What Do You Value?

How to get your money's worth from your online coaching experience.

I didn’t join Instagram until September 2022. I wanted to set up an online gallery to post the boudoir photographs I had been taking of myself the first year after my husband died from cancer. Before he died I was not a photographer or a lingerie model, but that’s another story.

Shortly after I opened by account I started seeing grief coaches in my feed. I had the word “widow” in my bio, so I guess the algorithm figured I could use a virtual shoulder to cry on. Within a few days I was seeing the accounts of grief coaches who specialized in widows and that’s when my ears perked up.

Over the next 18 months, I would “invest” tens of thousands of dollars on my own personal healing, growth, manifesting, writing and publishing journeys. Most of these programs were exactly what I needed, a few were just okay, and a couple I just didn’t like. Knowing what I know now, I look back and consider myself lucky.

I’m not saying that most of the online coaching programs out there today are good, a few are okay and a small percentage suck. They could all have well thought out courses, taught by highly skilled coaches, but if what they’re selling isn’t what you’re looking for, you’re not going to have a good experience.

If you don’t want to waste your money like I did, invest your time answering a few questions BEFORE you invest your money in a coach:

1. What are your core values? Do a Google search for “a list of core values” and see what comes up. Alternately, you can download Brené Brown’s list HERE.

   1. Choose 10 values, and then whittle down those down to 2 or 3. Before you hire a coach, check to see if their values align with yours. If they are wildly off, you may want to reconsider giving them a large chunk of your money. It doesn’t mean they are “bad” coaches, it just means you may not feel like you got your money’s worth if they are teaching skills you don’t value.

2. What are your goals after going through this coaching class or program? This will vary depending on the topic, and some goals are easier to quantify than others. After taking a business class you may want to increase your company’s revenue by 10 % in the next month, and double it over the next two years.

   I’ve found it useful to have at least one short term goal where you can expect to see results over the next few months. Ask the coach if your goals are realistic, and if their curriculum covers step-by-step instructions on how to meet them. Or, is their process more intuitive?

3. Assess how you like to learn. If you Google “learning styles” you’ll get a list of the different types, but you can also just ask yourself a few questions:

   1. Are you a visual learner? Do you like a lot of slides and graphics?

   2. Are you self directed, or do you need a roadmap and a timeline to follow?

   3. Do you prefer live instruction, or do you feel a video recording is just as good?

   4. Do you like small group instruction with more individualized attention, or are you okay in a big group where instruction is more like a lecture?

   5. How often and for how long do you like meeting with a coach? Once per week? Every other week? For an hour? Ninety minutes?

4. How much time and money can you really afford? What will give you the most bang for your hard earned buck?

I generally get the most value from meeting with a coach for ninety minutes once a week within a small group. I tend to prefer longer courses, spread out over 12 or 16 weeks.

That said, one of the best experiences I’ve had was a course that met every other week, while I found little to no value in another course that met live every week.

The content itself and the group size made a huge difference in both of those courses. I absolutely love my small group writing course that meets every other week, while I didn’t like a large, lecture style manifesting course with a two hour live call every week.

I would also encourage you to think about the concept of value. I know that I often took it for granted that the value of a course was the price set by the person leading it. That works for the coach, who has the difficult task of setting their fees based on the content they are sharing, and not what the consumer is willing to pay. It’s not just the cost that sets the value, for you and the coach.

The writing and manifesting courses I took are a great example. I paid a lot more for the manifesting course, but felt I got a lot less value than from my less expensive writing course.

Looking back I can see I valued a writing course that gave me concrete techniques and prompts to actually start writing over the ephemeral nature of a manifesting course which talked about attuning to vibrations and getting downloads from the Universe.

I’ll be honest, most of these lessons were hard learned. I don’t think I could have understood so much about myself, what I value and how I learn without getting out there and enrolling in a few coaching experiences.

Still, I think I could have avoided a few missteps and saved a few thousand dollars had I asked myself some of the questions listed above. I hope you found some value in this article even though it isn’t behind a paywall.