Have you heard of Zapier? It’s an app that makes other apps talk to each other.

If you use different systems for sales pages, squeeze pages, emails, surveys, forms… you know that it’s a lot.

Zoom? Calendar appointments? It’s a lot. We talked about this in another article discussing automation.

Now, in that one, we talked a lot about coaching in your own business. But I want to talk at an industry- type scale here as well.

Artificial Intelligence is making some massive leaps in the last few years. Specifically, you've got AI art and writing in the spotlight.

You can barely even turn on Twitter without seeing some quirky piece of nostalgia turned into an AI masterpiece – or some artist having a meltdown about people buying the AI stuff.

Some AI pieces are even beating humans in talent contest! It's enough to start an existential crisis… that's especially true if you're a coach or mentor.

Much like art, personal development is a really misunderstood niche.

Everybody thinks they could be great at what you do and it tends to drive the “default” price down.

But that kind of watering down isn't a problem for the future. Coaches and authors are ALREADY dealing with a glut of advice and “free content” on social media.

I think what's more important than the status of contests is the larger anxiety.

Are these computers going to make something “close enough” to our skills that people might choose a tireless machine that works for pennies over the work that WE are doing for you know, more than pennies.

Well, first of all, welcome to the club. My uncle is a long distance trucker who hates computers and they've been talking about truckers being obsolete since before Katy Perry danced with that shark. Lots of jobs are going to be absorbed by AI in the years to come. It especially applies to simple creative work and jobs with repeatable rules.

In fact, when you think about the pure volume of content that already exists, from people who are…

Way smarter than a “bot”…

And actually providing value for people…

The spectre of “AI art” should be way less intimidating.

Transformation is a really intimate thing. Real lasting change tends to happen in small groups. Just keep being your authentic self and save tomorrow's problems for tomorrow.

Also… it's worth remembering that the top of ANY field isn't going to be replaced by an app any time soon. At my own agency we experimented with using AI for parts of our social media outreach, and we tested some of those AI apps.

The technology just isn't there yet for absolute, personal touch for high ticket items. Anything a robot does, a human can do better, especially if it's a service that's high end.

It's also worth remembering that your high value clients are looking for you because they need services that are personal to them!

never feel like I’m getting 100% out of any article that I write. I’m always thinking of new angles or more details that I could add…

More details to share with people who are going to use my articles as a “cheat” to improve their business lives, and just making a personal connection with people.

I don’t work at some content mill – it’s not my job to just create “new stuff” a few times a day just for the sake of it.

Instead, I try to actually work hard in my business and find time to share the results.

Really, the best I can do is iterate. I know that every time I sit down and write a post, it’s going to be an improvement over what I’ve already written.

So, what about you? How complicated is your business? How many “systems” are you running?

We're seeing the stakes get really, really raised. There was a time in my own career online that you could create pages and send a bunch of link juice to them…

(Y'all remember Link Juice?)

That definitely won’t stand anymore. It’s getting way more expensive to run a business – because you need to be more aggressive to reach people and close sales. Using software in an efficient way means you’re spending less time pasting information between apps and more time actually creating outreach people will see.

Most people who are in coaching are underperforming, or they're not making the kind of money they expected when they started.

If you’re struggling like that, look at your sales funnel and look for ways to add automation.

But this is really a good thing.

We can work hard, craft a great message – ONCE – and then build relationships over and over again.

You want an automated workplace. So, these are the main parts of the business that we want to automate.

You’re always going to be looking at your limited time and trying to form the strongest leverage possible. Personally, I think of high leverage places – places that your future clients are looking at all the time, and forming a great connection with you.

Here are some places to look at your business.

Social media is a great place to reinforce your message.

Scheduling in bulk on a tool like Agorapulse allows you to plan, publish, and create content on a schedule.

Try your best to use more permanent forms of publishing like blog posts and videos and emails and use them to power your output on social, rather than trying to brainstorm perfect little tweets every day.

I'm subscribed to Christine Hassler's newsletter and I'm always surprised by how much authentic detail she puts into her emails, especially in the first week when she's working to build a relationship. You really feel like you're a constant presence in her life – of course she actually did those emails who knows how long ago, right?

One email that you take an hour or two to write has some lasting and positive results in your business.

They've read your content, they know your identity, they've met you a couple of times, and now they're actually clients.

First of all, big congratulations. Now how are you going to celebrate? Are you going to work yourself into a daze creating proposals and sign in sheets and scheduling onboarding calls?

I hope not.

For that reason, although I believe in being personal on calls and digging into a system.

I want my onboarding to be as uniform and “templated” as I can make it.

What's unique is your care about the client and their commitment to a better business and life…

The other elements are strictly repeatable processes.

This is a good thing.

So what does automation look like in your onboarding process?

It's a steady website to send people to once they buy. It's form collection. You're going to want to put customer data in one place.

These are your big questions. Really sit down and write down every question you're going to ask a client personally.

It's more important this work than look good. Aesthetics can come later, building the bond comes first.

I personally like to rev my engines towards new challenges and experiences. So if I find that I'm doing a repeating task over and over again, I want to simplify it and delegate it away. It's great if you can execute a process. But real mastery comes from making something so simple that anybody can do it. Look for ways to include automation in your actual coaching practice.

Delivering your core message via video is one method.

Think of chatbots as a (semi) living FAQ page. If you have a lot of prospects, you know that they're usually asking you the same questions about getting onboard.

OR alternatively, you need to put your prospects into a couple of “bowls” and start giving them service there.

So, in this situation, you'll want to try ManyChat. It's just great for having these conversations if you're getting a LOT of traffic through something like Facebook ads.

This is like onboarding, a situation where you SHOULD be celebrating…

But that situation can quickly turn into panic if you're not organized.

The tool I'm using is SimpleInvoice.

You've never seen anything so easy. You want billing to be something with as few hoops to jump through as possible – for obvious reasons.

Don't be afraid to add new processes to your business. If it saves you time, saves you work, and helps you communicate more authentically, it's the way to go.

At the same time, you've got to remember that automation is a tool and not a solution. If something goes wrong with this fancy interconnected series of apps, guess who is ultimately on the hook for it?

One of the things I do is provide pre automated services for a very high leverage part of your business (that's social media) – but it's not just a bunch of digital tools.

It's specialty copywriting that's specific to you and your niche. It's also human support when things to wrong.