And I remember your presence was so calm and soothing. And the way you were talking allowed me to think and follow. And I enjoyed that so much. And the way you talked about things and the way you offered solutions for questions that I might have had at that point or that Stacy was asking you was remarkable for me. And then I binged your podcast.

Lindsay: I love it. These are my favorite messages to get, is from people who are like, oh my gosh, sometimes people are like, I just searched, I don’t know, coaching skills or something, or life coach skills or something. And they’ll say I found your podcast, and I literally have listened to 100 episodes in like a week or something.

Nina: Yeah, I remember someone saying that they always listen to your podcast at night because they like your voice so much. And I did the same, but I fell asleep, but in the best way possible. And I had to re-listen to them the next morning. And I think that is something that I needed at this point. I needed a very calm, confident presence. That is what stood out for me.

Lindsay: I am so grateful that you shared that. And I actually don’t mind that you fell asleep. I do that to podcasts that I love, also. And I always just think that I’m still absorbing some of it, even when I’m like drifting off, right? Like, this is just setting me up. I’m going to wake up tomorrow and just have all of this in my memory bank.

Nina: Yeah.

Lindsay: I love it. Okay, so you have a marketing background. This is what you help your clients with, right? Marketing and branding?

Nina: Yeah. So, for me, I focus on branding, yes, of course. But personal branding. Like, who are you being? How do you create yourself? And one of the younger experiences I had when I was working as a model, I was working internationally and flying around a lot. And I think one of the earliest experiences I had during that time was that I had never met more outstandingly beautiful women that were more insecure about themselves, ever. And I was at that time, too.

And so really, how confident you are or no matter what you do, it all comes down to what you think of yourself is what makes you shine, basically. You can be as beautiful as you want to be on the outside. If the inside doesn’t align, you’re lost. Like basically lost. I think I experienced that as well because you are in a very competitive surrounding at a very early age. You’re traveling, and you’re alone most of the time. Teams are changing.

So working on who you are and how you’re creating yourself is something that I experienced at a very early age and that I love to work on with my clients because I know what a massive impact it can have on how you perceive yourself and how others perceive you because you made a decision, right?

Lindsay: So good. But as you’re saying that, my thought is, oh, no wonder you’re so attracted to the work that I’m doing and that you decided to join the mastermind. Because that very much aligns with what I do for coaches, right?

Like settling into who you are as a coach, how to just show up as you. Not thinking I have to be someone else. Because for every message that I get that’s like, “Hey, you talk too slow, I don’t like it,” which is just a few, by the way, not a ton. There are people like you that are like, “I love your voice. I fall asleep to your podcast.”

And if I were to choose, okay, well, which one of those people do I want to enjoy my content, and do I want to make happy, right? It’s the one that just aligns with this is just who I am naturally.

Nina: Yeah, absolutely. And I really have a deep interest in people. I always have. My father was a psychologist. And I think he opened up my interest in having different perspectives on things and that what makes sense for one person may be completely illogical to another.

And to have these different kinds of aspects and points of view in life, how you perceive things is something that fascinates me up to this point. And actually, that we can make a choice, that we have a chance to make a choice of who we are being, that is amazing. And if we can use that for us and for our businesses, like if we can embrace our brilliance, I always say unleash the it factor.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: Unleash your it factor or embrace your brilliance. And I think that is something that I learned over traveling so much and being with different kinds of people all of the time, basically. I spent, I don’t know, hours at airports, and I often sat there and I just looked around and looked at people, how they moved their bodies, how they were talking, how they were looking. The energy they were having around them.

I always thought, okay, what is their life looking like? And many, many times, I was talking to complete strangers and having deep conversations. I never ran out of questions, and most probably to find my own identity, right? I was on my own journey to know who I was at that point.

So having these conversations, and really hard to have conversations, people open up. If you’re really interested in listening, most people open up like up to a profound level. And, I mean, we all experience that as coaches, that most of the time, we don’t need to do all the magic. It’s really just deeply, actively listening and reflecting back. People want to be heard and seen for who they are. And if you help them understand who they are, and who they want to be, that’s deep shit.

Lindsay: I have chills listening to you. I feel like this is just your Ted talk. Just keep going. But I completely agree. And I didn’t realize how much we have in common, which is funny. I also am obsessed with, first of all, just knowing everything about other people.

I tell my husband all the time, and he thinks it’s so funny because he often is more opposite. I tell him all the time I’m just so lucky. I get to be a coach, and I get to travel with my job, and, you know, we travel personally. Not a ton. He doesn’t like to travel as much as I do. So it’s good that I travel as a coach.

