10 Principles to Deal with Scarcity Around Clients and Launches

If you’ve ever felt anxious before or during a launch about not hitting your numbers, or worried if a client doesn’t resign with you–this article is here to help.

Setting financial goals for our business and launches is a powerful motivator, but let’s face it: it can easily skew your perception of yourself when things don’t go as planned. Getting excited about enrolling 20 people and enrolling 10 instead can activate tons of self-judgement, blame, and self-criticism around not having done a good enough job. In a world that runs of achievement-based worthiness, “not doing well” has become a major issue in our society for why we feel anxious and stressed when we perceive ourselves as “failing.”

Stress and overwhelm are heavy enough, nevermind a hefty dose of “omg I fucking suck, why am I even doing this?!” to add to your plate.

 

Not only that, but it may activate feelings of rejection, abandonment, imposter syndrome, and even self-loathing that’s keeping you from expressing your fullest potential as a leader!

 

Since you’re a Conscious Leader– learning how to navigate these difficult conversations/situations is going to be key in decreasing stress and anxiety around things like client discussions, launches, refund conversations, and more.

 

This article covers my top 10 principles for transforming the way you think about client relationships, financial scarcity, and the entrepreneurial journey.

 

1. View Client and Audience Relationships As Mirrors For Your Personal Growth

 

Relationships are where we get to see ourselves in the reflection of another person; whether they reflect back to us how awesome we are, or they trigger the hell out of us–it’s a perfect opportunity to see who we are in others.

When it comes to clients and our social media audience; it’s no different. 

Journaling Prompt:

 

• What do I adore about my clients?
• Where do my clients frustrate me?
• What might this tell me about my relationship with myself?

 

2. View Your Triggers As Important Information For Your Healing

 

Scarcity occurs when we feel as though we don’t have enough resources or someone else is “taking” our resources. Resources being threatened is a deep, primal human fear and survival mechanism we’ve had since the beginning of time. As we’ve evolved, however, we now live in a world where we aren’t 100% reliant on others to provide us our resources; especially in Entrepreneurship where we learn new ways to make money every single day.

 

However–you may have grown up in a home where there was financial scarcity, or maybe you’ve lived paycheck to paycheck. It could also be that you’ve had anxiety-induced experiences around money, and your body activates the fight or flight response whenever a situation arises in which it perceives it’s “resources” to be “taken away.

Getting triggered when our clients want to leave and then hire another coach, or when another coach is launching the same thing at you at the same time provides you incredible information for what inner work you get to do.

Example: I used to run a 90-Day Group Coaching program for online entrepreneurs, and because I was scaling that product–we set goals to reach past a certain number of clients to ensure we profited from running the program. I had coaches and enrollment team members who were all receiving payment from the program. When other people were launching a 90-day group business coaching program at the same time I was, my own scarcity would kick in. It would send me into an anxiety spiral when I felt like all of the work I was doing–email writing, showing up with my content, and working my butt off for this program was potentially being threatened because leads were likely coach shopping and choosing between me, and others. 

If you’ve ever felt this way, you are NOT alone. The best way to move through this is to look at what the trigger is showing you, and what actions you can take because of it.

 

• Where can I create more safety for myself?
• How can I trust in the process?
• What ways can I enhance my marketing, branding, client results, or delivery to create an unforgettable experience for clients?
• How can I become even more strategic?
• What might this trigger be reminding me of from the past?

 

3. Set Clear Expectations From The Get-Go of All Client Relationships

 

Unclear Expectations Poison The Well Of Trust.

 

When clients make a commitment to investing in themselves, they’re opening themselves up to you as someone they’re entrusting with their vulnerable, painful experience. They may be sharing personal experiences with you that they expect you to hold and keep safe. This can create a bond between the coach and client that blurs the lines of “professionalism,” so we have to do our part in setting extremely clear expectations.

As service providers, if we aren’t setting explicitly clear expectations–we are setting ourselves up for surprises in the future. So instead of hoping everyone understands what you expect out of them and what they can expect out of you, take 30 minutes to clarify everything needed. Expectations like:

Billing:

When are they getting charged? (billing cycles, can add to cart check-outs and email confirmations)

How are they getting charged? (which service, credit card, automatically, etc.)

