Confidence comes with practice some say – once you get better at something you’ll also become more confident. Others say that you are born with it – you either are confident or not. I believe in the first statement – you can practice things and become more confident, even if you start out being very insecure about doing something.
The same way with marketing – you will immediately recognize a confident person when you enter the room – they have some kind of a quiet aura about them, they seem grounded and people seem to gravitate towards them. I am not talking about this brash confidence when you are rude and loud – this is overconfidence, aggression even. The real confidence takes into account others and holds them as valuable and equal. Not better or worse but equal in their own powers and knowledge.
It is difficult to be confident if you are not sure what is expected of you or what you need to do in a situation. If you haven’t been marketing yourself, it would not be easy to just get out there and on with it. Even for the most confident people in their non-business life.
There are also lots of misconceptions about marketing – you are supposed to sell and promote. Marketing is trying to sell things to people who don’t necessarily want it. Some people say that they are even allergic to marketing.
Yet marketing should not be anything that makes you cringe. Marketing is a way of building a bridge between the people who want the service or product and the people who provide it. It is a simple tool to match the right people with the right offer for them. Doesn’t that make you feel a little less anxious about marketing yourself?
One more thing to make you even more confident – you can behave like you normally would also when marketing yourself. You do not have to push or sell your products. If pushy salespeople turn you off, then don’t try to be them.
But how do you turn your normal conversations into a marketing conversation? It starts from knowing what you are able to offer and what your product or service helps your clients with. Then you can have a conversation and find out the other person’s preferences, ideas, their pain-points and find out whether they need your product or service.
If they don’t, you might recommend something that would help them and if you believe they would, ask whether they have considered that. This way you are inviting your conversation partner to engage in a discussion of how to help him or her. If they say they have, but don’t think it is right for them, don’t start listing benefits, ask them instead why not? You’ll learn something and can use it to develop your product or make your marketing more clear.
If you are wondering about how to be more confident in your marketing conversations, consider joining the Confident Marketing Club. This way you will have some tools at your fingertips to figure out what you need to know about your Ideal Clients and how to engage them in a conversation. Read more about Confident Marketing Club here.