I love to travel by myself because I do exactly what you just said. I love just watching people. And sometimes talking to them, maybe interacting with them. That’s fine. I’m not opposed to that. But I really am just so intrigued by other humans and just the way they act. Especially when they think no one is really paying attention or, you know, they’re just really being themselves, right?

I think maybe that’s what it is, is like, oh, this is just a moment of that person over there just being not in their head thinking about who’s watching me, even though I am being creepy and watching them. But yeah, I don’t know, there’s just something about they’re humans. I want to know everything.

Nina: Yeah. I always say, of course, we need to listen to what they say, but also try to listen to what they don’t say.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: That makes all the difference. Yeah, I think that is a big part of my work. I always say when you’re really dialed into your own being if you really understand your brilliance, if you own your brilliance, and if you act from that, everything else will be so much more easy. You will be more aligned in your marketing. Marketing is something that looks different for everyone. What might feel good for me might feel way out of line for someone else.

And also how you coach. Like I always say I help my clients to create the business they want. There is no right or wrong.

Lindsay: Not the one you want them to have.

Nina: Yeah, of course. And while I was building my online business, I founded together with my husband a sustainable online brand for yoga because we’ve been working with the yoga business for quite some time. And we had, of course, we have consultants. But what I learned from that is a consultant can only give you advice up to a certain point out of his experience frame.

But it’s your business, your decision, and you have to make the decision that aligns with your values, who you are, how you want to work, and how you want your business to run. No one can really tell you how to make it right.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: You have to decide for yourself. You have to have your own back.

Lindsay: I did an interview with someone. Actually, yesterday I recorded an interview with someone else, which it’ll actually probably come out after this one does. But one of the things she told me, she’s a past one-on-one client that I worked with a couple of years ago, and we’ve stayed in touch.

And one thing that she said is that she remembers, word for word, that one day I said to her, and I wasn’t even coaching her specifically on her business, but this was something that came up. I was like, listen, I will send you a list if you want. I will just write it out exactly what I did from start to finish today of what I’ve done. How I built this business exactly as best that my memory serves me, right? I can do that, but it’s just not going to work for you, right? And that’s how she repeated it.

And I said, well, I don’t know if that’s exactly how I said. I probably said it’s not going to work the same way that it did for me, but it might work for you. But I think that that’s so much of what you’re saying, right, is just like, yes, the actions are important. You have to take action to create results. And those actions might look so different for everyone else, right, for each different other person.

Nina: Yeah. And to allow yourself to enjoy your business and really create from what feels right for you. I think that is when you really unleash the power you want to bring into your business. And I’m very much for it. I want my clients to make money.

Lindsay: Yeah.

Nina: Of course, I want them to be successful. But whatever means making money or being successful for them is what I want for them. Nothing else. Not my blueprint or not my way of thinking. If they’re really dialed in and tuned into the best version they’ve created for themselves, I think that is the biggest success.

Lindsay: I get so excited, I shared this with you before we started, but I get really excited when business coaches, you know, anyone in that realm of business type coaching, come into Coaching Masters because I just know, like first, I already know, okay, they have a business frame that they’re using, that they’re using to grow their business.

And I just know that the results of business coaches that come in that are like, I really want to spend this time working on myself, working on my coaching, it’s so fun to just watch their results kind of blow up and how when they focus their attention on this thing, on the coaching skills versus how do I just make more money, which is ultimately kind of what they’re teaching their clients, right?

But when they focus on the skill, and when I know that they’re telling me just by joining like this is important to me, it just makes me really excited for just really, the industry in general because I think that it is such an important piece of coaching, especially for business coaches.

Nina: Yeah, I was really surprised because we were chatting before like you said. And when you said to me, hey, I never have business coaches come into my program, I was like, what? I hadn’t even realized. If I now look at our group, yeah, it makes sense.

But for me, you are doing business coaching in a way, but it comes from another angle. And it’s a badass angle. It’s like you’re coming right out of the back with so much intention. Like for me, the way you were setting it up, I use many of your processes. I adapted them for the way I work, b1ut it gave me so much. Whenever I think of you, I think of calm confidence. This is always what comes up, and certainty.

And this is what I actually like to provide for my clients. And many of my clients, for example, they come, and they say, hey, this is how I perceive myself, and this is what I want to do. But how do I fill half a year, right? They start with six sessions, eight sessions, ten sessions. But for me, transformational coaching is a process that can last one or two years easily. Easily.

