A Podcast for Coaches

About A Podcast for Coaches

A Podcast for Coaches shines a light on one of the most elegant, underrated business models in the world: one-on-one coaching. Mark Butler hosts the show, and he's been a coach and advisor to every kind of online business you can think of, having helped businesses earning everything from $0 to $25,000,000+. Although Mark believes every online business model has merit, he worries one-on-one coaching is viewed as a stepping-stone business for people who aren't ready or able to scale. But it's not true, and A Podcast for Coaches sets out to show people--through clear teaching and rich, current stories of successful coaches who love their business--that one-on-one coaching is one of the most gratifying and lowest "hassle-per-dollar" businesses in the world.

Publisher

Mark Butler

Category

business · business

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

6 Oct 2022

Latest episode

23 Jul 2026

Latest episodes

4 of 54 episodes have a transcript.

1. 

   23 Jul 2026

   A tool to help coaches discern, evaluate, decide, and advise.

   I set aside an episode I'd spent a week on after an adversarial read exposed a weakness in my own arguments. What came out of that is a three-question tool for evaluating claims — mine, yours, your clients', and the ones on every sales page you'll read this week. In this episode I run two of my own claims through it and show you where they hold and where they don't. [00:00] The episode I've been working on for a week — over 3,000 words, and I stopped short of publishing it [00:57] Why I wanted a closer look: I want this material to be foundational, which means it has to be reliable [01:26] I know how close I am to my own theories, so I don't know where my blind spots are [01:50] A reader who already agrees with me nods along. A reader who doesn't might find big holes [02:12] What I asked Claude to do: not content, not flow, not style — strength and defensibility [02:39] It found gaping holes in about thirty seconds, and a discernment tool started to emerge from the conversation [03:24] Where this tool applies: your own thinking, content you consume, sales pages, and conversations with clients — not to put them on trial, but to help them see the claims they're making [03:57] The tool: What is the claim being made? What happens if the claim is wrong? Can we find out if it's wrong? [04:39] Story one: my high school best friend texted me after five years of no contact, and I felt a surge of good feeling [05:04] Story two: a fellow coach running Facebook ads to consultations, spending far more than is coming back Question one: what is the claim? [05:47] The claim I actually made about my friend — relationships persist in spite of long dormancy — and why it's easy to confirm [06:13] The next rung up: dormant relationships could become coaching engagements. I can confirm the warm feeling. I can't confirm it converts [07:08] A claim about affinity quietly gets swapped for a claim about a transaction — and you'll meet this move constantly in the wild [07:25] "He referred me a client, therefore dormant relationships are your best lead source" — a sample size of one driving strategy, with no mention of the other forty-nine [08:14] The absurd version, three short steps from a story that felt completely reasonable [08:45] Why a relatable story and a relatable emotion can make an absurd claim feel believable [09:01] Every one of those claims could be true. The failure isn't dishonesty — it's the fit between the facts and what I claimed from them [09:37] The second story, where I got onto shaky ground [10:04] I never said you can't grow a coaching practice through paid ads. I implied it, and asked you to state it for me [10:29] Why this is the same move as the earnings claims I criticized a few weeks ago — just the mathematical reverse [11:17] An old sales adage from my own selling days: if you say it, the prospect can challenge it; if they say it, it's true [11:41] "So? You tell me." I was completely guilty of this [12:26] If I had stated my claim, I would have had to defend my claim [12:31] Stating the claim is often the whole job Question two: what happens if the claim is wrong? [13:21] If the friend story were entirely fabricated, essentially nothing changes for you or for me [13:47] If I'm wrong about paid ads, many of you discard a potentially profitable growth strategy [14:14] The stakes, not the intent, are what separate these two [14:43] I'm asking my listener to eat the cost of my being wrong — which is why I've got to clean up the claim Question three: can we find out if it's wrong? [15:18] For the friend claim, trivially — you yourselves are the evidence, which is why it needs no support [15:56] My first job with the ads claim: admit I don't know how representative that one coach is [16:29] Acknowledging that weakens the claim and strengthens the ethics — it pulls the cost of being wrong back onto me [17:08] I struggle to believe advertising works for one-on-one practices, and I don't have enough data to stand behind that [17:40] What it would take to actually know: survey a hundred coaches and find out [18:02] What a strong version of my claim would sound like with real numbers behind it [18:53] Going further still — accounting for the cases where it did work, and what those coaches had in play [19:30] Until I've done that work: this is my bias, supported by one story [19:45] What I wish the people making earnings claims would publish — robust data we could analyze, discuss, and debate [20:21] All I can offer today is an opinion with a small handful of anecdotes. You have to do your own research The tool, restated [20:31] Three questions for a client conversation, a spouse, a sales page, or a purchase decision [20:56] It usually takes about thirty seconds — and at minimum it tells you what the next step would be [21:20] If nothing else, it short-circuits hasty decisions built on weak claims Work with me Office Hours is a community for coaches building sustainable one-on-one practices — officehourswithmark.com (https://officehourswithmark.com/) Bookkeeping Let's Do the Books is bookkeeping built for coaches and small practices — letsdothebooks.com (https://letsdothebooks.com)

2. 

   13 Jul 2026TRANSCRIPT

   Scaling a One on One Coaching Practice

   Host Mark Butler explains how one-on-one coaches genuinely scale their practices by increasing output from input, not by moving to groups.

3. 

   6 Jul 2026TRANSCRIPT

   A Reasonable Refund Policy

   Host Mark discusses with industry experts how a sensible refund policy benefits coaches by building trust and protecting their brands.

Inside a recent episode

Scaling a One on One Coaching Practice

Published 13 Jul 2026 · Transcript excerpt

[…] But that's because it's the most obvious path to growth in your income. You hold the number of coaching hours constant. You increase the rate per hour. You have now scaled. Assuming, by the way, that you can generate the same amount of demand at the new price... that you were generating at the old price. You could make the argument that there's another version of scale here, which is to hold the income constant, but to reduce the number of working hours. So you could coach the same number of hours, but increase your rate. You could also increase your rate and coach fewer hours. One would increase your income and one would keep your income the same. […]

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.9 / 5

43 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

12 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 62 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

91

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

85

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Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

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