It can be hard to distinguish between imposter syndrome, fear and an inkling of intuition that is trying to tell you this isn’t the right path. Is questioning a decision being reasonable and rational or overthinking and self-sabotage. What even are the ways imposter impacts your business?
When you’ve lived with your imposter syndrome for so long you can start to overlook the ways it impacts you and your business. It’s like the paintings and pictures on your walls after a certain length of time you stop noticing them.
So let’s highlight five ways imposter impacts your business, what the signs are and ideas on how you can reduce the impact and create awareness.
1. Doing your soul work
Are you holding back from helping people by doing the thing that lights you up? Do you need another qualification before you can help people do that thing? Or are you sticking with a service because you’ve done it for years so it’s safer than doing what you are really passionate about
When we go into business for ourselves we have free range on what we want to do. But this range of endless possibilities is prime territory for our imposter. Second-guessing. Doubts. Continually considering changing direction. Which just couldn’t happen in a job.
Ask yourself if you’d be happy doing this work all day, every day. Try not to focus on what you ‘think’ you could or can sell. Is helping your client do the thing going to give you the deep soul satisfaction that a dream job would? Because you have the opportunity to create that dream job!
2. Over Delivering
Do you find yourself always giving more to clients? Always letting session times expand. Continually answering questions even though it would be better to wait until you have a session. Or throwing in extra sessions, more resources or going beyond the originally agreed scope of your work?
Over delivering often comes from our imposter because we doubt our abilities, we disregard our experience and value. The little voice in our head questions our value and we end up undervaluing our skills, abilities and experience.
But over delivery isn’t always a service to the client. Are they going to be overwhelmed with all the things they have to do if you give them 6 sessions, 4 freebies, 10 journal prompts and a list of resources, books and videos that could be helpful? Review what you offer through the lens of feeling achievable., And review how you respect other people’s time.
3. Avoiding Making Offers
When was the last time you posted an offer on your social media channel? The post where you tell people exactly how you can help them and how much it would cost and the outcomes they could achieve. Do you post in Facebook groups every day except the day you are allowed to promote your services?
One thing our ego hates is rejection, and our imposter can scare us into inaction because it often takes the opportunity to say ‘I told you so, I told you nobody would want your stuff’.
The conundrum with not offering is that we only really give ourselves the opportunity to be accepted if we allow the possibility of being rejected. People can’t buy if you don’t make offers. But if you make offers and people don’t buy you could view that as being rejected. Or you could view that as not being a good fit and move onto the next potential client.
4. Content
I don’t know what my audience wants to hear. Who I am to tell people how they should manage their mindset? What if someone disagrees with me on social media?
Releasing content, whether newsletter, blogs, podcasts, video or even just posting on your social media all require YOU to say SOMETHING. Because just posting pretty quotes is unlikely to result in potential clients. And we’ve heard hundreds of times that content marketing is essential for online businesses.
But that doesn’t make it any easier. So start with topics you are comfortable with, safe topics. You don’t have to get ranty, opinionated and polarising immediately. I’m sure there are heaps of topics in your service area that you could talk about that would be helpful for your client to understand more about. Then pay attention to what people engage with and try to do more of that with a dash of experimenting with new topics.
5. Under Charging
Who am I to charge that? People won’t pay me $800 for a six-session coaching package. Why would they pay me so much when other people do it cheaper?
Remember when you are pricing it isn’t just the hourly cost, there’s your whole experience and your uniqueness. And remember people are paying you for you to help them achieve the outcome. Yes, it seems easy to you, but clearly it doesn’t seem easy to them else they would have achieved it already. We all need outside help because we can’t be good at everything.
Review your price from the perspective of what is it ‘costing’ your clients not to get the outcome you help them achieve? What is the transformation worth? Make a few sales at a price in your comfort zone and then consider raising it to a point just above your comfort zone.
My Experience
I have all five of these impacts, symptoms and signs. I’ve held back from helping people with imposter because finance was safe and everyone needs finance, right? My sessions often run overtime because I want to give more, even with free sessions. I ‘forget’ to post in groups on promotion day. Writing this blog is giving me the ‘what if someone disagrees’ worry. And I constantly question my pricing, is it too much?
Reduce the Ways Imposter Impacts Your Business
You don’t have to get them ALL under control to be successful. You don’t have to get ANY of them under control. But you do need to assign the right level of attention to them. Use the insights they offer, adjust if necessary but keep going. Find ways to reassure your imposter that everything will be okay.
If you need help taming your imposter, identifying when it’s imposter and when it’s something else, and harnessing the insights that your resistances have to offer then book a free chat about how we could work together.
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