Half a year of coaching is just the door opener. If you really want a profound transformation, this goes for like years. You can work years with a coach, no problem. But, of course, when you work for a long period of time with a coach, what comes up, at least when I coach my clients, is they think they come for building their business. But then there’s something showing up that really blocks them off. Personally, on the soul line, I would say.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: And then there is goal line coaching and soul line coaching. And if you can’t align that, if you can’t leave all that out while you’re working with them for a long period, they can’t hustle to success. They need to follow internally as well.

And if you have the toolkit for that, if you know how you do that, if you know, of course, you get better over time, more experienced, and things might come easier. But what I learned through being in Coaching Masters is that being excellent in what you do can be a tiny tweak. It can be very calm. And the smallest twist in how you do something, like everything changes. For me, I was really surprised when you said you don’t have business coaches.

Lindsay: I do every once in a while. But it’s just I’m always surprised that there aren’t – I’ll have like one or two per round, usually. And that’s even just using the term broadly, right? Like some of them might not even call themselves like I’m strictly a business coach. And yeah, they’re oftentimes some of my favorite clients to work with. Of course, they’re all my favorites. At this moment, as I’m talking about it, I’m like, oh, they’re my favorite. But it’s because of that, right?

It’s because I just personally get very excited, especially when I know that they’re then going out and doing this work, maybe with other coaches, maybe with other people building businesses. And I think that coaches, just entrepreneurs in general, we just have so much impact, right?

I think, especially in this moment in time, I think we have the opportunity to make such an impact on the world. And if I can just shape that message a little bit by helping the business coaches that are then going out and helping all the other people, it just feels really exciting to me.

Nina: Yeah, it is.

Lindsay: Okay, so let’s just dive into how you think about personal branding. How would you define that? How does it show up with your clients? Kind of what are you working on them with?

Nina: So what I love to do is, I love to connect the dots. Most people, they don’t really own their brilliance. They don’t own what they’re really good at. They aren’t aware of their zone of genius. And, first of all, I like to work with them in a session I call about you. It’s a session where I help them to connect the dots of what they bring to the table, what makes them truly unique in a way that they can see it.

I always say we are too close to ourselves. And we all have very unique experiences that we perceive or experience in a certain way that makes us who we are at this point. So we’re diving into that, and we are connecting it with their talents. We’re looking at their light and their shadow sides and how they can use whatever we find there to create a message that is super unique.

That is one part. So I would say that goes into deep transformational coaching. Most of the time, this is a session where people cry a lot because they realize that they haven’t really seen themselves and valued themselves for who they are all of the time. That is always very, very touching.

This was one of the sessions I created pretty much in the beginning when I started coaching, and I met complete strangers. Like, I’ve never met these people before, and I’ve sent the questions up front, and then we did this session, and I sometimes even cried because it was so, so touching when they were opening up the way they did. And this is part of the container I’m working with my clients with at this point. And it’s something that opens them up to who they are and how they perceive themselves.

I love to work on values. And I always say that, as I said in the beginning, the outside, of course, isn’t everything. But it’s part of how we perceive ourselves, how we treat ourselves. With what are we surrounding ourselves? How do we take care of ourselves? So it’s really like a 360-degree look around of how they live, how they act, how they perceive themselves.

And after taking them through this specific way of working, they have quite a good connection to how they perceive themselves and probably how they are perceived. And then they make decisions. So I’m a big fan of decision-making because while you’re building a business, you have to make a lot of decisions.

Lindsay: So many.

Nina: Yeah. And especially if you have never done that before, if you maybe have never been the first lady, the front lady of your business, making all these kinds of decisions. Like, of course, I work on brand colors and maybe on tones and stuff like that. I help them with copy. And we’re working on the copy and making it really sharp on who they are being. There is a lot of marketing context in my program. I teach them tools.

But first of all, we hone into who they are, and that makes it so much easier for them to make decisions from that. I always say like, personal branding is so much more than fonts and colors. It’s what you bring to the table. It’s your love letter to the world. It’s your energy, your unique energy. And everyone is a personal brand. Most of us aren’t just using it on purpose.

There’s one sentence I love a lot from Dolly Parton. And she says, decide who you are, and do it on purpose. So I always tell my clients that marketing is rooted in trust. People need to trust who you are. They need to hear your message on repeat. You have to be yourself on repeat. So that others can trust you, you need to trust yourself first of all, in something that you maybe have never done before.

And yeah, so my coaching is deep transformational coaching, for sure, because I really like to dive deep with my clients. And out of that, they always tell me, or many of my clients tell me, wow, when we started and where we are now, I’m not the same person anymore. And probably they are, but they’re just handling themselves and their thoughts in a completely different way. And that fuels them to take action.