 

Communication:

How are you communicating?

How much time do you need in between responses?

Do you work on the weekends?

What can they do if you didn’t respond?

Who can they reach out to when they have a technical support issue?

 

Results:

What can they expect from the program or service?

Have other people like them received results?

What testimonials can you share?

I have found that people don’t mind boundaries as long as they are clear (relief!!!)

So set them, provide space for an “agreement” discussion, and move forward powerfully in your healthy masculine energy.

 

4.Manifest Dream Clients through the three-step formula: Intention + Healing + Action

 

You can’t bypass healing of what’s underneath; the unprocessed emotions, unresolved trauma and wounding, and the “low vibe” that only grow larger when ignored.

 

Everything under the surface is your ENERGY. It’s honest as fuck, and there’s nowhere to run from it if you want success.

So instead of doing only the first half (setting an intention, feeling into it, and surrendering to the when and the how)…. we also focus on true, deep healing.

We feel the “low vibe” emotions like fear, grief, shame, guilt, self-loathing…because if it feels unsafe to have $100k roll into your bank account, writing it down on your goals list isn’t going to help.

 

1. 1. Set the intention; get clear on what you do truly desire. If you don’t get it next week—you didn’t fail. It’s not a matter of “if” it’s a matter of “when” and “how” that usually doesn’t go anywhere near as planned.  Intention: direction and energy to the thing that you truly want. 

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2. Be honest with yourself; what unresolved emotions may I need to process? What hard conversations may I need to have with myself? How can I set clearer boundaries, or speak up for what I need, or look at my shadow I’ve been so comfortably ignoring?

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3. Take aligned action. What skills do you need to develop? What structures do you need to build? What work do you have to do?  What do I need to learn?

5. Surrender the “When” and the “How” When it Comes To Outcomes

 

When we get so attached to the outcomes of what we want to do and set for our goals, we feel like we NEED a certain thing to happen. For example: Wanting 20 people in our coaching program. Then we get on the phone and the client doesn’t want to join the program. They ghost or say they can’t afford it, or maybe they sign up with someone else instead. This may leave you feeling anxious, in financial security, and making anxiety-driven decisions to fix your problem.

As humans, it is challenging to be fully outcome detached, but we can practice. If our ego is negative and compares and judges, it’s trying to protect us and keep us safe. However, the Soul knows that there is a lesson in everything. It can trust that it doesn’t NEED to have this client. It knows that maybe this is a lesson to get better at sales or enhance a certain skill. The soul trusts, it is centered and knows things will be fine.

When: it’s not a matter of IF you’re going to achieve the desired outcome, it’s WHEN. Maybe you don’t sell out your first launch ever, but continue holding that intention and allow yourself to catch up to that vision through action.

How: the plans we need aren’t always the plans we make–so letting go of the exact marketing plan and numbers you so diligently map out for yourself is key; because it could feel like a total failure when things don’t go according to plan. The truth is: we can only plan so well inside of our own minds. Trust that that’s more magic available in the unknown.

 

6. Remember: Clients Pay For Results But Always Leave With Experiential Lessons

As service providers, it is our responsibility to show up and do the absolute best we can. We provide structure, accountability, and guidance to our clients to support them in creating the outcome they truly desire.

It’s very easy to feel as though we are 100% responsible for our clients’ results; they’re paying us, and if “we” don’t “get them” the results, it’s our fault, right?

Not necessarily.

As a coach or service provider, our responsibility is to be totally confident in what we offer and provide people. As coaches, it’s our job to support clients throughout their process of making changes and achieving outcomes. The more skilled we are, the more confident we can be about results. But truly, it’s a co-creative and collaborative effort between coach and client. The client is the hero of their own story, remember?

 

The lower the client is on the consciousness scale, the more they will believe paying for the service or product will fix them as a person–and the quicker they will be to blame their service provider for not giving it to them.

Similarly; the higher you are on this same scale will also reveal your own belief system around your level of responsibility to change or fix your clients. The truth is: Working with you is always going to provide a lesson, experience, a process, learning more of what they didn’t know–even if they struggled to achieve the outcome at the end. Perceived failures are lessons, and so is releasing over-responsibility for the client to get a specific outcome so we and feel good about ourselves.

