From panic attacks over wedding budgets to building a thriving financial coaching business, Nicole Stanley’s journey is nothing short of inspiring. As part of our Success Stories series, we sat down with this Financial Coach Academy® graduate who turned her passion for personal finance into a career that’s changing lives.
Nicole, the owner of Arise Financial Coaching, has helped hundreds of women break free from debt, build savings, and become confident investors. But her path wasn’t always smooth. In this candid Q&A, Nicole pulls back the curtain on her transformation from a financially anxious newlywed to a successful entrepreneur.
She shares the fears and doubts that almost held her back, the surprising truths about scaling a coaching business, and the pivotal moments that shaped her success. Whether you’re considering a career in financial coaching or looking to take your existing practice to the next level, Nicole’s story offers valuable insights, practical advice, and a hefty dose of motivation.
Nicole: I became interested in personal finance in early 2015. I was newly engaged, in my early 20s, and suffering from a lot of financial anxiety. This anxiety was showing up in my engagement and wedding planning. The breaking point came when I was budgeting for my wedding. I kept doing the numbers, and they weren’t adding up. I actually had my first panic attack about money. I remember looking at my fiancé and saying, “If we can’t pay for this wedding where our friends are baking the cake and bartending, how are we going to afford a life together?” That was our big wake-up call.
We realized that financial stress was pervading everything. We decided to start taking courses and learning about personal finance. I became a total personal finance nerd. After learning about budgeting and how to manage my own money, we really turned our financial situation around. We paid off $30,000 worth of debt in 10 months, started investing, and did a live-in flip. I started helping friends and family for free because I didn’t know financial coaching was a job. I just thought it was something fun.
Nicole: When I learned about financial coaching, I Googled some financial coaches in my area because I thought there was already too much competition. I got a call from somebody who was a student of Financial Coach Academy®, and we met up for coffee. She had been coaching for a few years and talked to me about what it took for her to become a financial coach. She actually showed me the Financial Coach Academy®.
At the time, it felt like a lot of money. I hemmed and hawed for about six months, and then finally I pulled the trigger and got access to Financial Coach Academy®. That really changed the way I thought about a financial coaching business. Four months later, I launched Arise Financial Coaching.
Nicole: I studied business management in school, and then I went into a corporate sales job for about 10 months. That was the main way I paid off our debt – just smiling and dialing. It was a horrible, soul-sucking job, but it got us what we needed in terms of paying off debt. The second I paid off debt, I quit that job because I hated it, and I actually went into youth ministry. Shortly after that, I got pregnant with my first child, and I felt at the time that I should want to stay home, so I did that. But that actually wasn’t the best personal choice for me, which is why I started my financial blog and helping people for free.
The great catalyst for me starting the company after being a stay-at-home mom was when my husband was furloughed in 2020. At the time, I was helping people for free, and then when we lost our main source of income, we kind of looked at each other and said, “Well, what if you charge someone?” And that was the beginning of considering this as a business.
Nicole: When I started my business, I remember journaling and saying, if I could bring in $2,000 for my family, my life would be set. I would be so happy, it would be perfect in every way. I thought that goal was years away, but when I started my company, I actually hit that goal fairly quickly. I realized that it wasn’t just about the money for me.
It really became almost an addiction – financial coaching is like the ultimate way to really help people with what they’re going through. Not the vague stuff, but the real numbers of the obstacles they have, their struggles every day. It became something I couldn’t stop because it was so much fun. Once you see how much this really helps people, you just want to keep doing it.
Now in my company, I focus on how many people we get to help and how many lives we get to change. Since I have another full-time coach on my team, I’m able to multiply the coaching I was able to do on my own. That’s a major way I look at success in my business as I continue to grow – how many more lives can we help? How can we do it most efficiently? How can we do it the best in the marketplace so that people are getting coaching and getting this transformation?
