Why Selling Your Services Feels Scary and 3 Ways to Get Over It

You started your business with excitement, enthusiasm and passion for helping others. You knew you had the skills to make a difference in someone else's life. Then, it became time to get visible, make proposals, and sell your services. Filled with self-doubt, you became paralyzed.

Who am I to be successful? Why should they buy from me? What if I make a proposal and they say "no"? Am I charging to much? Am I charging too little? 

The list of self-sabotaging messages can be quite long, and this inner dialogue does n.o.t.h.i.n.g. to serve you - OR - your clients.

As you sit in front of your computer spinning out because of these unwarranted fears, the people who need you the most are suffering and not getting the help they need, because they don't know about you.

You went into this business to help people, but your hiding and shrinking is making that impossible to do.

As a coach or healer, you're intuitive, so you know that these behaviors and thoughts are damaging and counterproductive, but that doesn't mean you know what to do about them because it's so much easier to clearly see the self-sabotaging behaviors that other people engage in, and not our own.

So what exactly are you to do?

Here are 3 common reasons coaches and healers struggle to sell their services and 3 simple things you can do to get unstuck, and get out there so that you can get more clients and help more people.

ABUNDANCE BLOCKS
Many coaches and healers are afraid to sell their services because of their subconscious beliefs about money, or what is often referred to as an abundance block. They often judge money as being inherently bad. The first step to overcome this challenge is to stop giving the money that will be exchanged for your services so much power. Money is inherently neutral. It is not good, it is not bad. What people do with money can be good or bad. If people are paying money to get the help they need, is that not a good thing?

If you find yourself getting caught up in subconscious abundance blocking beliefs like the following, it's time to examine the programming you received when you were younger.

Some common money stories that stop coaches and healers from success in business...

"If I get rich, there will be less money for everyone else."
"People should serve others out of the kindness of their hearts."
"People who are successful are greedy."
"Rich people are greedy."
"If I have money, it will just be taken away."
"If I have money, my family won't approve."
"If I have money, my friends will judge me/reject me, I won't fit in."

I could go on and on, but you get the point. Many service-oriented individuals have subconscious beliefs about money that are preventing them from selling their services. It is your responsibility as a coach or healer to work on this, because keeping your services to yourself helps no one.

Write down the stories you tell yourself about money. Look at them in black and white. Then re-write them into more empowering beliefs, and every time you catch yourself falling into old ways of thinking, recognize it, move away from it, and tell yourself a new, improved, more empowering belief. 

FEAR OF VISIBILITY
When you build a service-based business, you are the product. And when you realize this, it's natural to feel afraid. After-all, that means putting yourself out there. There are now photos of you on a public website. Your ideas and thoughts are out there in the form of videos, blogs and articles for all the world to see and critique. 

When reality hits that to create a successful business, you can no longer hide, the fear of being visible can take hold.

Similar to overcoming the abundance blocking beliefs that you're harboring, it's important to change your mindset here. First, get to the core of what's really going on.

Are you afraid of rejection by family and friends?

Do you think maybe you are you just a little too wu wu for their tastes and have been hiding who you really are?

Are you afraid that if you put yourself out there no one will listen and you'll feel like a fraud or a failure?

Are you afraid that if you put yourself out there, one of those nasty online trolls will disagree with your views and smash your credibility to smithereens? 

Listen, all of this is normal, but that doesn't mean it's okay to keep hiding. 

You chose a profession that includes helping others to realize their full potential through coaching or healing. That means, that you need to be willing to not just talk the talk, but walk the walk.

If your fears are stopping you from being bold, courageous, and flying that freak flag for the world, it's time to heal your self-worth issues, asap.

Would you ever counsel a client to hide and feel ashamed of who they really are? Of course not!

So, you shouldn't do this either.

At the root of all of these fears is a lack of self-worth, the feeling that "I'm not enough, just as I am."   

A lack of self-worth will sabotage your business efforts. You can purchase the most expensive business building program, and buy into all of the hype online about what to do to get clients, but if you don't shore this up, none of those strategies will help you.

A lack of self-worth is an energetic issue, and it repels potential clients. Clients want to hire someone who is confident. They need to know that you can get them the results they desire.  

So, what are you to do?

Get your own coach, engage in your own healing, and make yourself your #1 project! 

I cannot underscore the importance of tackling this issue enough. 

Overcoming a lack of self-worth doesn't usually happen overnight, so the sooner you get the support you need, the better. 

LACKING A CEO MINDSET
It's not likely you opened your business because of your passion for business. You opened your business to serve others and make a living while doing so. Currently, you identify yourself as a coach or a healer. You are identifying yourself as your modality, instead of as a business owner.

Coaches and healers don't sell, but business owners do.

This matters. A lot.

When you fail to shift into the mindset of the CEO of your business, you are not serving your clients. In order for your clients to get the help they need, you must run a successful business, and that means behaving like a CEO. 

Running around thinking of yourself as a "coach" or a "healer" makes it easy for you to let yourself off the hook for the important aspects of running a business like: marketing, keeping your books in order, getting clients, networking, etc...

​It gives you a convenient excuse to not do that Facebook Live, or follow up with that warm lead, or put together a marketing strategy. 

Shift this mindset of identifying yourself as your modality to identifying yourself as an entrepreneur immediately. You are an entrepreneur who provides coaching or healing services, not the other way around. 

Say a version of this that resonates with you aloud a few times, "I'm an entrepreneur who provides [coaching/healing]," so that you can begin to internalize this new identity.

What happened in your body?
 
Did you feel resistance?

If so, keep saying it. Say it as many times as you need to until you feel a shift in your energy and you can wear this title of entrepreneur or business owner like a glove.

When you start to identify with being a business owner rather than your modality, your confidence in business grows. You more quickly overcome the fears and anxieties that are wasting your time and preventing you from getting more clients. You begin to see that selling your services IS the service, because without it, you can't help people. 

Selling  = Service.

Get the tattoo.
Make the sticky for your computer.
Write it on your forehead. 

Business owners that recognize this, can put themselves out there with ease time and time again because instead of viewing selling as sleazy, they understand that not selling their services means not helping the people who need them most. CEO's know, without a doubt, that selling their service is the number 1 most important aspect of their business.