Lindsay: Yes. This is so amazing. I just had a realization as you were talking, as you were saying that. So you joined us virtually for Coaching Masters live from Spain. You weren’t able to come to Chicago, so you were virtual. So I’m not sure how much of this you saw because I know you saw a lot of it. But I know some of it also happened kind of behind the scenes or after hours.

And I walked away from that, just a little surprised by how much crying there was. Not in a bad way at all. I was very moved by it. And I spent a little bit of time thinking about it, and I had come to a conclusion, but I think I’ve really settled into a deeper conclusion now, which is so much of the work that I do is so similar to what you were just saying, where I’m helping people see the genius that is top of mind, right? That is right there. That they already have, that they don’t have to go learn 20 more things.

And just teaching someone that even though it’s on repeat in your head all the time, it doesn’t sound genius because it just sounds normal. It’s just you. It’s just your voice. You’re just saying it all the time to yourself. But other people don’t know it and aren’t hearing it the same way you are. And I think that the crying that I was a little surprised by, and I want to be clear, crying in the best way. This is not putting anyone down. There was a lot of transformation, a big transformation happening.

And I think so much of it came from them seeing that for the first time, maybe in themselves, right? Like really believing me when I say, no, that right there, that thing you just said, that simple process that you just talked about, like that is the genius. That’s the thing that people want.

I think it’s such a relief, right? When you’re the one experiencing that, of I don’t have to go be someone else. I don’t have to go learn 50 more methods on how to help my clients or how to create transformation.

Nina: Absolutely. The one sentence that I will forever remember thinking of you is you were saying that, and for you, for sure, it was just a sentence, and for me, my world changed. It was, teach from your knowing. So simple and so deep. For me, it was like I listened to that, and I was like, the word you just said relief. I think working with you gave me so much relief in the best way possible.

Not trying harder. Not wanting more in a way that it’s not enough, you know, staying in the not-enoughness. And that landed deeply. And I know like the kind of tears you’re saying. It’s relief tears. It’s when dots connect when you finally understand something that was up in the air, and you just couldn’t somehow connect it.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: It’s transformational tears almost, I would say.

Lindsay: Yeah. I think sometimes it feels like that. I assume you know this saying. But when you say, like, something’s just on the tip of my tongue. And you can’t connect the dots. You can’t find it, right? And it’s a physical experience of, like, I can feel it. It is right there. And if I could just remember the word, or the phrase, or the whatever, like, why can’t I think of it? And it’s like that, but on the next level, right? That moment that you’re like, oh yeah, the word, here it is.

That’s such a small example, but on just a much larger scale of more of like in the world, right? Like I know who I am in the world, moving around in the world. And there’s just something that’s a little off, and I just can’t. Like it’s on the tip of my tongue if I can just find it.

Nina: Yeah.

Lindsay: And I think that that’s the experience a lot of people were having.

Nina: Yeah, absolutely. It’s really like once you understand your genius, and genius, for example, when I work with German clients, if I use the word genius, they’re like, oh, I have a problem with that word, right? Me, I really think we all have our zone of genius. And if you own that, it makes a big difference. Not only to you but to all the people who interact with you, everyone, right? Because you are acting out of your power zone, I would even say.

And I think it was you, I’m pretty sure it was you when you were saying, and that is also something I remember, and that was so good. You were saying whenever you think it’s too easy, too basic, it comes because you share out of your zone of genius. For you, it is so integrated that you don’t even realize it. You think everyone heard it 100 times, but actually, they didn’t, right?

Lindsay: Even if you said it 100 times, they probably only paid attention once or twice, maybe.

Nina: Yes. Yes. So, knowing that helps you so much in creating marketing content. Whenever you think it’s too basic or too like, everyone knows that. If this happens to me, I’m like, okay, okay, slow down. What is the goodness in here? What is the part that I can only share the way I share it?

And that is also something that has to do with personal branding. What makes you – And I don’t really like to use the word stand out because it sounds so loud. But what makes you unique for your best-fit customers? Because there are so many coaches, and there are so many coaches doing the same thing.

But only you can say a certain thing the way you do it, with the energy you have. If you own that, that is your magic sauce. That is something that no one else can do the way you do it.

Lindsay: I just hope that everyone that’s listening is just really letting this, like having a moment, letting this sink in listening to you say that because that is such powerful work. And I think sometimes people want to skip it, right? Like yeah, yeah, yeah, but I already know who I am. That’s fine. Okay, whatever. Let’s move on to the next thing. And to me, it’s like this is the work.