Nicole: I know we’re finished with a client when they feel that their financial results make them feel successful. For each client, that’s different. It could be increased savings, a more fulfilling job, less stress in their marriage when they talk about their budget, or investing. They feel successful results-wise when it comes to money, or more successful than they were before, and they feel confident as a decision-maker around money.
Part of what we do as coaches is not just say, “Great, you saved all this money with me.” I haven’t done my job unless a client says, “Wow, I feel confident with money. Before I felt stressed, but now I know how to make decisions, whether it’s easy or hard. I trust myself with money. I have a generally positive relationship with money now.”
Nicole: The majority of my business is one-to-one coaching. We start with an initial session, or get them into a larger program. I have a six-month program and I just rolled out a three-month one. A lot of our clients stay with us for years. I’d say about 50% of the clients who do a coaching program that’s either 30, 90 days or six months end up staying with us for many years after.
Right now, the majority of our new clientele go to the full-time coach on my team, who I hired about three years into having the company. Before I hired her to expand my ability to serve more one-on-one clients, I created a group offering called the Financial Goal Accelerator. That’s a 12-month program that’s both a learning course and a way to hybrid coach people.
Nicole: I started on Instagram because it was cheap, free, and at the time, the easiest way for me to get my message out there. I’ve stuck with Instagram and Facebook being our main marketing channels for a while. I did start an email list early on because that’s what people said you should do. We have a really engaged email list at this time.
Over the past couple of years, as a way to gain visibility for free, I’ve started implementing pitching media sources and other podcasts to be a guest on their shows or a guest expert for their articles. That’s been really helpful for broadening our visibility and getting more people to find out about us.
Nicole: We mostly serve women and couples over the age of 30, though some clients are up to their 60s. Our goal is to serve someone who experiences high financial stress. Not the nonchalant people who say, “I just want to do things better.” We want people who feel stressed and have tried it all when it comes to budgeting. They’ve tried zero-based budgeting, maybe cash envelopes. They feel like they’re hitting their heads against the wall and want a better way.
We typically see that our clients are well-educated, high-earning women, so they’re pretty successful professionally. But there are always outliers in that group.
Nicole: I really enjoy my group program, but it’s nowhere near how I enjoy one-on-one coaching. I also feel that clients, at least with the way that I coach, get the best results with one-on-one coaching. I’m a high touch point person. I like to get into people’s business and really partner up with them.
I found myself getting burnt out with wanting to grow my business and being the main coach. I could only help the people that I could help, and if I wanted to help more people, I needed to max out my schedule. As a mom of three kids, with my youngest being one, I don’t have unlimited time. I need to make sure that I’m not burning out so that the people I do coach get the best coaching possible.
Nicole: Creating the program was the most helpful thing. Coaching is such a hot buzzword, but what does it even mean? What is coaching? Who pays money for coaches and why would they? The program setup was something I don’t think I could have figured out on my own.
I remember watching your session about the Eureka session and why you advocate for it. It was like a light bulb in my head. I understood how I could sell this product because it made sense to me. It was that building block of understanding who needs this product and then going from there.
Nicole: The best thing you can do is surround yourself with other people who are doing it, because everyone in your life is not going to understand what a financial coach is. The most impactful thing for me was joining the free groups and accessing the free resources available. I was able to surround myself with people who were new but also people who had successful businesses.
Watch all the free content available. Start asking your questions in those group sessions. Just start doing it and start getting in the community of people who are doing it. The resources are out there. And then the best thing you can do is buy the course. If you want a successful business and you’re too nervous to spend the money, remember that it’s doable. It’s not like becoming a rocket scientist. If you love helping people with their money, you can do this.
About Nicole Stanley
Nicole Stanley is owner and head money coach at Arise Financial Coaching. After paying off debt and increasing her family’s net worth through investing, she discovered her passion for helping women change their life through financial literacy and wealth.
Arise Financial Coaching has helped hundreds of women get out of debt, save, and become confident investors. Nicole and Arise have been featured on GMA, Yahoo Finance, Time, ABC News, Go Banking Rates, and more.
