In this solo podcast episode, senior executive coach Ellie Scarf walks listeners through a practical, step‑by‑step process for launching a coaching business on LinkedIn. She starts by reassuring listeners that a perfect launch isn’t necessary—aim for a B+ effort and treat the launch as the first of many re‑introductions. The core of her strategy is to use LinkedIn’s experience‑section update post, which automatically generates a high‑visibility announcement when a new role is added. Ellie advises what to include in that post (client focus, problem statement, personal reflection, credibility) and stresses the importance of responding to every comment to keep the post alive and to identify warm leads. She then outlines a weekly post sequence: a re‑introduction post that highlights the coach’s background, ideal clients, and personality (with a photo), followed by a “Work with me in 2026” sales‑style post that clearly states who the coach works with, the problems solved, and how to engage. Both posts should be featured on the profile so visitors see them immediately. Ellie also recommends prioritising outreach to engaged contacts—especially organizational decision‑makers—while avoiding over‑engagement with fellow coaches to prevent algorithmic echo chambers. Finally, she reminds listeners to optimise their headline, about section, and banner, and plugs her Corporate to Coach Accelerator program, which offers LinkedIn‑specific group coaching, personalized profile audits, and other business support, inviting listeners to book a call.
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Hello and welcome to the Business of Executive Coaching Podcast. I'm your host, Ellie Scarf, a senior executive coach with over 18 years experience coaching, which I now bring to my role as mentor and business coach to other executive and leadership coaches. When it comes to coaching business, I have done it all. So I've grown coaching businesses solo and in partnership and with teams of coaches working alongside me. I've been an in-house coach, I've been an associate coach. So when I talk about selling coaching to corporate clients, you know that I'm sharing from a place of experience and deep empathy. I work with coaches now through my group coaching program, the Corporate to Coach Accelerator, where executive and leadership coaches grow their business with more corporate clients. Today's episode is about something pretty specific, but it is a point that everyone is going to find themselves in at some point when they start their business. That is, How exactly should I announce or go live with my business on LinkedIn? And it came from a very specific question that I received, which said, I'm launching my coaching business in late April. How should I launch on LinkedIn? Do I contact my LinkedIn network via message first, or do I announce it via a post? And I would say that while this is about the launch of a business, the first launch of a business, I would say that there are probably some insights for people who maybe already have a business that is up and running, but who might might think it's time to reintroduce themselves. So keep listening as there might be some tips here for you too. So this is a fabulous question, and it's fabulous because I see coaches really twisting themselves up in knots about doing this right. And I say right in inverted commas here. When they get really up in their head about how to launch on LinkedIn, what it usually results in is not doing it at all. Or sort of, you know, thinking of it as a soft launch. And so firstly, I want to say two things to help you really relax about this. Firstly, there is no perfect, right? Just get it out there. That is the thing that will make a difference. If you put it off, you are just delaying the start and delaying that learning curve that you're going to have to go through anyway. So I often say aim for B+ work. If it's B+, Get it out there. There's no perfect. Secondly, this is not your only chance. It isn't the case that you make this one launch, one announcement, and then you never get to do it again. Absolutely not. You will reintroduce yourself. You will reintroduce your business and your offers regularly over the course of each year you're in business. So please relax knowing that if you aren't happy with how it goes, you get to do it again and again. And each time you'll touch a different audience. You'll try a different tactic. You might have new offers. So, so So think of it as the first in a process rather than a one-time opportunity. There is one thing I'll share that is, is kind of a unique one-time opportunity. So how should you launch your business on LinkedIn? Firstly, this is the one that is a little bit of a once-off, although there are ways of working around it. But when you first announce your business, there is this one golden post that you get, and that is when you update your experience section and you add your business as a new role. Those posts, and you will have seen them in your feed where people are like, you know, starting a new job and you've got a promotion. These posts get huge engagement and visibility and traction because LinkedIn shows them to more people than almost any other post. So when you make a change to your experience section, LinkedIn will then give you the opportunity to write some text in a post to go along with that change. You can't change the image. You'll know the one, it's like that celebration image. You can't change the image, but you can add like a post to it. So what I would include in this post is who you're working with and the problems you're going to help them solve, as well as like a really, you know, a real and personal reflection on that. Now, I wouldn't lean too hard into the, you know, this is what I'm passionate about. I want you to still keep it client-oriented, but you talk about the passion you you have for solving these problems, right? And, and how your professional credibility makes you the person to solve these problems. So like I said, you are going to get more visibility and engagement on this post than almost any other post you ever make. So really make sure that you leverage that, and