It is the work that changes everything about the way you coach, the way you feel about your coaching, and the way you build a business and feel kind of settled in it instead of always chasing the next thing. And I just want everyone to take a moment and just let that sink in. No matter who you are, what you do, or where you are in your coaching journey, this is important work. So thank you for sharing.

Nina: You’re very welcome.

Lindsay: When you said that sometimes your clients, especially in Germany, your German clients don’t love the word genius, this is something I noticed a while ago, too, is that I had to stop, not 100% stop, but that I had to find a different word besides Expert.

Because when I would say like, well, what are you already an expert at? Like, what do you already know? What do you already teach your clients that you’re an expert at? People would immediately be like, “Expert? I wouldn’t say I’m an expert at anything.” And I’m like, oh, that’s so interesting.

I think it’s the same type of thing people just have that reaction of, like, no, I’m not. I don’t know what you mean. And I think just being conscious of that sometimes just seeing, oh, my clients don’t, I know what I’m saying, but my clients do not respond well to this word. So I’m just going to use something else.

Nina: Yeah. And also, I think, especially, maybe it’s also a little bit at what level your clients are. When they find themselves at a certain point, probably the word expert or genius comes very naturally. But especially when you’re starting out, and what I experienced is maybe it’s a thing that women do, or maybe it’s like discounting is something that I experienced a lot in my female clients.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: It’s almost like it’s a plus, or it’s decent to really not own something you’re really good at or standing out. One of the things that, for my clients, for example, is quite demanding in the beginning, is putting themselves out there, like in the front end of their business. I always say you are your golden goose.

You have to take care of yourself. You can’t only hustle, hustle, hustle, and try to action yourself to the result. That doesn’t work.

And especially if you’re doing so many new things, you have the marketing part. You have the coaching part. You have to manage your own mind. And then you have to go out there, show yourself, right? And that is challenging in the beginning for many of them. They’ve never done that or not in that extensive way. They think or want to do it now that they are a personal brand.

I really believe everyone has a personal brand, especially if you’re working with clients. I had an art consult as one of my clients. And she is a genius like she has so much knowledge about art. And what she’s doing is she is helping people to pick the right art, to hang it in the right place in the house, and to help them buy a certain type of art.

Lindsay: I need this in my life.

Nina: Yes, she’s amazing. And well, she’s in Europe, but anyway. And what she does is she does a whole concept for people who maybe are interested in art or don’t know about art. And she always said to me, yeah, maybe I don’t sell enough. I’m always so neutral. And I’m not the bubbly girl, and maybe I need to be more salesy. And I said you know what, because I had been working with her, and the one thing that stood out about her is her deep knowledge.

She’s so confident in what she’s doing. She has such a big knowledge about what she’s selling, the artist, and all the history of this scene. People come to her for that. And she started to let an assistant handle her clients, and we worked through that. And after working with me, she understood it was about her. People want to come to her. They buy because of her, her energy.

What she thought was too little is really a calm, very present way of talking about things. That was her sales technique. That was her magic, and she didn’t see it.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: And after working together, she understood where she needs to spend time and where she can put an assistant, right? And that was something that was so obvious to me after having worked with her. And it was such, for me, knowing that she understands she’s the golden goose. She needs to nurture herself to be able to nurture a business with her clients. That’s the magic trick.

And that can mean working less to fuel herself, to then really give her best where she can give her best, where she has the biggest impact in her business.

Lindsay: Yes, this is so important. This is something I’ve been working on for the last probably year, just personally. Especially since I have someone who works for me now full-time and she’s so amazing because she will literally say to me sometimes like, you’re not doing that. No, that work is not for you, right? Like she will just take things away from me.

And she has really helped me learn. Between her and coaching and knowing myself, it is really interesting seeing how I do feel like I’m working less. I don’t know that I’m really working so many less hours. I’m certainly not overworking, right? But I don’t know that I’m working way less hours.

I’m just mostly doing things that I enjoy doing, which is very different than doing things that I think I should be doing in my business. Not that I’m not doing any of those things. Sometimes I am. But I’ve really tried to, like, oh, these are tasks that I can take off of my plate. And these are all the things I want to keep on.

So I think that that’s really like your genius showing, right, of like that’s what you helped her see. Because I think it’s such a powerful thing for coaches, for really any entrepreneurs who, you know, being an entrepreneur is such a unique thing where you’re kind of taking on so many jobs at once. And you’re just not going to be the best at all of them. Like you just can’t be. It’s impossible.

