Confidence as your Competitive Edge
In business
What if I was to tell you that your CONFIDENCE can be your competitive edge in your business.
Confidence is:
- A feeling
- To have trust in yourself whatever the outcome
- Can be built and strengthened
- Hard won and easy lost
- Not loud – its moving with purpose and intention
- A strategic asset, build it, maintain it and leverage it.
If CONFIDENCE is a strategic asset – an important resource or capability that a business can leverage to achieve mission, goals, and a sustainable competitive advantage – then why wouldn’t you use it to help you and your business grow and gain more clients?
Here’s 5 ways I believe you can use your CONFIDENCE as your competitive edge.
#1 Values Led Confidence
What are your values for your business? Do you live by them? Are they how you do business?
89% of business leaders say values driven decisions have helped them to move towards long term success.
If values are at the heart of your business, they can help to guide you, to make decisions, to set intentions, to provide boundaries, and when things feel a bit wobbly or a bit off, they can help to bring you back to the present and remind you why you are great at what you do and to stay in your own lane.
They aren’t just words on a piece of paper, they are behaviours and intentions that help you to create certainty which increased that confident feeling.
Yes, they will take work; no, you won’t always get it right; yes, they might change over time as you and your business evolve and grow.
My Values are:
Courage | Determination | Impact | Integrity | Authenticity | Curiosity
And you can see the behaviours that sit by the values. The behaviours determine for me how I do business and what I live by. Someone once said to me, if an alien came down from space and followed me around for a week, would they see me living into my values?
Values can guide you in your business;
- They give you clarity which always provides an instant confidence shot
- They help to reduce that comparisonisitis read blog post, because you can come back to them
- They create conviction for you and your clients, they are the ‘how’ you do stuff!
ACTION: Name 3 things that are important to you in your business, that could form your values – which ONE can you turn the volume up on? If you already have values which one can you turn up the volume on this year to build more confidence for you and your clients?
#2 Bold Positioning
The most confident of business owners aren’t vague about what they do and who they help. If your website says we help everyone with everything, your audience will hear and see nothing that stands out.
Get really clear about who you are and what you do and what makes you different and that’s why people will want to work with you. Understanding what makes you, you and makes you unique will give you that competitive edge.
When you’re a bit vague about this your confidence dips, self-doubt creeps in and your client’s confidence in you will dip too, creating their own self-doubt about working with you.
I have done quite a bit of work to determine the kind of coach I am, who I want to work with and don’t want to work with and the boundaries of the work that I can do with and for clients. I’m clear about who I want to work with and if something isn’t right, I’m brave enough to say that I don’t think I’m the right person. That’s not to say I don’t stretch my comfort zone and push myself, but I am clear.
If you connect with me, you’ll see I’ve positioned myself as a confidence coach – you’ll likely see stuff about BIG PANTS – but what you won’t necessarily know about me is that I’m also a facilitator and trainer – why? Because I wanted to boldly position myself as a confidence coach so that was what I focused on.
Of course, there will be clients who will engage with you and then choose someone else to work with, that’s ok, they aren’t your people. There will be people you won’t want to work with (but want the money), and it’s ok to say no, let your values guide you. You won’t be right for everyone. Remember you don’t like everyone, so why would everyone like you!
These examples are where your bold positioning and understanding of who you are will make it easier to say no. It also makes it clear to clients whether you might be right for them too, potentially saving you all time and money!
ACTION: Get clear on who you are and what you do in one succinct sentence. When someone asks you, you can tell them with absolute confidence.
#3 Consistent Visibility Builds Confidence
Show up consistently, even when it feels uncomfortable. Why? Because you can’t be the best kept secret. And repetition builds confidence. Get comfortable with the uncomfortable.
Being visible and consistent keeps you front and centre with your audience (old, current and new). It gives you a chance to talk about what do, who you work with and with each interaction you build that confidence muscle for you and your client.
So, whether that’s in person events or social media, showing up is important for your business. 95% of my business comes from networking, I show up, I’m consistent and I build relationships, backed up with a website, social media and an email list!
Networking feels awkward the first time you do it, you feel like everyone knows the deal and you don’t, you leave having ‘not got any business’, feeling like it was a waste a time, your confidence took a bit of a knock, so you don’t come again.
Remember, networking is the long game and the more you do it, the easier it will become. There is a statistic that says people need to interact with you 7 times or more before they work with you, so that one networking event was not a waste of time, but the start of you being visible and showing up. Your new client might not be at networking, but you network will get to know you so they can confidently recommend you.
Consistency of showing up will help to build know, like and trust for your fellow networkers and potential clients.
