Tips & Talk 25 – Let’s Rank Your Confidence Level
Certainly this varies from day to day and in different situations, but having a solid level of confidence overall is necessary in order to be a successful business owner. Small handmade product businesses in particular need a leader who projects confidence. You are the focal point as the maker right beside your fabulous products.
Pulling from a talk by Lisa Paden at the Gift Designer’s Conference, let’s talk about 5 Traits of Low Confidence and how to address these obstacles to get the results you’re seeking.
Here are the traits we’ll address:
- Doubting your abilities
- Feeling ilsolated
- Running from challenges or taking risks
- No self grace
Upgrade your ranking in these areas and you’ll see an impact on your sales and happiness!
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Transcript
Hi there.
Speaker:It's Sue.
Speaker:And thanks for joining me for tips and talk day.
Speaker:These are bite-sized topics that I pull from community questions and
Speaker:things that I'm observing in the world of handmade small business.
Speaker:If you'd like to submit a topic,
Speaker:DME, over on Instagram at gift biz unwrapped,
Speaker:how's your confidence ranking.
Speaker:I'm recently back from Phoenix,
Speaker:where I attended the gifted designer conference kicking off that event.
Speaker:Lisa Payden from the personal gift basket did a presentation on
Speaker:creating a confident you and I heard what she had to
Speaker:say. I thought,
Speaker:ah, ha,
Speaker:this could be a tips and talk conversation where I can
Speaker:add my personal spin to the things that she's talking about.
Speaker:This whole idea of confidence is so important because it literally
Speaker:can make or break your business.
Speaker:As I work with people who are just starting out,
Speaker:I'll tell you some people don't even take the very first
Speaker:step because they're concerned about themselves and whether they can actually
Speaker:do it.
Speaker:And this plays right into a portion of Lisa's presentation,
Speaker:where she stated five traits of low confidence.
Speaker:I titled this,
Speaker:what's your confidence ranking,
Speaker:and I'm not doing a numbers thing where you have to
Speaker:add up your points and figure out where you are on
Speaker:a scale.
Speaker:But I want you to mentally just think to yourself,
Speaker:well, how am I ranking on each of these five points
Speaker:of low confidence?
Speaker:The first one is doubting your abilities.
Speaker:Where do you rank in terms of whether you think you
Speaker:have the ability to succeed in your business?
Speaker:Many have a dream that they'd like to pursue,
Speaker:but they're afraid that it's not going to be able to
Speaker:work for them because why they don't have any business experience
Speaker:never in their past.
Speaker:Have they ever been really working to do something themselves?
Speaker:They've always been working for someone and being told what they
Speaker:should do or what their job is.
Speaker:And now it would be all on them.
Speaker:So they're worried about if they actually have the experience and
Speaker:the ability to run their own business.
Speaker:I'll also see people being concerned about marketing and sales.
Speaker:I've never done that before.
Speaker:I'm not outgoing secretly an inter divert all of those types
Speaker:of things.
Speaker:When you're thinking that way,
Speaker:you're mentally getting in your head,
Speaker:that you don't have the ability.
Speaker:Let me share with you the real truth.
Speaker:You can have as much book smarts as you want.
Speaker:And I'll see people who have a lot of experience,
Speaker:they have that degree and they're no better than somebody who's
Speaker:just starting out without having had the experience.
Speaker:So I want you to stop thinking about,
Speaker:do I have the ability,
Speaker:especially with all the access that we have these days to
Speaker:all different resources,
Speaker:information, it's so much she's your now than ever before.
Speaker:You don't need coding.
Speaker:You don't need tons of technical ability.
Speaker:You need your skill.
Speaker:You need what you bring to the product that you create.
Speaker:And from there you can learn everything else.
Speaker:So this first one,
Speaker:again, doubting your abilities.
Speaker:This decreases your level of confidence.
Speaker:The same second one that Lisa talked about was feeling isolated,
Speaker:feeling like you're in this all by yourself.
Speaker:So how are you ever going to learn everything?
Speaker:Because you're all alone.
Speaker:I think the reason why we feel less than confident with
Speaker:this particular one is that we're afraid to reach out for
Speaker:help. We're afraid to ask other people or even admit that
Speaker:maybe we don't know something.
Speaker:When in truth,
Speaker:there are so many people available to help you at the
Speaker:conference that I've been referencing here.
Speaker:They're all people with similar types of businesses and what are
Speaker:we doing?