 

7. Express The Parts Of Yourself You’ve Hidden To Attract Soulmate Clients

Authenticity attracts more than any marketing strategy ever will. The more we take ownership of what’s authentic to us (our personality, our quirks, our polarizing beliefs) and remove blocks we have to express the fullness of ourselves, we will attract the right people. This is the Magnetism of the Divine Feminine; which, when in her magnetic radiance, attracts the correct people to her. If you’ve ever felt fully on fire and expressed on social media and noticed how many more people reached out to work with you; it’s that.

If we put on a mask or persona, we end up falling into the bucket of coaches people can choose from rather than having our people be so incredibly clear that WE are their teacher.

 

8. Create a Safe Space For Difficult Conversations

Conversations about money, transitioning client agreements, and misunderstandings are vulnerable subjects for clients to bring up to coaches; especially if they look up to them. If they feel uncertain as to whether or not their concerns will be well received–a lot of underlying resentment can build, and these client relationships may not last as long as they would have if there was an open, safe space for hard conversations.

When setting expectations for your clients, share with them what they can do if they ever have any concerns–letting them know that they are completely safe and free to bring things up and process them with you. Within those moments, allow your clients to fully share and express their feelings. This may be triggering, upsetting, or challenging for you…but learning how to hold space for clients as they process these emotions is a powerful coaching/faciliation skill that will lengthen these customer relationships.

 

Clients you don’t lose are better than all of the new clients you could gain.

 

9. Don’t Attempt to Be Everything To All of Your Clients (Own Your Role)

As an online coach or service provider, you’re always going to be improving your skills. As you grow, this might mean that your ideal clientele is at a higher level as well. For example; as you scale past 6-figures in your own business, you’re able to begin helping people do the same–which means your ideal customer may shift from a total newbie to an early-stage entrepreneur.

But after a certain point of skill development and “going up the ladder of mastery,” there is a point in which you shift your decision making from “who is the highest level person I can serve?” to “at this point, which clients do I want to serve and not want to serve?”

In my own coaching practice, I recognize how much I absolutely adore working with mid-stage entrepreneurs who are expanding into higher levels of leadership and desire to focus both on strategy and inner work. I absolutely can help people scale to 7-figures, but it’s actually less fun for me to focus on heavier entrepreneurial business scaling strategies and systems (like organizing scaled financial systems or optimizing the team hiring, onboarding, and training process.) I am an absolutely fantastic coach for entrepreneurs who are building out their product suite, stepping into higher-level collaborations, and scaling into the low-high six0figure range.

I love it there, and I’ve decided fully to hang out there. I’m the business coach who focuses on personal strategic alignment in all business decisions and can help you absolutely crush a six-figure product launch. If that means clients of mine want to scale past that and hire someone else for more strategic marketing, Facebook ads, and running teams of 8–that is PERFECT. I’ll refer them out to a friend and feel at peace with it.

 

Ask yourself: who am I exactly, and to whom?

Who do I not want to be?

Which roles do I not want to play?

Who are my trusted friends and colleagues who I can refer out to?

How can I claim even more of my worth by claiming my exact role, and not try to be everything to everyone?

 

 

10. Discern Between A Client’s Projection and The Truth

 

A projection is an underlying emotion that has yet to be taken personal responsibility for, so it will be projected out into the external world–likely onto other people. And knowing how to do this requires you to truly know how to understand your own projections so you can hold space for theirs. For example–if a client says that don’t need mindset work and haven’t gotten enough results from you yet, there’s a good chance they’re experiencing frustration with their process thus far and it’s easiest to blame the person they’re paying for results. A lot can come up when there’s finances, vulnerability, and pain in the experience of the client–and it’s up to you (the coach, educator, or customer service email responder!) to be able to not take things personally and navigate triggers with customers.

 

We can only take clients as deep as we take ourselves. If these things occur and you’re still experiencing messiness and confusion between your emotions and your client’s emotions…

 

I invite you to apply for the Conscious Leadership Experience. Click here to learn more an apply now.

 

This program was created for coaches, entrepreneurs, educators, and creators like you who know they could be making a bigger impact and experiencing more success…but struggle with the overwhelm, anxiety, and imposter syndrome occurring at the current level they’re at.