What I was Missing That No One Told Me
Nine years in business. This is the coaching business foundation nobody taught me at the start, and the gap I see in almost every coach I work with.
This is the final episode of my Confessions from Nine Years in Business series. Episode one was about how you spend your time. Episode two was about who you’re becoming. Today is about seeing the whole picture clearly, and why that missing piece cost me years.
We’re All Treating Symptoms
When I was twelve, I started collapsing during basketball games. My legs would turn purple from the knee down. I saw doctors, specialists, and physical therapists, and every single one looked at my ankle, my arch, and the way I moved.
Nobody found the answer. Not until a high school trainer zoomed all the way out and said: we’re looking at the wrong problem.
What I had was compartment syndrome. The fascia around my calf muscles was constricting blood flow. The pain looked like an ankle issue. However, the source was something else entirely.
I think about this story constantly in the context of building a coaching business. So many coaches are treating the ankle.
Your website isn’t converting. The bio needs a rewrite, the funnel isn’t working, and the branding feels off. Those are symptoms. When all of them are broken at once, what it reveals is a gap in the foundation of the coaching business itself: a lack of clear understanding of the specific problem you solve and the direct result you produce.
A newer BDC member joined after spending thousands on a web designer who positioned her as a postpartum coach. She didn’t even love postpartum work. When she joined me and did a brain dump, I could see her core problem and result within two minutes. She was in tears. Not because it was complicated. Because nobody had helped her see it.
The website was never the problem. The clarity was.
I Was Thinking Like a Coach, Not a Business Owner
For a long time, I was showing up just as a coach. And I was brilliant at it. But being brilliant at coaching wasn’t enough.
Coach thinking: justify why you’re great. Explain your method. Lead with your certification.
Business owner thinking: you exist to solve a specific problem. Is your messaging landing? Is the right person finding you?
I kept hitting a ceiling because I hadn’t made that mental shift. Instead of going back to basics—someone has a problem, I solve it—I was looking at everyone else’s business as a map and trying to replicate what I saw. Am I actually saying that clearly? That was the question I wasn’t asking.
Your method and your heart are not enough on their own. Your transformation can’t be vague, clever, or designed to sound smart to other coaches. It has to land with the person who is searching for it at 11 pm, desperate for help.
Your People Give You Your Marketing
The shift that changed my coaching business messaging more than anything: I stopped listening to everyone’s opinions about my business and started obsessively listening to my clients.
I opened a document called “client sayings” and logged their exact words. Raw. Unpolished. Real.
I’ve spent thousands of dollars on professional copywriters. The best copy I’ve ever written, however, came directly from my clients. I simply gave it back to them through my emails, my podcast, and my social media.
When someone describes their struggle in a way that gives you chills, write that down. That’s your sales page and your content. That’s also the exact phrase the next person searching for you will type into Google.
Here’s your action step. Go back to your last three conversations with potential or current clients. What were their exact words? Don’t clean them up. If your most brilliant client says “I feel like an old hag in my clothes” and you’re a stylist, use that. The clearer your message is, the faster the right people will find you. That’s not a coincidence.
The Foundation Nobody Gave Me
Years in, I heard one sentence from James Wedmore: “You’re in the business of solving problems.”
That reframed everything. If I’m a solution maker who also coaches, the solution maker leads on the outside. In the marketing, the messaging, the content. The coach shows up once someone’s in my world.
I wasn’t failing because I lacked talent. I was simply missing a coaching business foundation that nobody had laid for me. The moment I started building it, growth felt like a rocket ship.
And I know what it’s like to care deeply, be all in, be genuinely great at your craft, and still feel stuck. That feeling isn’t evidence that you’re doing something wrong. It’s evidence of a missing foundation.
The Full Picture
This three-part series was built intentionally. All three pieces are synergistic—you need them working together.
- Episode 1 was about how you spend your time.
- Episode 2 was about who you’re becoming.
- Episode 3 is about seeing the whole picture clearly.
You can have the best identity work and still be zoomed in on the wrong problem. Incredible time management still won’t help if you’re unclear on what you actually solve. And niche clarity alone won’t move the needle if you’re still avoiding the internal shifts that make it all click.
Your brilliance and your craft are needed. It’s time to build the foundation underneath them.
