Trena Little, who runs a six-figure coaching business in 20 hours a week, ditched sales calls for a YouTube-first system with a Google Doc intake packet. She publishes 1-2 evergreen YouTube videos weekly instead of daily Instagram posts, enforces no-work Fridays and weekends, and targets just two new clients per week instead of chasing seven figures.
I run a multi-six-figure coaching business on just 20 hours a week, and there are 5 specific things that I started not doing in 2026. And I'm not talking about the little stuff. I'm talking about what most business gurus tell you, what most business coaches tell you, what all these business bros tell you that you need to do to get your business to that next level. And the best thing about quitting doing these 5 things, it got easier and easier to skip them when I changed just one thing about my marketing strategy. So let me tell you what these 5 things are that I don't do, what I do instead, and you can steal whatever you want. Number 1, and a lot of people don't believe this, but I don't do sales calls, no discovery calls, no strategy sessions that are secretly pitches, none of that. And get this, I even turn my sales page to my coaching program completely off. Here's my entire sales process right now, and it's working great for me. I have a video that walks through my entire system in my YouTube coaching experience. In that video, I mentioned a word that you can DM me if you're interested in more information. When you DM me on Instagram, I will then send you a simple Google Doc that walks you through the entire program, the cost, what's involved, and then I can start having conversations with those people in the DMs. And yes, this is on Instagram because until YouTube can give us DMs, that's where I'm going to need to have these conversations. So why does this work over sales calls? Because if somebody is applying or sending me that they want more information, they've watched my YouTube videos. They've seen me teach, they've seen me coach, and they already trust me. The sales calls are only necessary because trust isn't built yet, but my YouTube videos do that at scale all around the clock. Second thing I don't do, I don't post daily content. Somebody just pulled up beside me, so this is really weird. My entire content strategy is posting 1 to 2 YouTube videos a week. That's it. That's my machine. And I will tell you, I have tried posting on Instagram. I just did another test in August posting Monday through Friday, and I hate it. And I don't get nearly the engagement or feel like anybody's even listening than what I do on YouTube. And the best part is my YouTube videos that I published in the beginning of August are still getting views and driving me leads, whereas the Reels that I did in the beginning of August are pretty much dead. I don't create the content that requires me to show up every single day. Instead, I focus on evergreen sales assets, which are my YouTube videos, which is a library of sales assets consistently getting in front of a new audience, building trust with them, and getting them into my funnels. Third thing I don't do, I don't work Fridays. I don't work evenings, and I don't work weekends. And I'll add in there, I don't work the last 2 weeks of December either. In fact, my employee has off and we're completely dark so that we can spend those last 2 weeks of the year completely offline during the holidays with our family. And my clients know this from day one. I am very clear, very upfront with my boundaries, with my work hours, and when they can expect to hear from me. And they know they are not going to hear from me at any given time of the day. They also know I will respond to them within a 24 to 48 hour window. So they're not expecting me to immediately respond to them as soon as they send something to me. Um, what I've learned setting these boundaries in place is that my clients respect me more. Nobody has ever quit or wanted to leave my program because I refuse to answer them at 9 PM on a Saturday night. And yes, some people do submit audits and questions during that time because that's when they're working on the program, but they know I will respond when I'm back in the office on Monday mornings. It's clear to them that my boundaries aren't walls against my clients. It's really the structure that lets my business hold my life instead of taking over my life and making me hate my job. I want to be excited. And energized when I show up every morning to engage and work with my clients. Number 4, I don't chase 7 figures and I don't have a million-dollar business as a goal of mine. Gasp, I know, right? What I do have is an enough number. I sat down one day and honestly, my mentor had to probably force this out of me, but I actually did the math. My real expenses in my business and in life, how much money I wanna bring home from my business, like what I wanna actually pay myself, how much I wanna save in my business for like my business nest egg, what I want to invest in my business. Same thing with my personal— what I want to save for retirement, what I want to invest in, what plans we have that we want to do that year. And then I took that entire number and I divided it by the cost of my offer, and right there is the number of clients that I need to take to hit my goal. And then when I broke it all down, it came to just 2 yeses a week to hit my number. Literally 2 clients a week, or 8 clients a month, is all I need to hit my goal. And the moment I knew that number, like all the panic, all the stress, all the overwhelm that you feel running a business kind of left because I stopped chasing a number that was out there for no purpose, just to impress people. So if you literally do just one thing from this video, do that math tonight. And I promise you that enough number is probably smaller than what you think you actually need to make to live the life that you live. 5th thing that I don't do, and it's a big one. I don't depend on Instagram or any other social platform to grow my business. And I can say that truthfully because as I mentioned earlier, I tested it. I did not even post on Instagram most of 2025 and I had the best business year ever. And I hadn't been on Instagram most of this year. And then I went back in August and I didn't see any big changes by posting so much freaking content every week. So while I may be on Instagram every so often, it's on my terms and not in what is recommended strategy-wise or the amount of content that you really need to grow a business. Because what I use Instagram for is nurturing my audience. If I wanna go on a reel or I wanna go on stories and kind of share more behind the scenes, more of what I'm doing, that's what I use Instagram for. Instagram is a horrible platform just for discovery. So that's where YouTube is. YouTube is where people are typing in their problems, searching their problem, and they're finding me as their results and they're getting on my email list. And that's what's actively growing my email list by hundreds a month. Because liking a platform and needing a platform are 2 different things when it comes to marketing strategy. Because when your content can be somewhere that can be found and keeps working for you, social media becomes a choice. Let me know in the comments, say choice, if you wish social media was a choice for you and you didn't have to show up there. And every single thing on this list— no sales calls, 4-day weeks, 2 yeses a week— all of that is because of that one shift that I made with all of my marketing. One platform, YouTube, for content that can be found when my audience is actually looking for a solution. I wanna know down in the comments, which thing are you gonna stop doing now after you've heard this? And if you're starting to think, maybe I need to take YouTube more seriously, I have an entire training. I'll put it on your screen right now that will walk you through the framework that I use that I've taught my clients to go to a once-a-week YouTube video system that will consistently drive you leads, grow your email list, and send you the best clients that you've ever had. Click that training to watch it now.
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