How can a SWOT Analysis help you grow your private practice or coaching business?

Strengths are things you as a coach or business do really well and sets you apart from the competition. These are about how you show up for your clients that makes them raving fans and wants them to keep booking and refer others.

Now with strengths what I notice is coaches can either underplay it or overplay it. 

So ask yourself these questions to make a fair and balanced assessment:

• What do I do well that is important to my clients?
• What sets me apart from others?

Ask your clients for their perspective as they might see the same things as you and they can also notice different things that you were not aware of, for example:

• What are my/our strengths? What can you count on me/us for?
• What is my/our unique ability? What am I/are we best in the world at?

Weaknesses are the areas of your business that need to improve or develop.

You can get your weaknesses from feedback forms, complaints or suggestions.

This information is like gold dust as it can allow you to support your clients in a much more meaningful way.

Main thing is to be honest!

So just like strengths there are a set of questions you can ask yourself to figure these out:

• Where can I improve such that it would delight my clients?
• Where do I have fewer resources?
• What are the development needs of myself as a coach or my business where we need to grow to have even more happy clients

And ask your clients for their perspective as they might see the same things as you and they can also notice different things that you were not aware of, for example:

• What are my/our weaknesses? What can you not count on me/us for?

Opportunities are openings or chances for something positive to happen.

They arise from outside your business or organisation and are based on trends, the pains and needs of your tribe, economic impacts, environmental factors and political climate.

For example, if the government mandated coaching for every school going child this would be an opportunity for all coaches.

Being able to spot opportunities begins with understanding the prayers, pain, needs and desires of your tribe.

These are the questions you can ask yourself to get clear on the opportunities you might have:

• What are the prayers, pains, needs, fears and frustrations of my tribe relative to what I offer?
• What strengths can I turn into opportunities
• What trends can I take advantage of?

Examples of coaching opportunities might be:

• Relationship coaching for those going through marital problems
• Weight loss program for women who hate diets and exercise
• Wellness for CEOs, VPs & Executives
• Accepting oneself and ones sexuality for the LGBT community

Threats are anything that can negatively impact your private practice or business.

Main thing is to become aware of them and to be prepared to take action should it be needed. These are obstacles to the smooth running and continued growth of your private practice or business.

For example, cheap on-line courses that claim to provide the same benefits as a thorough training course with certification.

Questions you can ask yourself to explore your threats:

• What threats could harm you ?
• What threats do your weaknesses expose you up to? (So inner self talk could be something here that causes sabotage)