New Client Onboarding Process
So you onboarded your new client and you're so excited. But now what?
I get this question often because so many coaches have the goods, but they wonder how to effectively package and deliver it. Today, I'm going to answer your question and talk about how you can create a comprehensive onboarding packaging kit so that you can effectively communicate with your client and offer those amazing goods that you know you have to share.
When onboarding a new client, the first thing you want to do is put yourself in your client's shoes.
What are some of the questions that you're going to have?
What are some of the things that are going to excite you?
What are some of the things that you'll be considering and wondering in the back of your mind?
When you put yourself in your client's shoes, you make sure that you can speak directly to them. We're going to dive through each part of the onboarding package that I give to my clients that help the process to be streamlined and, dare I even say, fun.
Cover Page
The first part of the onboarding package is the cover, and on the cover, I'll say my name or my business name, as well as the name of the offer they're joining. So if they're joining The Elevate Method, it'll say “Elevate Method with Dr. Nicolya Williams”. And that's just an example.
Table of Contents
The second page that I have inside the onboarding kit package is a table of contents. As clients go through the program, they have certain questions and want to go straight to that section, so having a layout is important.
I like to equate onboarding packages to ebooks. When people get ebooks, you want to make it comprehensive, you want to make it reader-friendly, and you want to make it be something that they know they can scroll through and get the answer that they need.
Welcome Page
After the cover and the table of contents, I have a welcome page where I welcome the client and I tell them why I'm so excited that they're there. I'll usually say something like, “It's one thing to talk about your dreams is something different to show up for them. And so I'm sending you a hug and a round of applause to honor this decision that you made.” Just something welcoming them and reminding them why this is an amazing next step.
Now you could have a general welcome section or you could have a personalized welcome section. One of the things that I do inside The Elevate Method, because my welcome packages are virtual, is I create a welcome video that's very personal and that just really helps people to feel connected right away.
Introduce Yourself and/or The Team
After the welcome section, I share a little bit about who I am and I'll also introduce the team. If you are a solopreneur. You can use this as an opportunity to just discuss who you are and introduce yourself so people get more insight about who you are behind the brand.
Vision and Mission Statement
This section might be one of my favorite parts of my onboarding kit. The reason that this is so powerful is that your vision serves as a compass guiding your business, right? Your mission shows what's important to you and why it is that you're doing what you're doing. When you showcase these different parts of your brand, you help to connect with people on a deeper level.
So let's say, for example, one of your top values is support (that's one of mine), so I will talk about how we showcase support inside this program as a top value of mine. What it does is it serves as a gentle reminder to my clients that they're extremely supported here. Sharing your mission and vision statement will ensure that the client feels aligned with your business before they dive in.
What To Expect in the Program
I use this page to outline the project or the process that I'm going to take them through. Whether it's one-on-one, whether it's my coaching certification program, or whether it's one of my group coaching programs, I'll make sure that I lay out what they can expect throughout our time together. This includes a time frame. Are we working together for twelve weeks? How many sessions do we have? What time of day? Where the calls be? For the programs that I have specific deadlines or expectations for, I'll put a layout on that same page, which includes like timelines and milestones. So it may say something like, unit one will be completed by this date. You got to complete unit one before moving into unit two, that sort of thing.
If at any point they need to understand or they forget something, they can reference this. So it serves as a guide for my client to know what to expect.
Coach-Client Expectations
I like to break this section into two parts. I have the client expectations and then the coach expectations.
For the coach expectations section, I lead by example. So I'll say things like, “I promise to show up to calls on time. I promise to cancel within 24 hours. If I need to cancel, I promise to keep your information confidential.” Integrity is a strong value of mine, and so I hold myself to a high standard.
I think it's important for me to showcase that to my clients, especially because I have expectations for them and that's why I like to lay mine out first and then move right into the client expectations.
Now, I don't know about you, if you've ever worked with clients before, but there are people that start with the most amazing intentions, but then life can get in the way. And so I've had clients in the past that will stop showing up for calls or not honor their payments, or I had a client who signed up, paid, and then went through the entire program not showing up at all and then wanted to go through the next live round. And that wasn't really fair because I hold space for each person that comes through. And that was only me coaching at the time.
And so that's when I realized it is so important to set that expectation early on for your clients to follow. So on this page, you'll want to explain what your expectations are when working with you. This may look like how long the calls are going to be and what time you expect them to show up, how soon they have for a cancellation, honoring other people's work. So like in my Book writing Boot Camp, because people will share titles or subtitles, I want to make sure that they honor confidentiality. And I always included in this page, in this section.
This is also a really good section to express boundaries. So you may say something like, you're free to email me, but I have a 24 hours, 48 hours turnaround time or Please do not email me something that you can bring to the coaching calls. You obviously want to word it in a way that they understand, but it's a great place and critical place to really set your expectations and the boundaries around the ways that clients should interact. I always like to think that this is their first time working with a coach, or if it's not their first time working with the coach, it's their first time working with you. And so you want to really be able to explain how you would like things to be streamlined and how you would like things to work.
Next Steps
So what happens after you've read through this welcome kit? What is the next thing you can expect? I may say something like, “Come join our online accountability and support group on Facebook” or “Send me an email when you're done with this”, or “Submit this Wheel of Life document so that I can see what area we're going to dive into next.” I'm setting that expectation that something to look forward to.
Sometimes people will use this section to incorporate the contract. It may say something like, “Submit your contract by this deadline” or “Be sure to sign your contract”. The choice is yours. For me, typically I'll send my contract separately, and once they sign the contract, then I'll send the onboarding kit. But again, you get to decide how you want that to look.
All in all, you can see that the onboarding kit and the process to working through it doesn't have to be complicated. You get to make it uniquely fit in with your business and your brand as well as your clients' needs.
One final suggestion that I would give you as you're making your onboarding kit and process is to remember that this is your client's first experience with taking that next step with you. And so you don't want it to be something that's just kind of thrown together or something that's just all willy-nilly. But you want to make sure that it's something that you've put your effort, energy and thoughts into. You want to make sure it's something that you've carefully considered and you want to make sure that as you're designing it, it really fits the impression that you want your client to have of your brand.
Now, before I go, there's a question that I often get about this is when should I send this? Should it be for one-on-one group coaching?
And I'll tell you, the choice is truly yours. I send onboarding kits for group coaching as well as one-on-one. And that to me, feels like a great way to really connect with my audience, help them to really know more about my business, help them to feel connected to my business, and also help them to understand what to expect. Decide what feels aligned for you.
So now that you have your client in the onboarding kit process understood and ready to go, if you are ready to elevate your coaching sessions, meaning take your client transformations to that next level, I have just the thing for you.
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