How to hit your $5K per month goal in 2021 as a yoga teacher, coach, or consultant

$5k is very doable. I know it’s a goal I set with many of my mindful marketing coaching clients, and it was a goal for me as well especially when I turned the corner away from anything that gave me a W2. (Side note: I’ll be fully transparent, I don’t hit this goal every month. Sometimes I do, sometimes I’m shy a few hundred but my actions and intentions move in this direction every day.) But when getting there means trying to do that with $20 per class or one coaching client at $100 — there’s only so much you can take on and you’ll notice by the end of the week you’re at $300. How do you leap from $300 to $1250? Or how do you leap from quitting your steady $5k paycheck at a 9-5 and go full-time with $20 classes or $300 weeks. First, ball buster… it’s impossible. There’s no way that you will survive from classes alone or one-off coaching clients. Not only financially but your body can’t physically do that. And the bummer part is that teacher training, coaching trainings don’t speak about ANY of this. I know because I’ve been in a 200-hour yoga teacher training, and 300-hour yoga teacher training, and a life coaching certification, plus countless other continued ed programs. None have been close to what I’m about to explain. I am the first person to tell you to follow your passion. And I’m also the first person to be like, ok let’s crunch some numbers though.

Maybe it’s the ♉️ Taurus ♉️ in me that needs a strong foundation, or the fact that my first job after undergrad was in accounting….nonetheless this conversation needs to happen closer to yesterday. I’m here to show you how to actually make a liveable wage with your passion. I will promise you it won’t happen overnight. And I can reassure you that it takes patience, practice, persistence (the three p’s, a topic I love talking about). And I am so confident that you can actually do it.

Here are a few tips and some number crunching on hitting your income goals!

Change your Mindset!

You don’t need to prove you’re a full-time yoga teacher by equating the number of hours you spend teaching or doing yoga stuff. You will not be doing 40 hours of teaching. Similar in coaching and consulting— I remember being in a “regular” 9-5 and I definitely did not work the whole 8 hours. So, let’s remove that fake news from our mind that we need to be doing something for 40 hours of our week. For a long time, I considered myself a full-time teacher and I only taught 1 class per week.

Crunch the numbers

I get so fiery and passionate and angry about this. I get angry because studios don’t want to pay us! I get angry because the industry doesn’t want to change! I get angry because the wellness industry is a billion-dollar industry but that’s exclusive to the CEOs and not the people making the change! And I get angry because this is not taught in the training’s we take that are meant to set us up for success. Yet so many people end up wanting to “teach full-time” or “make my passion my job.” Honey, it is your job. All you gotta do is change your mindset. And diversify your income a bit more.

So, you’re trying to make $5k right?

Be honest with your community, I charge this much because I need to make a living. I am not a donation-center. I am not a 501(c)(3). I am not the Goodwill. Yes, perhaps other studios can make that happen because they actually are non-profits and they get funding elsewhere. Are you getting funding elsewhere? If so, let your community know. I can offer my classes at a donation rate because I get funding through_____. If you have a partner that supports your journey as a passionate teacher, coach, healer—I would suggest being transparent with your community as well as to why that is possible for you specifically because not every passionate practitioner has that priviledge in their life.

Your new money mindset

“I strive to make my offerings accessible and in that accessibility I value myself. I value my craft and these are the price structures that I can offer to make this a career.”

The 8-hour working day

News flash if you haven’t heard:

1 hour session or 1 class = 3 hours of your time. Period. End of story.

I know it seems like, oh just one hour. It’s not. It’s your prep time. It’s your set up or getting there. It’s your presence and taking a few breaths to arrive with yourself. And it’s your energy. Plus driving back or unwinding. Not to mention if you’re doing marketing beforehand for it. So, if a one-hour offering is actually three-hours and a typical work schedule is eight-hours — how many classes or sessions can you hypothetically teach in the 8-hour work day model? 2.5 sessions. And let’s say you decide to work a “traditional” 5 days per week… you need to make $250 per day to make $5k ($5000/4 weeks=$1250/5 days=$250 per day) If you’re teaching 2 classes (modest round down) you need to make $125 per class to make that happen. *Smh* Please email me at [email protected] if there’s a studio out there in the world that pays $125 per class. I’m dying to know! With this model, you’re also teaching 12 classes per week. Meaning your mornings, weeknights, and lunch hour are probably all full. You have the luxury of having 1 pm free.

