A costly mistake that some coaches make is to adopt generic task management software like Dubsado, Trello or Asana to manage their coaching business, only to regret it later.

The problem with choosing generic task management tools is that...

• They’re made specifically for task tracking They’re not designed specifically with coaches in mind

• Their most lucrative market is large businesses with many team members/departments

• They make client management needlessly complicated as they are not CRM software

• Their automation features are too complex for the needs of a coach

This is why picking a task management software that is specially created for coaches and their coachees will help your business instead of complicating it further.

So what is the best software for coaches?

This depends on what your coaching practice or business looks like, however it all starts with a personal assessment of your business needs. Before you try to look for ‘the best’ coaching software tool, you need to look at your practice. 

Think about what your business will look like in a year, in 3 years, 5 years. 

Make a list of things you’d like to automate and things you want to keep personal so that you’re clear about which part of your business involves direct interaction with your clients and which parts will be automated.  Identify whether you’ll be working with groups in a 1:many format. Or perhaps you want to target corporates and grow a team of coaches to service large companies with long term team contracts.  

Picture what you want your business to look like and make sure you pick a coaching software that will allow you to grow in that direction. Ideally (though not always possible) you should pick software that will grow with you. 

You should choose a platform that has upgrades to fit the structure of your future business. Even if these may seem expensive now, once you’ve grown they will be affordable and necessary. Picking the most complex project management software that’s packed with full features comes with a hefty price tag and you may find that you’re using only 20% of the features to manage 80% of your needs. It’s therefore not the right choice.

At the other extreme, using free or freemium tools comes with another hefty price tag - your time. You’ll find that you have to spend time trying to stitch everything together with zaps or other APIs which may require you to hire a technical expert to get the job done. And they don’t come cheap.

Often, you’ll find that you need to upgrade to their paid plans when you get to the nitty-gritty of setting things up and then realize that the free plan doesn’t support what you actually need. Therefore, beware of the hidden costs of ‘free’ tools! The best thing you can do for yourself is to choose an affordable solution that’s simple to use yet has the functionalities that meet at least 80% of your needs. Because let’s face it - there isn’t a tool on the market that will meet 100% of your needs. 

In addition, another tip is to check the tool’s roadmap. They may be developing features that will be rolled out soon that you will need in the future. It’s also important to pick a tool you can afford because you don’t want to go through the trouble of setting it up and importing all your data only to abandon the project.

CoachVantage has a number of features that fit most coaching businesses whether you’re a solo coach or hire other coaches or plan to uplevel to group coaching, we have the tools for you.  

Want to see our features for yourself? Register for the CoachVantage Free Trial Below.