you can do that by responding to all the comments that people make. And there will be lots, and it'll just, you know, it'll be a lot of, oh, congratulations, sounds great, wow, big move, things like that. But respond to those because that keep it alive. It'll keep you front of mind. It'll keep showing you to more and more people in your network and to your, your second-degree network. It will also lead to a whole bunch of inbound congratulations messages. And a lot of those are very standard, right? You know, almost those automated ones like congratulations on your new role, but that is still good data because every person who engages, whether it's a like, a comment, or a message sent to you, that person, if they are a potential ideal client, they are the people that you should be prioritizing as the first line in your warm network that you will be doing outreach to, which is the, the messaging component. So I would really pay attention and make sure that you are capturing those people, reaching out to them, not necessarily as like a pitch, but really as a, you know, hey, it's great to connect, right? Really focus on connection with those especially those ones who are potential ideal clients. Now, if it's all other coaches, you know, that's lovely. Don't engage too much because that is going to shift your algorithm to become a bit of a, you know, an echo chamber of coaches. Whereas what we want is we want, you know, the people who are in organizations, whether or not they are, you know, HR or learning and development, that doesn't really matter. But if they're in your ideal client organizations or, you know, adjacent organizations, those are the people that I would be really prioritizing. So that's your first, first port of call. Then as part of your first, the week you launch, I would recommend that you have another 2 posts at least that you work through. The first is a reintroduction post, and that is more about you, right? It's about, this is who I am. Now I want you to make it focus less on your passion for coaching, although it's okay to share that, but more about, again, your ideal clients, your professional background, your credibility, right? So ideal clients and their pain points, your professional background, your credibility. Personality is important in this one. And a photo is really important. You have to get comfortable with sharing some photos. Now, if you say, oh, Ellie, putting a photo of myself on LinkedIn is like a hard boundary for me, then come and join me inside the Corporate Coach Accelerator because we work through this all the time. Lots of people find this really confronting. And so just know, if you have that real resistance, I would rather you just post it and we'll add the photo later. But if you feel comfortable, and even if you feel a little bit uncomfortable, put a photo up ASAP. Because we want that to be, we want people to start associating you with your work, start recognizing you, all of that sort of thing. The second post is a work with me in 2026 post, right? And that should be how people can work with you. So that it is very clear. And this is a type of sales post, right? Like we often don't say, here's the work I do, come work with me. But again, how can people work with you? Who do you work with? And what problems do you solve for them? And remember, I want you talking about the organization, not about the individual. If your goal is organizational clients, of course. So you might choose to have some sort of prepare some sort of a graphic on Canva with your photo in the background and work with me in 2026. And then in And then in the text you would have, you know, this is who I work with, the problems I solve, and this is how I work with them, right? Coaching, leadership development, whatever that blend is for you. And then what you can do in the first, you know, first few weeks when you have your business out there is feature these posts, right? Feature those posts so that when people are looking at your profile, they're going to see this is who I am, this is how you can work with me, and that's going to be front and center, and they're not going to have to look too far into your post to know how to work with you. So I would feature those. Now, eventually, and certainly if you, you work with us, this is what our LinkedIn coach teaches you through personalized audits of your LinkedIn page. You might end up having, you know, some of your web pages, particularly your offer-based web pages that we feature so that your featured post almost becomes like a series of sales pages. But for now, feature those posts that will get you started. And then the next part of your launch is let the outreach begin, right? Let the outreach begin to your warmest network, the people who before you started your business said, look me up when you're ready to go, or the people who engaged with that first post, all of those things, get into it, start talking to those people. Now, of course, you're going to then do a whole bunch of work on your about section, on your banner, on your headline. Don't forget all of those, really important. But as a launch post sequence, this is what I've just been through is what I recommend. And you can do that. Even if everything else is not perfect, you can do it. You can get it done. So I hope that's helpful. Inside my group coaching program, the Corporate to Coach Accelerator, which is aimed to support coaches who want more corporate clients, we have very specialist link— specialized LinkedIn resources to help you to answer your questions. And so that includes monthly LinkedIn-specific group coaching with our LinkedIn coach. She also does personalized LinkedIn profile audits for all of our members, gives you very tailored, specific recommendations on what you could shift. So if you think you could use some support like this, among other much more business support, and you'd like to discuss whether this program, the Corporate to Coach Accelerator, could be a good move for you, please do book in with me. Let's have a chat and let's figure out if it's the right step. You can book a call at elliescarf.com/bookacall. I'll be back next week. Have a great week.