Nina: No, and realizing that and really making decisions, like conscious decisions and where you want to step in and where you can delegate. And I’m a big fan of if you’re building your business, I say, of course, you can give everything out. You can hire a VA or PA or whatever if you have the financial possibility. But if you first understand every part of your business, like how it works and how you can create everything yourself up to a certain point, of course.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: This is a superpower because you really understand your business.

Lindsay: I do think, and I’m curious what your thoughts are about this, as I have grown my business, and this is something I have talked about the kind of with my coach in my business mastermind, is there is a shift that happens at some point, right? It’s like in the beginning, at least for me, I know I was very scrappy. I was very like, I can do it all myself, I can learn it all, and I can figure it out. And I think that was a huge asset that I had when I was starting my business.

But then you hit a point where you really can’t. It takes away from your genius, from the things that you’re great at because you’re not spending the time on that because you’re kind of doing all these other things over here that maybe you could be delegating.

So for me, that has been, you know, I think some people have to do that learning in the beginning of, okay, I guess I’ll figure it out. I guess that I’ll learn how to do all the things. And for me, that wasn’t as much learning because I was very willing to just get dirty and get in there and do everything.

So for me, the more uncomfortable thing has been the opposite. Like really learning, no, these things are coming off my plate. Either they’re not getting done, or someone else is going to do them, or we’re going to figure out a different solution. And just like really learning that piece has been growth for me.

Nina: Yeah, I think it’s crucial at a certain point. And I think if I say it’s a superpower, I really mean in the beginning stages.

Lindsay: And it is. I fully agree with that.

Nina: Yeah, right? If you know what’s behind every door of your business, that’s what I learned while I was creating my online business. And I mean, I was involved in design and the creative process. And while we were growing, it got more and more into a tech company, like what back-end are you using? What obligations do you have in marketing? In a way, there were regulations from the European Union and stuff like that.

And you have to know so many different aspects that, at one point, you have to decide which road to take. And you have to make decisions, and you can’t do it all on your own. It’s impossible. And that is the same if you have a growing online business or a growing coaching business. At a certain point, you have to make decisions not to do it all.

I do agree. It’s challenging. Especially if you are really, as you say, you get dirty. You’re doing it all. And I’m the same. I really love to work, but there’s a point of no return where you have to help. Elsewise, you’re drowning. It doesn’t work.

Lindsay: Yeah. And let’s be clear. I said that like it was such a great thing about me that I like to get dirty. I can get in there and do the thing. And it is good. But also, there’s a piece of it that I just like to be in control of everything. Which is a little different, right? There’s a piece of me still today that’s like, oh, no, no, I’ve got that. I’ll do it, right? And thank goodness for Aqeelah, who is incredible, who knows me well enough at this point to kind of push back on me and say like, no, no, you’re not doing that.

Nina: Yeah, amazing. I mean, if you have somebody like that who’s really taking care of you in a good way, amazing.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: Who wouldn’t want that?

Lindsay: Yeah, she is very honest with me. And that’s definitely her superpower. She will say no, no, no, we’re going to find someone else to do this, or she does it, right? Sometimes it is her zone of genius, and it’s a little bit like, why would you do that when I can finish it in 10 minutes or whatever?

So, okay, is there anything else about what you do that we haven’t covered that you were wanting to share?

Nina: Maybe what we can talk about is copy. I’m a big fan of copywriting, and that you really understand how you can integrate what you have found out about yourself, about your personal brand, about your values, and how you can create copy through that.

For example, there are so many coaches out there that are following a certain plan or a certain playbook. And sometimes I think that is a bit sad because if you really connect to who you are, it’s a beautiful possibility to show that whenever you’re writing copy or whenever you’re showing yourself. And this is something that I like to work on with my clients as well.

And I even think becoming a coach, you’re also becoming a writer, in a way, an author. And that is something that surprised me a lot when I started off. And I think one of the things I like to inspire my clients with is that they start writing right away. If possible, every morning. That will help them to find their own words. That will help them to really feel confident about telling things the way they understand them, or they want to express them.

That is an art to express yourself because we, as coaches, work with words, right? And we work with words while we are coaching, but also while we are selling, while we are marketing, and while we are talking to our best-fit clients. Marketing is nothing else than an ongoing conversation with our best-fit clients.

And if you are able to train that for yourself first thing in the morning, five minutes. If you are used to tuning into how you want to talk about your business, about tools, or the way you work, this will enable you, and it makes things so much easier. And it makes you unique as well.

So this is something I would highly, highly suggest to everyone starting out. And basically, I think you probably also do that. I imagine content creation is a big, big, big topic for all of us.