Speaker:We're in a room supporting each other because we're each in
Speaker:certain areas of the country.
Speaker:We each have different audiences.
Speaker:So don't feel like you have to either keep your product
Speaker:so close to you and not let other people know about
Speaker:it because you're afraid they're going to steal your idea or
Speaker:all those other things.
Speaker:If you're feeling like your,
Speaker:just all by yourself,
Speaker:reach out to business groups like chamber of commerce or small
Speaker:business association,
Speaker:and start rubbing shoulders with other people who are doing a
Speaker:similar thing to you,
Speaker:because there is no reason you should feel isolated,
Speaker:nor is that the best way to achieve success.
Speaker:You want to be surrounded with other people who are doing
Speaker:something very similar to you.
Speaker:Point number three of traits.
Speaker:When you have low confidence is running from challenges,
Speaker:not taking risks at all.
Speaker:Anyone you talk to who's had a successful business will tell
Speaker:you that you take more risks and you see that things
Speaker:don't necessarily work out the way you want many,
Speaker:many, many times before you actually land what works.
Speaker:This is just part of the gig.
Speaker:This is part of what you buy into.
Speaker:When you decide you're going to build your own business,
Speaker:you're going to try something.
Speaker:It's not going to work.
Speaker:You're going to tweak it a little bit.
Speaker:You'll try something else.
Speaker:It might not work.
Speaker:You'll hear about something that someone else is doing.
Speaker:You try that.
Speaker:Maybe it works a little bit for you.
Speaker:And then finally you land on something that is the golden
Speaker:gem that really works for you.
Speaker:But it's by taking all of these little individual steps that
Speaker:you get to the point where something actually truly works.
Speaker:You need to be a risk taker.
Speaker:Yeah, it's going to be uncomfortable.
Speaker:But when you think of these things as experiments and you
Speaker:take these risks,
Speaker:that's when see success.
Speaker:And if you run from everything,
Speaker:if you just want to do it,
Speaker:the easy,
Speaker:safe way,
Speaker:you'll never get anywhere.
Speaker:Point number four,
Speaker:comparing yourself to others.
Speaker:When you compare yourself to authors,
Speaker:obviously you get intimidated and your confidence drops way down.
Speaker:All right?
Speaker:Comparisonitis we all have it.
Speaker:No matter how successful you are.
Speaker:If you start looking at what other people are doing,
Speaker:it starts to intimidate you and make you feel maybe a
Speaker:little bit less than,
Speaker:and maybe someone else's doing something better than you.
Speaker:It's natural to feel that way.
Speaker:I found the best thing is look at other people who
Speaker:are doing something similar and use it to your advantage versus
Speaker:it totally tanking your confidence.
Speaker:What are they doing that you could add to what you're
Speaker:doing? And honestly,
Speaker:not everything that other businesses do is something that would integrate
Speaker:well within your own company.
Speaker:Even if you're selling the same product,
Speaker:because you have different audiences,
Speaker:yours spin off your business in terms of the messaging that
Speaker:you bring might be different.
Speaker:So you always want to look at what other people are
Speaker:doing in your industry,
Speaker:and then judge for yourself of whether it applies to your
Speaker:business or not,
Speaker:not judging that they're doing something that you're not doing.
Speaker:And for whatever reason,
Speaker:then they're better.
Speaker:That's when the comparison itis comes in.
Speaker:The other thing to keep yourself in check.
Speaker:When you're looking at other people is remind yourself of how
Speaker:long they've been in business.
Speaker:If you've started only a year or two ago,
Speaker:and you're comparing yourself against somebody who's been in business for
Speaker:10 or 15,
Speaker:nine years,
Speaker:obviously you're going to see things a little more buttoned down.
Speaker:They've been doing this way longer than you have.
Speaker:So don't use them as a marker in the sand of
Speaker:what you have or haven't achieved yet.
Speaker:There are also people I will say that start their business
Speaker:and right away just catapult and move forward very quickly.
Speaker:Well, that's great,
Speaker:but they might have hired coaches.
Speaker:They might have started with more funding than you.
Speaker:I mean,
Speaker:everyone starts at a different place.
Speaker:So you really need to think of your business as your
Speaker:own journey.
Speaker:Listen, there are lots of different reasons why people will start
Speaker:their business.
Speaker:Some of it is the empowerment that you feel the excitement
Speaker:of building something for yourself,
Speaker:getting out of being committed to somebody else for the nine
Speaker:to five and all of their goals.