Then there is social media and whether you love or hate it consistency on there too often pays off. I’m no social media expert, but I do know for most of my clients and for me, consistency is key. Don’t get hung up on those vanity metrics of likes, comments etc (even though they will give you an instant dopamine hit and make you feel confident). There are lots of LinkedIn lurkers – people who never interact with your posts but will say to you oh I saw your post or best case scenario they message you and say I’ve been following you for a while and I’m ready to chat about working with you.
It’s unlikely you’ll ever feel confident the first time you do something – so stop waiting to feel ready. Confidence is built in small everyday actions. The more you do it, the easier it will become.
If networking feels hard, find someone to go with, check out the guest list beforehand and make a beeline for someone familiar or in your line of work.
If posting on social media feels like a step too far, comment on posts – I’ve had comments on LinkedIn that have had more reach than posts!
ACTION: Where can you regularly show up? Pick one and start there. If it’s networking – get signed up and go! If it’s social media, don’t overthink it, post, schedule it and then you can forget about it. Be consistent.
#4 Communicate with Authority and not Apology
To communicate confidently does not mean to be arrogant. Confident communication isn’t loud, or brash or rude. It’s clear. The language we use is so important in our confident competitive edge.
We need to stop making ourselves small with our language:
- Decide without over-explaining or justifying your decision
- Given X & Y, we’ll go ahead with Z
- Ask directly
- To move forward we’ll need sign off by Friday and a deposit of £X
- Set boundaries
- We don’t discount, we adjust our scope
- Say no (no is a full sentence too!)
- This isn’t a fit. Here’s an alternative.
One of the most common things we might come across as business owners is clients asking for “a little extra” and the tendency amongst business owners in a need to be liked and not to lose work would be to add it in. A better way to respond would be to say. “Happy to add that. It sits outside of what we have agreed so I can price it as an add-on or we can schedule it for phase 2. What works best for you.”
And ladies – this one is for you: please stop saying those bits that make you small.
- Just – sounds apologetic / diminishes your thoughts
- I just want to check
- I’m just curious
- Kind of / Almost – we use this when we’re uncomfortable
- I kind of think
- I almost think
- Sorry but
- Sorry to bother you
- Sorry if this is a silly question but
- A little bit – as if it’s not worth much more time
- I’d like to take a few minutes of your time
- I’d like to tell you a little bit
Maybe there are some men that can hear themselves in that small language too.
Having boundaries around your communication with your clients, protects your energy! The directness reduces friction, there is no mis-interpretation of messages. The clear communication can also signal competence to others, and people have trust in competence.
ACTION: What language do you need to drop or add to make your communication more confidence in 2026?
#5 Courageous Decisions
Courage provides a foundation for you to build confidence, to make the most of every opportunity that presents itself, and if we don’t have that courage to say yes in business where would we be?
Without courage, you can’t get to confidence.
Courage is: I’ve got this, I’ll keep going, I can do it, I’ll experiment, I’ll pick myself up and carry on.
Courage also is: admitting you were wrong, learning from others, saying you don’t understand, sharing your ideas and changing your opinion.
Now one of things about confidence that I’ve heard time and time again is people say I wish I was more confident – when actually what we are lacking is the courage to go and do that thing that we are putting off, that thing we’re procrastinating about, that thing we fear.
Because it’s those moments of courage where we make a decision to take action that confidence is built.
COURAGE in business might be:
- Saying yes to stuff that feels out of your comfort zone
- Your pricing – raising it to what you are actually worth
- Investment – in growth / business or personal
- Collaborations – with others – great for visibility
Each courageous action or decision you make is evidence that you can do the tough stuff!
I get my courage from pulling up my big pants, find out more about BIG PANTS, and facing into the things I find hard, the things I find a challenge, the things that make me nervous, anxious, clammy and make my heart race. The everyday things that require my big pants, that even includes my coaching sessions, where I have no idea what the outcome will be from that session. And remember, situations that require courage are different for everyone.
For me, those big pants are my version of a super hero cape because when I pull them up, it means I’ve made a courageous decision to take action.
ACTION: What an area you can be more courageous or a decision you’ve been delaying. What’s your next smallest step towards that in the next 24 hours?
And finally
As business owners we can’t wait until we feel confident to do everything, we don’t have that luxury. We do first and then our feelings catch up later. When your VALUES guide you, your BOLD POSITIONING gives you clarity, your VISIBILITY grows, your communication gives you AUTHORITY, and your COURAGEOUS decision making creates momentum, your CONFIDENCE becomes your COMPETITIVE EDGE.