Lindsay: Yeah, I love this. I’m like. I should be taking notes as you are talking. I think that this has been something that I have spent a lot of time working on since I decided to be a coach. I think it is something that I realized in the beginning, honestly, that I’ve had to work through a lot of thoughts about because, just like you said, when you become a coach, you kind of become an author.

You really are practicing putting into writing what it is that you do, what it is that you believe, and all of that. And I think when I saw that, I was like, oh no, I hate this part. And I spent some time in resistance about it and just kind of thinking, oh, no, I can, like, logic my way out of this. I’m going to avoid it a little bit. If I just talk about the results and just sell that way.

And what I now, of course, know over the years, I still wouldn’t consider myself an expert at it. And I mostly say that because I don’t love it, maybe. I don’t know if you have to love something to be an expert at it, but I definitely like it more than I used to. And I think the biggest thing for me is exactly what you said, like actually doing the opposite of what I was doing in the beginning, which is learning how to just talk like I normally would, right?

Just talk to the people who are paying attention and not think about how do I write this one thing to create this one result. Which is, I think, we’re so many people get stuck, like write this one thing to sell this thing, right? To like create money by writing this one post or this one, whatever.

What would you say to coaches who are listening who are like, okay, but how do you get out of that? Because I know so many coaches that just kind of get stuck in that like, but I posted about it, right? I wrote a post, I wrote my sales page, and like no one’s clicking. And they very much link this one thing to the one result that they’re looking for. And coaches still will say this to me; obviously, this isn’t something I’m coaching on a lot.

But every once in a while, it’ll come up where they’ll say, well, but I did that. I already wrote a post about that, right? And it’s like they’re kind of linking I shouldn’t have to do it again. I said that already. I wrote one thing. I wrote one post. Or I made an offer, right? I put an offer on social media or wherever they’re putting it, and they don’t understand why that thing isn’t creating the people just flooding in, like creating the results that they want in their business.

Nina: First of all, I think there are two components. The one is like a practical part, like really looking at the thing. And the other part is what I always say is only because you’re putting something out there, people won’t buy, because what is missing? Trust, right?

If people don’t trust you enough to be able to solve their pain points and their problems, and if they don’t understand the solution you’re offering, they won’t buy. And they also won’t buy if they don’t trust themselves. So they have to trust themselves, they have to trust you, and they have to trust the result or offer you’re selling.

So many, many times, trust is produced through repetition but also through nonverbal communication. Who you are being while you’re not selling, right? For example, what comes easy? When are you in the flow? When are you truly yourself? When are you talking about things that really come easy to you and where you are not having the intention to sell?

If there’s something that is really related, for example, I’m coaching a client right now. She’s building her business. She has created quite a lot of success in the beginning. What she’s doing is quite unique. At this point, we are working on how she can eliminate this emotional block.

She sometimes is tapping into talking about what she’s doing without feeling salesy. I don’t even know if salesy is a word, but let’s use salesy. We were focusing on her core message and what she is. Really, in this case, it’s confidence. She is an energetic healing coach, focusing on healing her clients through tapping into the confidence that they have lost along the way through traumas, whatever.

So we have created a process for her, how she can talk about her main topic, confidence, in many, many different ways that aren’t exactly related to her selling her program. But how she can talk about in the most, maybe profound, and most simple way connected to her everyday life. For example, I think posting on stories can be more playful. It can be more unrelated to whatever you’re doing but still show who you are.

And that is what she tapped into. That gives her the confidence to trust her own creation, that she’s always able to create something that is valuable for her audience. And the post she’s creating is more like, I say, your Instagram feed is more like the name card of your business. It’s there. It doesn’t get eliminated after 24 hours, even if you put it in the highlight. It is more there for being more intentional.

But being playful and creating a habit of creating content that feels aligned with who you are can be a very nice and flowing process to do it that way. Just because you put something out there once doesn’t mean somebody sees it, will engage or will feel compelled to buy. You have to tune up the dial, I would say. And that is something that is related to mindset. Because if you think, if I put this out again, people will be repelled. They don’t want to hear about me. It’s a thought.

Lindsay: This is true.

Nina: Why would you think about what you are doing that way?

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: And this is where mindset comes into place. Mindset is a huge part of building a successful business. Was that related to what you’ve been asking me, or was it a bit off-topic?

Lindsay: No, that was perfect. Yes, that was exactly what I was asking you. And I think that was my fault, by the way. I couldn’t think of how to really formulate that question. But I think what you just said is a great answer for it.