Speaker:You want to work towards your goals.
Speaker:There are lots of different reasons.
Speaker:And you know,
Speaker:none of what I just said was only to make money,
Speaker:right? Because there are psychological reasons why you start your business.
Speaker:There are more concrete,
Speaker:financial reasons why you would start your business,
Speaker:et cetera.
Speaker:And when we're talking about confidence,
Speaker:all of that sits in psychological zone,
Speaker:doesn't it?
Speaker:Okay. Rounding this out.
Speaker:Point number five on Lisa's chart.
Speaker:No self grace.
Speaker:Why are we so hard on ourselves all the time?
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:when we trip just the littlest bit,
Speaker:we say such mean things to ourselves and we just put
Speaker:ourselves down in this little hole,
Speaker:like I knew you couldn't do this.
Speaker:Who were you thinking that you would be able to create
Speaker:your own business from scratch?
Speaker:No, no,
Speaker:no, no,
Speaker:no enough of that kind of thinking,
Speaker:give yourself some grace,
Speaker:especially if you're doing something for the very first time you're
Speaker:learning, you're going to improve and you're going to get better
Speaker:each and every time.
Speaker:And just think about something that maybe you've done in your
Speaker:life. That the first time you weren't so good at,
Speaker:but now that you've perfected your systems or your ways you've
Speaker:trained yourself,
Speaker:now you're a pro at it.
Speaker:So again,
Speaker:the five traits of lower self-confidence are doubting our abilities,
Speaker:feeling isolated.
Speaker:And I'm going to say feeling isolated versus needing to be
Speaker:isolated. You aren't three running from challenges.
Speaker:So not being a risk taker because that we have to
Speaker:do. If we're going to see any level of success,
Speaker:comparing ourselves to others,
Speaker:I know we do it.
Speaker:It feels so yucky,
Speaker:doesn't it.
Speaker:But if you put it into a different position in your
Speaker:mind about what you're actually looking at,
Speaker:when you look at others versus saying,
Speaker:they're better than me,
Speaker:just look at examples of things that they do,
Speaker:that you could potentially integrate in to up your game.
Speaker:And finally,
Speaker:this whole idea of self grace being nicer to yourself and
Speaker:allowing yourself to learn.
Speaker:A lot of us are moms here.
Speaker:If you're a little toddlers learning to walk and they fall
Speaker:down and skin,
Speaker:their knee do yell at them and tell them they're bad.
Speaker:And they'll never be a good Walker.
Speaker:Of course not.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:you lift them up and you tell them it's okay.
Speaker:It's okay.
Speaker:And then you guide them a little bit.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:you give them some stability.
Speaker:They strengthen their legs.
Speaker:And my guess is they learn how to walk.
Speaker:We need to do the same thing for ourselves.
Speaker:Okay? Have a little grace and caring and comfort for yourself.
Speaker:When you upgrade your whole support system and the ideas under
Speaker:this confidence factor,
Speaker:you'll see an impact on your sales because you're going to
Speaker:show up stronger.
Speaker:And just by being more confident,
Speaker:you're going to attract more business and more sales to you.
Speaker:We all know when you're talking with other people and they're
Speaker:like, oh yeah.
Speaker:Oh wait,
Speaker:you want to know how much that cost?
Speaker:Well, let me go back and look on my sheet,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:versus someone who says,
Speaker:oh yes,
Speaker:those are three for $15.
Speaker:And the great thing this product is<inaudible> that whatever you're going
Speaker:to say,
Speaker:you're much more likely to buy from someone who's interacting with
Speaker:you confidently.
Speaker:And if you're interested in purchasing guides,
Speaker:you along the path to the sale,
Speaker:Michelle James from uniquely made for more provided a great comment
Speaker:on this topic.
Speaker:She says,
Speaker:as humans,
Speaker:we're imperfect prone to fail and make mistakes.
Speaker:We need to accept our humanity,
Speaker:laugh at ourselves,
Speaker:brush it off and keep moving right on Michelle.
Speaker:And thanks,
Speaker:Lisa, for the inspiration for the topic today.
Speaker:Now let's all go out and face the world with confidence.
Speaker:That's a wrap.
Speaker:I'm a get to the point kind of girl.
Speaker:And this is what you can expect from these quick midweek
Speaker:sessions. Now it's your turn go out and fulfill that dream
Speaker:of yours.
Speaker:Share your handmade products with us.