Meet Lewis Raymond Taylor, founder of The Coaching Masters
Lewis Raymond Taylor is the Founder of The Coaching Masters, a tech-driven online coaching business for aspiring life coaches. A rapidly growing platform, The Coaching Masters has seen 100% year-on-year growth with over $4m in revenue to date, a thriving online and offline community and 5,000 customers from 71 countries.
Tell us about the founder behind the brand?
Looking at where I’m at now in life, compared to where I was a few years ago, I still can’t believe how much my life has changed. I lived through an incredible amount of adversity in my earlier years, and just seven years ago, when I was 24, I was serving my third prison sentence. The person I was, and the situation I was in, have hugely shaped where I am today.
I am now the Founder and CEO of The Coaching Masters. This online coaching platform qualifies, accredits and helps people become coaches while providing coaching and guidance on how to market and build their businesses. The business has seen incredible growth and was recently valued at $25million, which is mind-blowing. I split my time between the UK and Bali, which I’ve found has a great community of digital entrepreneurs, and I am also a motivational speaker, speaking on stages across the world.
There’s always a lightbulb moment before the beginning of a new venture. What was that moment for you?
It was during the third prison sentence that I had my defining moment. I had an abusive childhood, resulting in years of violence and destructive self-sabotage. I had absolutely no direction and was making bad decisions. I was sitting on the edge of my bed in prison and realised that I just couldn’t go on in life like I was.
I decided to start making changes. I invested a lot of time in rediscovering myself. I worked with counsellors and read every self-help book I could find. I went into rehab for six months and attended 12- step drug and alcohol meetings daily. I also began volunteering with charities and realised how much I enjoy helping others, which led me to become interested in becoming a Life Coach and helping give back to others.
What inspired you to launch your business and what is the end goal?
The adversity I went through in my earlier years and the healing journey I went on inspired me to help others find their happiness. This, along with my charity work, led me to become a Life Coach, and it spiralled from there. I started connecting with people on social media, and I built a solid client base within six months. Within eight months I was earning a six figure income, and by the time I hit my first year in business, I was fully booked, with a dedicated online community of thousands of people and a monthly membership service designed to fulfil the demands of multiple clients.
I started to become inundated with requests from other coaches asking my secrets and how I was able to rise so quickly, so I shared my learning with them and they also saw some amazing results with their businesses. Fast forward three years in business, and I am now a senior accredited coaching trainer, and the founder and CEO of The Coaching Masters. I have big ambitions for the business and there isn’t an end goal as such - we’re focused purely on growing, helping more people fulfil their dreams of becoming coaches and expanding across the globe.
How do you set yourself apart from other businesses in your industry?
Firstly, we make The Coaching Masters accessible and affordable for everyone. It is based around a low-cost subscription model, leading to it becoming known as ‘The Netflix of coaching’. For $9.99 per month, there are 100s of hours of valuable coach training video content with the option to upgrade for further qualifications to elevate your coaching business.
Our online community is incredibly strong, and many of the people who participate in our courses form close connections. The vast majority of the business is still purely online. However, we recently launched ‘Café Coach’ – an offline hub for the coaching community - which allows people to connect face-to-face. Café Coach is an inspiring place for other coaches to work, learn and meet. Our first branch is based in Bali.
Also, our new interactive app - Coachapp - is launching soon, and is unlike anything the coaching world has seen before. It connects coaches and coachees, enables users to grow with e-learning products, including accredited qualifications, cutting-edge virtual reality and artificial intelligence and enables coaches to exchange services and earn directly into their secure online wallet.
What plans do you have for The Coaching Masters over the next two years?
It’s an exciting time for us with lots in the pipeline.
We’re going to Crowdfund and give savvy investors the opportunity to become shareholders in our platform. We’re aiming to raise an estimated $2m USD. This will go live in October so we’ll be able to finish the year with the funds in place, ready to expand in 2023. This investment will mean we can hire more talented team members, help scale and innovate new technologies to help serve our customers more efficiently, and accelerate our marketing efforts to expand our user base internationally.
The funds will also help launch CoachApp and we will also be rolling out more Café Coach hubs in other countries worldwide, enabling more coaches to connect in the real world.
How did you fund the launch of your business and what creative strategies did you use to execute a minimal cash flow?
I didn’t have any outside investment when I launched. When I first started coaching, and it was just me, it all grew organically through social media. The build of The Coaching Masters was funded through the money I earned coaching. In fact, it wasn’t until April 2022 that any outside investment came into the business.
What do you think gives a brand longevity?
We put our energy into three main areas and that seems to work really well for us. They may evolve in the future, but currently:
We focus on quality. This is important for any business, but especially for coaching businesses. People are looking for results; if you can deliver on this, they will keep coming back.
We're constantly innovating. It’s important to keep up with the latest trends and technologies and to be at the forefront of innovation in your industry.
A strong community. A supportive community can be invaluable for long-term success. If you can build a community of like-minded people who are invested in your brand, they will stick with you through thick and thin.
What social media channel would you say has worked the best for your business and why?
We’ve found that Facebook and Instagram have worked the best for us regarding reach and engagement. We put a lot of effort into creating quality content that our audience will find useful, and we make sure to post regularly. We also use Facebook Ads to target specific groups of people who might be interested in our courses. People seem to think that there is some magic formula to social media, but it’s just a matter of trial and error and being painfully consistent until you find what works best for your business.
What are your top tips for entrepreneurs wanting to get their business out there?
There's no one-size-fits-all answer to this, as every business is different, but I can offer some general advice; do your research. This sounds obvious, but you would be surprised how many people don’t do their research before launching a business. You need to know who your competitors are and what they’re offering. Be prepared to work hard. Many people think that starting a business is easy, but it’s a lot of hard work. If you’re not prepared to put in the hours, then it’s probably not going to be for you. And finally, don’t give up. It’s easy to get discouraged when things aren’t going how you want them to, but it’s important to persevere. If you believe in your business, things will eventually start to fall into place.
Do you prioritise self-care as an entrepreneur?
This is very important to me. I have suffered with mental health issues, and I know that looking after myself will help keep me in a good place. So many people are obsessed with getting the perfect morning routine or working out for hours every day, but I think it’s more important to find what works for you. Maybe it’s taking a yoga class once a week, surfing when the waves are good or going for a run when you need some time to clear your head. Taking the time to listen to what your body and mind are actually asking for is true self-care to me.
How do you prepare for an AI centric world?
It’s funny, as coaching is obviously a very personal thing and connecting with a coach on a personal level is really key and so a lot of what we do can’t necessarily be done by tech. But we can definitely automate certain areas of how our platform works and make the process as seamless for users as possible. For example, our new CoachApp will utilise AI to help connect coaches and coachees.
