Do-It-Yourself Websites for Health Coaches

Have you ever tried to create a website for your health coaching practice – only to realize itʼs a lot harder than it looks? Maybe you tried using a website template that required “no programming skills” – then discovered that it wasnʼt as easy as it looked in the demo video.  If youʼre wondering how to create a do-it-yourself website that looks great and attracts clients, keep reading.

You want a professional website that will help you grow your health coaching business. But you donʼt want the ongoing expenses of paying a webmaster.  And you donʼt want to spend frustrating weeks – or even months – trying to figure out how to put all the pieces together.  Is there a way to have it all?

The solution is to hire experts to do the critical parts that you cannot do and then take those parts and put them together yourself.  The reason most coaches spend endless hours trying to complete a website is because they either try to do everything themselves, or they donʼt know what parts to hire out and what to do themselves.

Creating a great do-it-yourself website is also a lot like hiring a health coach.  For instance, someone could spend months reading books on nutrition, taking cooking classes, trying out recipes, and different nutritional supplements – trying anything and everything in the hopes that something works.

Or they could have a consultation with a health coach, run a few assessments or lab tests, and find out exactly which nutritional supplements and food choices will most likely give them maximum results.

A health coach canʼt eat for you, but they can give you a strategy and plan so you can do-it-yourself.  Then you create a healthy lifestyle on your own.  Itʼs faster and the results are much better.

Here are 3 steps to creating a do-it-yourself website that looks great, attracts clients, and helps you save money.

Step 1 – Marketing Strategy

Before you start designing your website, you want to get crystal clear on your niche, ideal client, and the transformation that you offer.  Otherwise, youʼll end up with an ineffective website.  Even if it looks pretty, youʼll find that it doesnʼt help you get new clients.

To do this, youʼll want to work with an Internet and marketing expert, such as a business coach, marketing coach, or online marketing coach/consultant.  They can help you create your online marketing strategy to attract clients, including planning out your website.

This is one of the best investments you will ever make in your business because it saves you so much time and effort and helps you get FAST results.  And there are lots of options available, depending on your budget: home study courses, group programs, or private VIP coaching programs.

Of course, the closer you work personally with the expert, the better your results will be.  But as a health coach yourself, you already knew that, right?

This is a case where you donʼt know what you donʼt know.  An online marketing expert will help you know what web pages you need, how to best layout those pages, and what to write on the website to make it irresistible. Youʼll learn what tools are best to use and how to maximize list building and sales.

They will usually help you with your branding message as well, such as choosing a URL, company name, website colors, tag lines, and program names.  And occasionally, youʼll find an online marketing expert, like myself, who can also create the website for you.  Normally, your marketing expert and web designer will be two separate people.

Step 2 – Website Template

Hire a web designer (or webmaster) to create the website your online marketing expert helped you develop.  Donʼt try to do this yourself.

I recommend using a WordPress theme for your site, rather than having a site built from scratch.  This will save a lot of time and money,   Your web designer can add custom graphics, essential plugins, and easy (or complex) customization to the WordPress theme to implement your online marketing strategy.

WordPress blogs are fairly easy to use.  But they are rarely easy to customize.  Rather than waste tons of time learning how to do this yourself, hire it done, and have the site ready fast.

Your goal here is to have a professional set up the foundation of the site for you so you can build on it.  Remember my earlier analogy about hiring a health coach?

Having a web designer create the foundation for you is like having a health coach create a personalized protocol.  Have them do the technical parts that require training and skill, such as graphic design, hosting set up, plugin configuration, and adjustments to the stylesheets.

Your financial investment will vary greatly depending on the amount of customization and extra services you ask your web designer to do before you take over the site.  Things like search engine optimization, keyword research, custom graphics, and shopping carts can add hundreds or thousands of dollars to the cost of a site set up.  So if youʼre on a budget, start with the bare minimum and plan to add on later.  If you are using a WordPress site, it should be easy to add extras in the future without having to redo everything.

Step 3 – Website Creation

Now start adding content to your site.  WordPress allows you to create blog posts and pages with the same ease as using a word processor.  And you can often add audio, video, and special formatting with little (or even no) programming skills.

WordPress is truly a do-it-yourself website solution.  And there is a lot of flexibility on how much you can do yourself or hire it done.

Summary

If youʼve been struggling to build your health coaching website, take a look at the 3 steps above and make a list of where you need to leverage your time and/or invest in experts to save money.

Are you crystal clear on your niche and ideal client?  Are you getting assistance with your online marketing strategy or trying to “wing it”?  Or you wasting time trying to learn programming or graphic software?

With expert assistance, you really can have an irresistible, do-it-yourself website for your health coaching business.