{Case Study} Zero clients for 6 months…then this changed it
Rachel DeSonier is a registered dietitian, a certified personal trainer, and a mom of 5. She had a podcast, a Facebook community, real credentials. For six months, she didn’t book a single sales call. The problem wasn’t her offer. It was her coaching business messaging.
Then she fixed it. Two premium clients booked within weeks.
That’s what fixing your coaching business messaging actually looks like. Not a new offer. Not a rebrand. Words that finally land. Rachel came on Best Damn Coach to walk through that shift. If you’ve had clients but can’t make it consistent, you’ll see yourself here.
The on-again, off-again client cycle
Rachel’s pattern wasn’t a crisis. It was a slow drip. A couple of clients, then eight months of nothing. A couple more, then silence again. No pattern she could name.
She knew her messaging was off but couldn’t say why. So she guessed: new angles, new focus, spaghetti at the wall.
If that’s you right now, you’re not behind. You’re missing one piece.
Why tweaking your offer won’t fix bad coaching business messaging
Stuck coaches mess with the offer first. Add Voxer. Rename the package. Build a new tier. I watch this constantly, and I always pump the brakes.
Nobody’s been inside your offer yet. You can’t know what they want more or less of when they haven’t discovered you exist.
The real gap sits earlier. You haven’t built urgency. You haven’t used language that makes someone think, “that’s me.” So they scroll past. The offer never gets a chance.
What activation language means for your coaching business messaging
Activation language is the exact phrasing your ideal client already uses for her own problem. Not the polished version you were trained to write. Her words.
Rachel gave me a perfect example without trying. She said she’d had some clients, but they were on and off. No jargon. Anyone who’s lived that frustration recognizes it instantly.
Compare that to “are you struggling with client acquisition and enrollment consistency?” Nobody talks like that. It sounds like a slide deck. Nobody wakes up thinking they have a client acquisition problem. They think, “I had a couple clients, then it went quiet.”
You don’t need better language. You need to listen for what’s already there.
Where to find your client’s exact words
Rachel had a Facebook community where ideal clients talked daily. The language was right there. She’d just never treated it as marketing material.
The process: keep a notes app open. When someone says something that stops you, write it down exactly as said.
From her community: “I don’t know where to get started.” “I feel overwhelmed.” “I just don’t have time.” Short, specific, unpolished. Those phrases go straight into emails and titles, because hearing your own words back lights up your brain.
Why hitting every pain point hits none of them
Coaches write emails trying to cover everything: nutrition, sleep, hormones, stress, strength, mindset, all in one piece. The logic seems sound. Name every problem, reach more people.
Instead, you sound like everyone else. Generic. Forgettable.
Rachel caught herself doing this the day before we recorded. She pulled an email back to one moment: standing in the gym with no idea what to do. One problem. One person.
That specificity is what gets a reply.
The ripple effect
Once Rachel used activation language everywhere, her podcast downloads climbed after she rewrote her episode titles. Growth held steady within four months instead of spiking and dropping.
Activation language mirrors how people search too. Title something in your client’s exact words, and you’re often writing what she’d type into Google.
She took it offline as well. Her neighborhood strength class is full of ideal clients. No pitch, just listening for how they talk about their struggle.
Knowing your premium client
Rachel doesn’t chase every possible client anymore. She knows exactly who her premium client is.
Her background touches perimenopause, so that language kept showing up. But it’s not who she wants to coach. Her real client needs the foundation first: sleep, nutrition, strength training that fits her schedule.
Before our work, her messaging pulled in women focused on hormonal symptoms, a topic she can speak to but doesn’t want to build around. One language shift changed who showed up.
Speak to everyone, and you water everything down. Your best-fit client can’t find herself when she’s buried under every other problem you could solve.
The result: 2 clients in weeks
Rachel asks new clients how long they’d listened before booking. Both clients she signed after our work booked in February, the month after she applied the shift.
One had listened a month. The other a couple weeks. Both premium clients from the start, not maybes.
That’s the return on fixing your foundation: not more clients, the right ones.
Connect with Rachel DeSonier
- Website
- Podcast: Effective Weight Loss for Moms (strength training and nutrition for busy moms)
- Instagram: @effectivefitnessforwomen
- Free exercise resources
- Free nutrition resources
- Strength Training & Weight Loss for Moms-Lose Weight & Gain Confidence! Facebook Group
