Many coaches we work with prefer to work on their websites themselves. However, making a coaching website that looks good and is suitable for marketing can be a challenge.
In this guide, I will share how you can create a good coaching website with marketing in mind.
What makes a coaching website suitable for marketing?
Before we begin, I think it’s crucial to define what makes a good “marketing website.” In my view, a marketing-ready website should check the following boxes:
- It should convey the information about your coaching business accurately and effectively.
- It should have a blog to share articles, videos, and other materials.
- It should be GDPR & CCPA compatible.
- It should be easy to install tracking pixels and create remarketing audiences for your Facebook Ads, Google Ads, etc.
- It should be fast and optimized for mobile devices.
Now that we know what functionality is essential to build into our website, let’s get started with creating one.
How to create a website design for your coaching business
First, it’s essential to remember that you are not a designer. You are a goal-oriented coach who wants to launch a website.
I know many people own and operate websites, and most people who are responsible for their websites are amateurs. That’s okay. Don’t aim for perfection. Instead, when designing and building your website, your goal should be to instill in it your personal taste.
Your personal taste will give your website visitors a feeling about who you are, what you value, and what it feels like to work with you. That’s a big deal.
The design approach I recommend:
- Choose a website font that is available on Google Fonts. It will allow you to add a font to your website later with minimum friction.
- Create the entire website structure on Keynote (for Mac users) or PowerPoint. If you don’t have access to these tools, Google slides will also work. The idea is to create a slide for every section of a page, starting with your homepage.
- Focus on the structure of your website, and create any content you need in advance. Then add and arrange the content, photos, backgrounds, etc., on each slide.
- Use Google to find coaching websites you like and scrapbook ideas from these websites.
- Focus on creating your website’s essential pages/areas first: Homepage, About, Offers, Testimonials (can also be part of your offers page), and Contact.
At the end of this process, you will have 10-20 slides worth of website content, together with your website’s complete look and feel. Now, let’s discuss what are the best technologies you can use to create your actual coaching website.
The best technologies for building a coaching website
Best CMS for coaches: WordPress
The reason why it’s the best: I’ve used almost every CMS out there, from no CMS at all (static websites) to Wix, Ghost, Squarespace, WordPress, and more. In the beginning, I disliked WordPress because I’ve encountered many badly-made WordPress sites. But lately, I realized that this was not due to the CMS itself but rather the layers of customization and bad development work people did on top of it.
In reality, though, WordPress is very fast, offers a great deal of customization flexibility, and is easy to use. Last but not least, this degree of customization is great for SEO because it allows you to be at the cutting edge of new search features. For me, it’s clearly at the top, and if you asked me, there’s no “number two” that I would use.
Best WordPress theme for coaches: GeneratePress
The reason why it’s the best: GeneratePress is super-fast, and allows you to bring your perfect design to life using directly WordPress’s visual editor. It basically sits on top of the Gutenberg editor (the new WordPress default) and gives you extra website building blocks to create just about anything. I am a GeneratePress user myself, and I can wholeheartedly recommend it.
Best web hosting for coaches: Cloudways
The reason why it’s the best: They allow you to host a WordPress site on servers from the best/fastest cloud providers with just one click. The quality and speed of servers they offer don’t come even close to shared hosting offers from traditional hosting providers. I personally use VULTR high-frequency servers from Cloudways, and for just $13 per month starting price, I can wholeheartedly recommend them.
Domain registration for your coaching business: Cloudflare Registrar
If you need a domain for your new website, I can wholeheartedly recommend Cloudflare.
The reason why it’s the best: Domains are not their primary business, but they wanted to create something useful for their client base. So they allow anyone with a Cloudflare account to buy a domain at no-markup pricing. There are no surprising renewal fees or hidden add-on charges; you always pay what a domain costs.
Final thoughts
Making a coaching website is no easy task. On the one hand, a coaching website needs to be marketing-ready to succeed in today’s digital business environment. On the other hand, when you develop a website, you’re building a company’s identity. It’s the first impression that potential customers see and it should be the ideal representation of who you are as a business.
All of the processes and technology platforms that we’ve discussed are proven and tested, and I hope you will find them helpful in taking your next steps.
