10 Powerful NLP Techniques Every Coach Should Know
The subconscious tools that shift identity, behaviour, and results — fast.
There’s a moment in every coaching journey where the surface-level tools just… stop working.
Your client knows what to do. You’ve mapped out the strategy. You’ve cleared their calendar, scripted their launch, crafted the offer.
And yet — something is stuck.
They’re showing up… but not selling.
They’re planning… but not posting.
They’re close to a breakthrough… and suddenly self-sabotage hits.
This is where NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) comes in.
Because where strategy ends, the subconscious begins.
If you’re a coach who’s ready to work beneath the surface, these are the 10 NLP techniques that will change everything — for your clients, your confidence, and your coaching results.
1. Anchoring
Tap into emotional states on command.
Anchoring allows you to associate a physical movement, word, or visual cue with a specific emotional state — like confidence, calm, or motivation.
🔁 Think: setting up a “confidence anchor” your client can fire before a sales call, or an “ease anchor” to calm nervous system responses around visibility.
As a coach, anchoring gives your clients a tangible way to access the version of them that already exists — the one who leads, sells, and shows up with certainty.
2. Swish Pattern
Rewire unwanted patterns and habits quickly.
This technique rewires the automatic thought loops your client doesn’t even realise they’re running — like picturing failure every time they go to post online.
The Swish Pattern uses mental imagery to interrupt the old pathway and install a new, empowering one.
Perfect for procrastination, fear-based loops, and upper-limit sabotage.
3. Submodalities
Change the structure of how a thought is experienced.
Submodalities are the qualities of a memory or thought — things like brightness, size, sound, movement.
By shifting these details (e.g. shrinking a loud, overwhelming mental image), you can reduce the emotional charge around a fear or increase the intensity of a goal.
It’s a subtle but powerful reprogramming technique that feels like magic — and works fast.
4. Timeline Techniques
Release past events and rewire the future.
This is one of the deepest NLP tools, allowing clients to revisit a memory on the timeline of their life, extract the learnings, and let go of the emotional hold it had.
You can also use it to install future memories — creating subconscious safety around success, sales, and visibility before it happens.
Perfect for:
Fear of failure/success
Releasing past identity
Anchoring future results
5. Perceptual Positions
Change how you see a problem — instantly.
This tool shifts perspective by exploring a challenge from three views:
First position: your own view
Second position: the other person’s view
Third position: the detached observer
It’s a powerful technique for conflict, emotional regulation, and leadership development. It helps your client step out of reactivity and into wisdom.
6. Parts Integration
Heal inner conflict and become whole.
Ever had a client say, “Part of me wants to scale… and part of me wants to hide”?
This technique resolves inner conflict between two opposing parts of the subconscious — allowing the client to feel integrated, safe, and clear.
It’s especially powerful for coaches navigating visibility blocks, identity shifts, and sabotage.
7. Reframing
Change the meaning of an experience in real time.
NLP reframing isn’t just about “positive thinking” — it’s the art of shifting perception so your client experiences new emotion and behaviour automatically.
You’ll use this everywhere:
Reframing fear of selling into service
Reframing rejection into redirection
Reframing failure into feedback
Simple, but game-changing when used with precision.
8. Meta Model
_Clear confusion and upgrade internal language.**
The Meta Model teaches you how to ask precise, laser-focused questions that uncover distortions, deletions, and generalisations in your client’s language.
It helps you call out:
“I always mess up launches”
“No one wants what I sell”
“I can’t raise my prices”
So they can shift the story — and the behaviour that follows.
9. Milton Model
Influence and create subconscious openness with language.
This is the flip of the Meta Model — it’s more suggestive, hypnotic, and fluid.
You’ll use Milton Model language in:
Hypnosis tracks
Sales conversations
Content that lands deeply
It’s not about manipulation — it’s about speaking to the subconscious in a way that invites expansion.
10. Strategies
Map out how someone makes decisions or repeats patterns.
Every client has subconscious “strategies” they run:
A decision-making strategy
A sabotage strategy
A motivation strategy
When you can identify and adjust their internal code, you can create new outcomes — sustainably and quickly.
🧠 Why These Tools Matter
Your clients aren’t stuck because they’re lazy. They’re stuck because their subconscious believes it’s safer to stay small.
These tools help you meet them where they are — beneath the logic, inside the identity, and at the source of the belief.
Because once the subconscious shifts? The action becomes effortless.
This is what it means to coach with depth.
This is what sets you apart.
🎓 Want to Learn How to Use These NLP Tools?
At The Subconscious Institute, we don’t just teach NLP.
We train you to embody it.
Inside our NLP Practitioner Certification, you’ll:
Learn how to use all 10 techniques (and more) with confidence
Practice on real humans, not just scripts
Integrate the tools into your existing coaching offers
Leave feeling like the most powerful version of you — as a coach, leader, and subconscious guide
Because your work deserves tools that match your vision.
And your clients?
They deserve transformation that lasts.