Coaching is a transformative service calling that benefits individuals from all walks of life. But at the heart of coaching is community — people who come together to accomplish a shared goal. As a coach in the online space, it’s important to learn how to harness the power of community to expand your reach.
An engaging, and often fun, way of nurturing your coaching community is by creating an online challenge. Read along as we uncover the benefits and steps for creating an online coaching challenge.
What is an Online Challenge?
An online challenge is a task or activity that invites others to participate in sharing their experiences and perspectives on social media. These types of challenges have been around for decades but the most notable was the Ice Bucket Challenge in 2014, which raised awareness and funds for ALS.
According to Mind the Challenge, online challenges are more likely to go viral because people want “to personally participate in the creation of trendy content on social networks, to test themselves, or feel accepted within a group or community.”
Businesses and organizations often leverage the use of online challenges to increase their visibility and engagement on social media. Most of these challenges are shareable and involve a specific hashtag to track participation.
How Coaches Benefit from Hosting an Online Challenge
Okay, you may not be into going “viral” or becoming TikTok’s next best dance sensation, which is totally fine. But having your own online challenge does come with a few perks.
Let’s discuss three key benefits of an online challenge:
1. Online challenges generate buzz and excitement for your services and products.
Online challenges are fun and people love things that get them excited. The challenge format taps into people’s competitive spirit and desire for self-improvement. This is what makes it such a fun and rewarding experience.
While participants are sharing their progress and achievements, they unconsciously generate word-of-mouth marketing. This attracts more interested participants. This level of buzz surrounding your coaching practice leads to increased inquiries and conversions. Potential clients are able to see the value and impact of your coaching firsthand.
2. Online challenges elevate your coaching authority.
When you design a challenge that addresses specific pain points or goals of your ideal clients, you prove that you’re an expert. For instance, a fitness coach might create a 30-day workout challenge, while a business coach might design a productivity challenge. In both cases, as participants progress through the challenge and see results, they’ll recognize the leadership you have in your field.
To take things further, if you sprinkle in a few educational gems and share your expertise, participants learn and feel comfortable reaching out to you for more help.
3. Online challenges nurture your community through accountability.
An online challenge helps you create a safe space for your clients and prospective clients. It’s a place on the internet where participants join a collective effort while sharing their experiences, successes, and struggles along the way. This builds a supportive environment where members encourage each other and feel like they belong.
The most impactful benefit is the accountability that participants receive. Participants are more likely to stick with a challenge and achieve their goals when they know others are watching and supporting their journey. This accountability is foundational for effective coaching.
Steps for Creating and Running Your Online Challenge
Now that you have an understanding of what an online challenge is and how it benefits your practice, here are the steps for creating your own online coaching challenge.
Step 1: Set Your Challenge Goals
Before you start planning your challenge, think about what you’re looking to achieve. A new coaching practice will have a different goal from an established practice. Goals will also vary between coaching industries. As you’re forming your goals, think about the following questions:
- Do you want to attract new clients?
- Are you looking to create a stronger coaching community?
- Does your practice need more brand recognition?
- Do you have a specific product or service that you would like to promote?
Once you have your goal, break down your goals into something that’s very specific and measurable. Take a look at these examples:
- Generate 100 new leads by the end of the challenge.
- Increase social media followers by 20%.
- Gain active participation from 50% of the challenge participants.
Step 2: Choose Your Target Audience and Platform
When you’re choosing a target audience, you should start by looking at your current clients. If you are satisfied with your current clientele, then use their age, gender, location, and occupation to lay a blueprint. It also helps to think about what appeals to them in terms of music or activities.
To help with this, look at insights that are already available to you from social media or client files. If you don’t have insights to pull from, conduct surveys or polls using platforms like SurveyMonkey or Google Forms. Ask questions that will help you understand their preferences, challenges, and what they hope to gain from participating in an online challenge.
You can also get information from social media using polls on Instagram. This research step makes your challenge more personalized to the participants.
Platform Comparison
Select the platforms that best suit your challenge and audience. Here’s a brief comparison of the most popular options:
| Pros | Cons | |
|---|---|---|
| TikTok | Great for younger audiences and short, engaging video content. | Higher engagement and chances for virality but may require more creative video content |
| Best for visual content like stories and reels. Has tools and features to support a large community. | Heavily reliant on visual content. | |
| Great for written posts, groups, and events. It also has a more diverse user base. | Excellent for community building, detailed posts, but can be crowded and competitive. | |
| Ideal for targeting professionals and business-oriented audiences. Supports long-form written content, articles, and native video. | Less focus on visual content compared to other platforms. Audience skews towards professional and career-related topics. | |
| YouTube | Ideal for longer-form video content, tutorials, and explanations. Has a large, diverse audience and can be easily monetized. | Requires more time and effort to create high-quality video content. Can be competitive and may require consistency to build a following. |
Step 3: Design Your Challenge
When brainstorming, focus on trending topics or common challenges your audience faces. For instance, if intermittent fasting is popular, a nutrition coach might design a challenge around that. Keep the challenge simple, like a daily 10-minute workout for fitness enthusiasts or a 20-minute meditation session for burnout coaching clients.
After you have your idea, define the duration, daily tasks, rules, and guidelines. The duration of your challenge could range from 7 to 30 days, depending on the complexity and goals. Breaking down the challenge into manageable daily tasks helps participants stay committed. For example, a business growth challenge might include tasks like “Create a marketing plan” or “Reach out to five new contacts.”
Clearly outline the rules and guidelines so participants know exactly what to expect.
Next, you need to choose the right tools and resources. Use tools like Google Sheets, Trello, or apps like Nudge to monitor participant progress. It also helps to establish a dedicated communication channel, like a private Facebook group or an Instagram subscription group to help with support.
Step 4: Promote and Launch
During the pre-launch phase, tease the challenge on social media, send out announcements, and encourage sign-ups. When it’s time to launch the challenge, use a live event or video to help everyone get started.
Content creation is another important aspect of launching the challenge. Here are a few tips for creating content.
- Record video or written instructions.
- Outline daily tasks and milestones.
- Create motivational messages and videos to keep participants inspired.
For example, a fitness coach could use a mix of content to demonstrate exercises, provide nutritional advice, and share motivational quotes. While a life coach could combine video tutorials, printable worksheets, and guided audio meditations to guide participants through daily mindfulness practices.
Post Launch
The post-challenge phase should include follow-up activities to maintain engagement, such as sharing results, thanking participants, and inviting them to future events. This is also the time to get feedback through surveys, testimonials, and reviews.
Use your online challenge tools to review overall participation and to assess goal achievement.
Get In on the Online Challenge Action
By using the steps outlined above, you can launch your own online challenge as soon as you feel ready. Keep your goals in mind as you plan for your launch but don’t forget to keep it light and fun for your participants. They’ll appreciate the accountability and excitement that comes with completing the challenge.
You also want to keep the theme of your challenge focused on strengthening your or building a solid community around your coaching practice. By doing so, you set yourself up for success by having a consistent team that looks to you for support and guidance while also promoting your products and services.
Join the free 28-day MCode Catalyst Challenge here. Let us know what you think!