The new business model for yoga teachers, coaches, and consultants

Diversify your income

If you’re a teacher, teaching cannot be the bulk of how you make money. It’s mostly an introduction to your style, passion, and personality. When you set it up correctly, it’s the place you’re going to make the least amount of money. You gotta find a strategy that funnels them down to other offerings that are higher-scale, more expensive, and require more of your energy. That could be workshops, or an extended coaching program, or retreats. Here’s an example of what a diversified monthly teaching income looks like — Teaching/Privates: $700 — Workshops: $1000 — High-end offering (consulting, coaching, retreats): $2300* — Current total income: $4000 In this calculation, hitting these smaller goals seems a bit more manageable to start. Second, you might notice that after I summed it up we’re actually $1K short. So, what can you do to make an extra $1K? Can you monetize another skill? What if you made closer to $900 for your teaching/privates? What does that look like? When you crunch some numbers it’s not so bad: If 3 people show up for your class and pay you closer to $20 per class—that’s $60 per class. You only need to teach 4 classes for the week to meet your $900 teaching goal. You’ll actually be at $960! Let’s say you switch to a membership model, you need 20 people in your membership at $45/month to generate that $900. We’re getting closer to $5K. My point is that it’s a trial and error. It’s a process. You’ll do a few things and then realize you need to charge more or switch up some things. You’ll notice an asterisk around high-end offerings — you may not always be offering a retreat, or a coaching program so you’ll need to spread this income across a few months. If that’s the case, how many high-end offerings do you need per year? Do they need to overlap? Questions that need to be planned. You can’t exactly wing it each month. There are so many creative ways to design your business model! I’ve heard of teachers teaching at a community college. I’ve heard of coaches having a part-time role at a University as a career counselor. It’s endless! You just gotta be clear with what YOU want and a realistic goal for each stream.

The New Passionate Mindset

Your time, energy, knowledge is so powerful. It is up to us as practitioners to educate our people on our pricing model. Yes, make it accessible and include tiered pricing or sliding scale but think of, what is the energy or underlying message behind “donation” versus “sliding scale.” Vanessa from the Wealthy Goddess Movement says, Money: The story or narrative we attach to it. Currency: Flow, energy, think of a current. Wealth: Wisdom. Lasts forever. I would encourage you to stop thinking of your classes or one-off sessions as your main source of income. It’s actually the least source of income you’ll make. Think of your classes as an invitation. An invitation to continue a relationship and grow with you! Allow them to grow with you by having these various sources of income to support you. From all my business ventures I have 4 sources of income (consulting, coaching, teaching, workshops). In the past, I’ve had retreats as a source of income. It’s doable. Reach out to me if you’re curious about more details. Or check out the latest mastermind group  Mindful Marketing Spiral Mastermind. Applications are open and we start April 8th. You’ll talk with other practitioners about what they’re doing and empower yourself with the right business and markering skills. You got this!!!!!!

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P.S Final thought.

If you’re making $5k as a self-employed business owner (aka most likely you) you’re not “taking home” $5k. You need to set aside money for taxes and expenses.

This is an example of what that breakdown looks like

Revenue ………………………..$5,000

30% for Taxes & OpEx…..<$1,500> *Est. 30%, you’ll need to figure out your own %

Take-home income………….$3,500  

So the next time you accept a $40 class or a $100 engagement. Think about what amount you’re actually making. Look at the breakdown for a $40 class as an example Revenue……..$40

30%…………<$12>

Income……..$28

Even further if 1-hour = 3-hours of your time, you just made $9/hour. That’s less than minimum wage (just sayin’).