This episode is for the educator who has decided that this is your last year working in a school district and you are ready to go full time with your business next school year! You may be a teacher, administrator, instructional coach, district administrator - but you know that this is your last year working in a school district - listen up!

There are so many things that you can be doing right now to lay the solid foundation of your business - from setting up tech, to building content and credibility, to starting the networking game - you can do all the things to feel comfortable jumping out of a district and stepping boldly into this entrepreneur role!

If you’re ready to build or grow your education consulting business, there are three ways I can help:

👉 If you’re just starting out, grab Concept to Cashflow for only $47—it’ll walk you through setting up the foundations of your business.
👉 If you’re ready to grow with a proven system, the Education Consultant Accelerator is my 90-day blueprint—and now it includes Concept to Cashflow as a bonus. Use this link to get ECA for only $297! That’s $200 off!
👉 And if you’re ready to scale fast, 1:1 Coaching gives you personalized support, live calls, Voxer access, and direct feedback to accelerate your results. 

You can click the links above, or head to www.jennkleiber.com and choose which level works for you!

Shownotes:

Hey friends. I want to talk about a very pressing issue that is happening right now in our industry. To say that the funding for education is a bit wonky right now is the understatement of the YEAR- especially for education consultants. I know this can shake our confidence in our business, especially if you’ve had contracts that have been put on hold. 

So, in this episode, we going to talk about why I’m not panicking and also what pivots you may want to make moving forward.

 I am not an expert in this. I’m going to explain this to the best of my ability - also, by the time this gets published, and especially by the time you are listening, things could’ve very well changed!

I’m also going to give my opinion on a few things - but understand this - it’s just my opinion and it’s just based on what I know today. In a few months, my opinion may change. This episode is just to serve as maybe a helpful guide on clarity or maybe even a bit a bit of encouragement.

**Listen after this episode for an update since funding was released! 

Links:

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Free Masterclass: 4-Step Framework to Build and Sell Profitable PD

Education Consultant Accelerator:90 Day Blueprint

Of course there are some sales strategies that people who are in that industry know and learn…however, I’m making this stat up but 90% of sales is mindset. So if you go into conversations with the wrong mindset, feeling uncomfortable, your business is going to be affected. None of us want to sabotage our business, so lets change this!

Here’s a sales strategy:

Ask questions and listen - here are 3 questions I love to ask administrators - especially if they are new to me or I’m reconnecting with them - 

1. What’s one celebration you’ve had this year or last?
2. What’s the thing that keeps you up at night in regards to (literacy). Why do you think this is such a problem?
3. What do you think teachers need to solve that problem?

Links:

Free LIVE Webinar: Education Biz Growth Game Plan- https://www.jennkleiber.com/gameplan

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Education Consultant Accelerator 1:1 Coaching

Good coaching is such an impactful practice, and I can honestly say that in my education consulting business, coaching teachers has had the single biggest impact both on my business and on school results, and having a coach has had the single biggest impact on my own business growth.

Links:

Free LIVE Webinar: Education Biz Growth Game Plan- https://www.jennkleiber.com/gameplan

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Education Consultant Accelerator 1:1 Coaching

Links:

Free Training: 4-Step Framework to Build and Sell Profitable PD - https://www.jennkleiber.com/ppf-registration

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Education Consultant Accelerator: https://www.jennkleiber.com/ECA

The 4 Steps to Profitable PD (PD meaning professional Development)

1. FOCUS - (Phase 1) I would say that easily ½ of the clients I’ve worked with the ECA Blueprint members that I’ve brainstormed with have this as their biggest problem. They are great problem solvers and have been fabulous educators, which means they can solve all the problems at the same time…but this doesn’t work in business - especially at the beginning or close to the start of a business. 
2. BUILD - (Phase 2) We have to Build PD in ways that make the administrators ask us back again and again. We need to coach in focused ways that bring measurable results. 
3. PACKAGE - (Phase 3) Getting your solution in front of decision-makers in a way that helps you book those high-ticket contracts.  It is up to us to present a package that brings the desired results.                                                                                           
4. SELL- (Phase 3)This, for a lot of people, feels like the most daunting piece of it - and I totally get that. There are several mindsets you have to wrap your mind around.

Links:

Free Training: 4-Step Framework to Build and Sell Profitable PD - https://www.jennkleiber.com/ppf-registration

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Education Consultant Accelerator: https://www.jennkleiber.com/ECA

One of the great parts about being an entrepreneur is the fact that you can build your business in a model that works best for you. You get to lean into your strengths and your super power and operate within that wheelhouse. 

Within the education consultant space, there are a lot of different “vehicles” as I call them to get your solution to teachers - you have training days, or what we call PD or professional development. You have online courses, virtual trainings, and coaching. You can have physical products like books or workbooks or resources. And this, to me, is one of the exciting things about this industry. So in today’s episode, I’m going to tell you the model that I lean into and why… This is not the only way to do this, but this is the way that I have found my solution to be the most impactful and my business to be the most profitable and predictable.

And that is packaging high-ticket offers together. So in a nutshell, I offer a workshop or full day Professional development training, and then a number of coaching days. I also have a book that I sell with the PD, and a number or courses that I use as either an upsell or a bonus.

