Why the Enquiries That Excite You Waste the Most Time

You know the one.

A long, heartfelt email lands in your inbox. They've been following your work for ages. They say things like "I feel like you just get it" and "I've been looking for someone like you." Your stomach does a little flip. You clear space in your diary.

And then nothing. A vague reply. A "I'll get back to you when things settle down." Silence.

You're left wondering what you said wrong, whether your pricing scared them off, whether you're cut out for this at all.

Here's what I want you to consider: you probably didn't do anything wrong. The problem started before you even opened that email.

Enthusiasm and Readiness Aren't the Same Thing

The enquiries that feel most promising are often the ones furthest from an actual decision.

A long message, an excited DM, a "I've been following you for ages" doesn't tell you where someone is in their process. It tells you they're aware of their problem and they like you. Those are good things. They're just not the same as being ready to start.

That's human nature, and your marketing didn't cause it.

Research on therapy clients, which I think applies as a useful parallel for coaches, counsellors and healers, shows just how long the gap between "knowing I need help" and "actually getting help" can be. A 2025 analysis of the Australian National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing (Birrell et al., Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences) found the median delay from first symptoms to seeking treatment was 3 years for mood disorders and 11 years for anxiety disorders. The University of Sydney, reporting on the same study, put it even more starkly: Australians are waiting an average of 12 years to seek treatment for mental health and substance use disorders.

Twelve years of knowing something's off before taking action.

Again, these figures are about therapy clients, not coaching or healing clients. But if you work with people on anything personal, that gap between awareness and action should sound familiar. The person who's been "thinking about getting support" for two years and found you last week? They're aware. They might not be ready.

You Already Know This About Your Own Clients

Here's the thing that gets me: most practitioners understand this pattern completely in the people they serve.

You know that people sit with their pain for a long time before they reach out. You know that wanting to talk isn't the same as being willing to commit. You know that the first conversation is often just someone testing the water.

And yet, when an excited enquiry lands in your inbox, all of that knowledge goes out the window. Because it feels different when it's directed at you.

I had a call with a practitioner I'll call Kay (not her real name). She was struggling to attract clients and wanted help with quizzes. We had what felt like a really productive conversation. We looked at her business, found several gaps and talked through how to plug them. She was interested and engaged the whole way through. Then she said she'd come back to me. The moment I heard that, I knew it was the kiss of death. When people say they'll come back, they usually don't. And she didn't.

That moment, whatever yours looks like, is the cost of talking to people before you know where they actually are.

What It Costs You (And It's More Than Time)

Every discovery call or free chat with someone who isn't ready costs you three things.

Time, obviously. An hour here, half an hour there, the prep before, the follow-up after.

Energy. You show up fully for these conversations. You listen, you think, you care. That's not nothing.

Confidence. This one's the sneaky one. When someone disappears after what felt like a great chat, you start second-guessing yourself. You wonder if your offer is wrong, if your prices are off, if you said something that put them off. You tinker with things that don't need tinkering.

The readiness research backs this up too. A meta-analysis of 39 studies by Norcross, Krebs and Prochaska (Journal of Clinical Psychology, 2011) found that "the amount of progress clients make during treatment tends to be a function of their pretreatment stage of change." That's again from the therapy literature, but the logic translates: where someone is when they arrive shapes everything that follows. Talking to someone who's not ready doesn't move them to ready. It just drains you both.

A Short Quiz Changes the Conversation Before It Starts

What if, before someone reached your calendar, they'd already done something that helped them understand where they are?

That's what a short self-assessment or quiz does. Think of it as a bridge into the conversation.

When someone completes a quiz before booking a call with you, a few things happen:

• They get something useful straight away, a result, a reflection, a starting point
• You learn where they are before you've said a word to them
• They've invested a small amount of effort, which means they're already more engaged

That last point matters more than it sounds. Research from Norton, Mochon and Ariely (Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2012) on what they called the IKEA effect found that people value things more when they've put effort into them, with the important caveat that the effort has to result in completion. So the quiz has to be short enough to finish. Not a 40-question deep-dive. Something someone can do in five minutes and actually get to the end of.

On the conversion side, Interact's own platform data from their 2026 report found that about 4 in 10 people (40.1%) who start one of their quizzes go on to leave their contact details. That's a meaningful number of people who are actively raising their hand.

The people who don't complete it, or who see their result and don't take the next step, have sorted themselves out. On their own terms, without a call that leaves you both feeling awkward.

What This Looks Like in Practice

I built a short quiz called the Client Attraction Score for practitioners exactly like you: counsellors, coaches, energy healers, consultants, anyone who wins clients on trust.

It takes about two minutes and gives you a clear picture of where your client attraction is actually stuck. Not a vague "you need better marketing" result. Something specific you can do something with.

It's also an example of what I mean in action. Before we talk, you've already got something useful. You've reflected on your own situation. You arrive to any conversation with me knowing more about yourself than you did before.

That's the experience you can create for the people who find you.

Want to Build Your Own?

If you're a practitioner who's tired of exciting enquiries that go cold, building a short quiz or self-assessment is one of the most practical things you can do this year.

At the time, I didn't have a quiz programme to point Kay towards. Her enquiry is one of the reasons I created the 30-Day Quiz Builder Challenge.

In the challenge, I walk you through creating yours, step by step, in a way that actually fits how you work and who you serve.

Start by taking the Client Attraction Score to see where you're at right now.

Then, if building your own feels like the right next step, come and find out more about the 30-Day Quiz Builder Challenge.

Questions people ask

Is a quiz only useful if I have a big audience?

A quiz works at any list size because it changes the quality of conversations, not just the quantity. Even a small number of people completing a self-assessment before they reach you can cut the time you spend on calls that go nowhere.

Won't adding a step before booking put people off?

A short quiz that gives people something useful, like a personalised result, gives them a reason to take part. Interact's own platform data from their 2026 report found that about 4 in 10 people who start a quiz go on to leave their contact details, which suggests people are willing to participate when there's a clear payoff for them.

How long should a quiz be?

Short enough to finish in one sitting, ideally five minutes or less. Research by Norton, Mochon and Ariely on the IKEA effect found that the value people place on something they've completed only applies when they actually reach the end, so a quiz that's too long works against you.