What the client is checking
A client choosing a coach or therapist is asking three things of the credentials: is this person trained to do what they say, does anyone hold them to a standard, and can I check. Life coaching is unregulated in most countries, hypnotherapy and complementary therapy largely so, and clients know it. That is exactly why the accreditation, the training and the memberships carry weight. "Certified coach" in a sentence answers none of the three questions. Here is what does.
1. The credentials bar
A slim strip on every page, under the header or above the footer, with the logo of each body you belong to and, beside it, your membership or registration number where the body issues one. Each logo links to your entry on the body's public register or member directory, so the client can verify it without emailing you.
For a life coach that is the accreditation body and level (ICF, EMCC or the Association for Coaching, at the level you actually hold). For a hypnotherapist, the training school and the professional body or voluntary register. For a reflexologist or reiki practitioner, the professional body and the insurer. The number matters more than the logo. A logo can be copied; a number that resolves on a register cannot.
2. The credentials section on About
A dedicated section, not a paragraph, listing:
- Accreditation: body, level, year achieved, and what the level means in one plain line ("PCC requires 500 hours of coaching and an exam").
- Training: the qualification, the school, the year, and the hours or duration. Clients cannot judge a certificate name; they can judge "a two-year diploma with supervised practice".
- Memberships and registers: each body, and whether membership requires a code of ethics, insurance, supervision and continuing education. If it does, say so; that is the standard the client wants someone holding you to.
- Continuing education: the recent training you have done, briefly. It shows the practice is current.
3. The scope line
One sentence that says what your qualification lets you do and what it does not. For a health coach: "I am a certified health coach, not a registered dietitian; I support behaviour change and do not diagnose or prescribe." For a hypnotherapist: "I work alongside, not instead of, medical care." For a doula: "A doula is not a midwife; I do not provide clinical care." Clients trust the line, and regulators in most countries expect it. The health coach and doula sub-pages explain why it matters most for those practices.
4. Experience in numbers you can stand behind
Hours coached, years in practice, number of clients where you have counted. For life coaches these are the figures accreditation bodies themselves use, and clients read them the same way. Do not round up. "Over 800 coaching hours" is a claim you can support with your log; "thousands of lives changed" is not.
5. Insurance
"Professional indemnity and public liability insured" with the insurer named if you are comfortable, on About and in the bar. Holistic therapists and hypnotherapists in particular are asked about this, and many professional bodies require it as a condition of membership, which is worth saying.
6. Supervision and ethics
For hypnotherapists, relationship therapists and counsellors outside clinical settings: who supervises your practice, how often, and which code of ethics you work under, with a link. For coaches: the ethics code of your accreditation body. This is the answer to "does anyone hold you to a standard".
7. Where it appears
The bar on every page. The full section on About. A short version, two or three lines, on each who-I-work-with page and beside the Book button, because the decision to book is made there, not on About. On the hypnotherapist and holistic therapist sub-pages we describe it as the credentials being visible on the page the client is actually reading.
What not to do
- Logos of bodies you have left or never joined. Bodies check, and clients can.
- "Fully qualified" with no body, level or year.
- A certificate scan as an image with no text, which nobody can read on a phone and search engines cannot read at all.
- Training listed as a wall of course names. Pick what a client understands and put the rest in a collapsed list.
- Titles you are not entitled to. "Psychologist", "psychotherapist", "dietitian" and "counsellor" are protected in various countries and states; use the title your qualification gives you.
- Letting a lapsed membership stay on the site. Renewal dates go on the calendar.
Building it as records
Each credential as a record: body, logo, level or qualification, number, register URL, year, expiry or renewal date. The bar, the About section and the short versions render from the records; the renewal date triggers a reminder. Adding a new qualification is filling in a form, and nothing on the site goes out of date silently.
Where this sits
Credentials that a client can check, displayed as a bar with linked numbers, a plain section on About and a short version beside every Book button, are one of the six things every coaching practice website we build has to do. In a field where anyone can call themselves a coach, the checkable credential is the difference between a claim and proof.