Links:

Free Training: 4-Step Framework to Build and Sell Profitable PD - https://www.jennkleiber.com/ppf-registration

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Education Consultant Accelerator: https://www.jennkleiber.com/ECA

Shownotes:

The vast majority of your business the first 5 years (and maybe longer - depending on how you want to build your business model) will be from your warm market - people you already know. People that don’t care about your brand. People that will respond to a text message in a heartbeat but never open one of your newsletters.

So what does this look like - 

1. We ask questions. Harvard researchers found when using an MRI, that questions that asked participants to disclose their opinions increased neural activity in the areas of the brain associated with reward and pleasure. What does this mean? People like to be heard. And when we can sit down in front of an administrator, and instead of give information or even give solutions, but ask questions - give them the opportunity to share their voice and their thoughts on what’s going on in the trenches where they spend every day, they like it. And they like the conversation. 
2. We listen. We empathize and we take notes. 
3. We connect. Whether it be on a personal or professional level of both - look for ways to make authentic connections. It’s not just about booking the dates. Be authentic and don’t waste their time, but if you walk in and they have a picture of your favorite place on their wall, or you notice you went to the same college, or they have pics of their kids and you have kids about that age, make a connection. If you already know them, ask them about their family, or how they’re doing. And listen.
4. We follow up. We ask for feedback. We thank them for their time or inviting us to their campus.
5. We check in. Now this is different then following up. If you are doing a long-term contract, you want to check in throughout the work. Be transparent. Maybe you’re in a period of time where you’re not working with them - check in! Authentically! If they are local, set up a quick meeting, take them their favorite drink and just check-in. No sales call. Just a check in. Or a Starbucks gift card and say Coffee on me.
6. We ask for testimonies and referrals. We leverage their relationships with our relationship. I know this may not seem like a comfortable thing to do, but have a system where you send a short survey that asks for feedback, asks if you can use the testimony, and asks for a referral. You can even give a referral incentive if that feels good to you.

The bottom line is this - you will not build and scale your education consultant business by only sitting behind a computer.

Links:

Free Training: 4-Step Framework to Build and Sell Profitable PD - https://www.jennkleiber.com/ppf-registration

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Education Consultant Accelerator: https://www.jennkleiber.com/ECA

Shownotes:

There are so many ways to market your business, and it can be easy to get overwhelmed by all of the options. Between social media, email marketing, word of mouth, cold calling, dropping by schools, events, conferences…literally it’s enough to stop you in your tracks - especially if you don’t “feel” like marketing is your expertise.

This is the bottom line of why I didn’t continue with social media. I didn’t like it AND it was not targeting my ideal client - who is an administrator. Social media is great for direct to consumer business plans - where you are selling directly to the person on the other side of the screen. However, selling to a school or a school district is a very different system. Also, I served teachers. So my content was based on helping teachers - therefore, the audience I built on social media was…teachers! 

There are so many other options for marketing that give value and bring a better turn for my time and financial investment in marketing!

SHOWNOTES

It’s “selling season”!  Maybe I should better call it “booking season”. Now is the time when administrators want to start thinking about summer and back to school training. Many of them like to have those PD dates booked by the time school is out. And as a consultant, my goal is to have about 75% of dates booked out before the next school year even starts. 

Here are the 3 things to be prioritizing during this season:

1. Email list
2. A landing page
3. Automated email sequence

Links:

Free Training: 4-Step Framework to Build and Sell Profitable PD - https://www.jennkleiber.com/ppf-registration

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Website: https://www.jennkleiber.com

Free Training: 4-Step Framework to Build and Sell Profitable PD - https://www.jennkleiber.com/ppf-registration

IG: www.instagram.com/jenn_kleiber

Education Consultant Accelerator: https://www.jennkleiber.com/eca

Shownotes:

As you try to prioritize your never-ending to-do list, put what we’re talking about today as one of those 3 main things if you haven’t already - and that’s building your email list.

Let’s start with why - 

1. You don’t own social media. So while the “trend” is to put content on social media, it can change in a second. 
2. The vast majority of your consulting business, especially for the first 5 years, will be word-of-mouth and recurring clients. Because of this, you need a place where you can nurture your audience and stay top-of-mind
3. Let’s talk conversion rates. The typical conversion rate for email marketing is 3-5%. This may sound low, but the typical conversion rate for IG (for top performing brands) is 1%. And I would even venture to say that that is lower for our industry because school districts don’t tend to purchase off of social media. So, let’s talk numbers. If you have 1000 administrators who have chosen to be on your email list, 3% of that is 30. If 30 administrators buy from you (and then refer you to others), this is huge. If you have 100 administrators on your list and 3 of them buy from you - this is also huge. 

This is why building your email list as soon as possible is really crucial to the success of your business. 

Now, here is a common misconception- a lot of my clients think they need to have the rest, or at least a good part of the rest of their business built BEFORE they start building their email list - like they need to have their website built, or their training built or fill in the blank - but that’s simply not true. Building your email list is something that you want to do as you build the rest of your business.