I just had a memory of, you know, when you just said, like, very specifically, like in stories, you can show more of who you are, you can be more playful. The funny thing about that is I’m pretty sure our first interaction, the first time you messaged me or interacted with me at all, had nothing to do with coaching. And I think it was when I was posting videos or pictures of my daughter riding a horse, which is something very relatable for you.

Nina: Exactly, right? People want to relate with you. And even if it’s you wearing glasses that they’ve never seen before and didn’t know you needed them. Or if they see you’re not always 100% perfect, and you’re late to school, or I don’t know, if you probably are always very put together, you may be all over the place. Maybe you show that your kitchen is a complete mess.

People want to know who you are as a human being. They want to be able to connect with you. They don’t want this picture-perfect image of you being unrelatable. People need to relate. And, of course, they want to know you’re offering the solution, right? They want to know you can take them on the journey and help them to get where they want to be.

But I always say picking a coach is something super energetical. For example, if I think about how I found you like I found you through the podcast. I binged your podcast. Then I went into Coach Lab. I really liked it. And then there was this coach through Coaching Masters offer coming up. And I wasn’t even looking for a mastermind. And I remember writing you, and actually, you were answering on Instagram, yourself.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: And we were having a conversation. And I think if I now think of it, your magic for me is that how you say things, the way you say things really lands. We had a very, very short conversation, and I signed up. I just knew. It was a deep alignment for what I needed at that point, and I knew. And that’s it. And seeing how I decided on making that investment shows me how my clients are going to make it.

Lindsay: Yes.

Nina: So knowing that once you’re aligning with someone, I didn’t even look at your sales page. I wasn’t interested in that anymore at that point. I just made the decision because for what I have seen, for what I have experienced, for the personal interaction we were having, it just felt 100% right. I made the decision from that. That was my most important sales point, I would say.

And you didn’t even intend to do that, right? That’s it? And I think that is how many, many, many clients decide on picking their coach because they come to you. It’s not you coming to them, right?

Lindsay: Yes, that’s so good. I love it. Well, thank you so much for sharing all of this goodness. You have just so much to offer, and I’m so glad that you decided you would be here today and do this interview with me. And I’m sure that everybody has so much to take away from this.

What do you think, so when this episode comes out, we will be either about to start or right in the middle of a Coaching Masters launch. What would you say for someone who is trying to make the decision? Should they do it? Should they not do it? What would your advice be?

Nina: Do it. Well, okay, that was a very short version of my answer. If you’re interested in a space where you can be yourself, where you can come as you are where you are, and where you are taken through in a very calm, confident way, through different kinds of processes that you are working on yourself that you can then adapt in your own coaching experience that you’re offering for your clients.

I was always looking forward to our sessions. And I was fully booked at that point. Do you remember, I said, oh my gosh, you know, it’s I’m like really – I hardly missed any session because it really, it dialed me down and tuned me in. And what I took out of it will definitely impact the way I work and the processes I have set up for myself. And it’s like you are like 100% who you are like. You’ll never change. It’s like just who you are.

And for me, at this point, this was just the energy I wanted in my life. Not this loud like super, super sales driven. No, I didn’t want to look into funnels and ads and stuff like that. I really wanted to become a better coach and use that to market my business. And that is absolutely what I got.

Lindsay: I love it.

Nina: So yes, hell yes, go for it.

Lindsay: Hell, yes. All right. Okay, and what if they’re listening and they’re like, no, I want to know more about what Nina does. Where will they find you? And how do you work with your clients? Where can they find you? Where’s your favorite spot to hang out to chat with people? Tell them all the things.

Nina: Yeah, I’m more than happy. So I love Instagram, so my account is lafeliz.coaching, you can find me there. And I’m working one-on-one but also in groups. And I really love working in groups because there’s so much growth. And I’m starting a group program in February, and that is going to be in English. And there’s going to be another group program starting in January, and that is going to be in German.

So I have a few spots one-on-one. And I love working one on one, but I have to say the group experience – And that is also something I experienced through working with you and that we have been working on, is something that, really, I love that. So yeah, that’s how you can find me.

Lindsay: Perfect. All right, well, thank you so much for being here today. We will link all of that in the show notes so that they can go there, click it, find you. They should definitely follow you on Instagram. Your Instagram is beautiful and fun, and everyone should come see it. So thank you so much for being here today. And I will see you on our next call.

Nina: Thank you so much, Lindsay, for having me.

Lindsay: You’re welcome.

Nina: It was a pleasure.

Lindsay: Bye.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Mastering Coaching Skills. If you want to learn more about my work, come visit me at lindsaydotzlafcoaching.com. That’s Lindsay with an A, D-O-T-Z-L-A-F.com. See you next week.