Positioning outcomes: More confidence

This is a squishy metric: How does one measure confidence? Yet it’s also something I hear from founders who have gone through a positioning workshop: We feel more confident talking about our paid product, our open source project and our company in general.

Nothing kills confidence quite like facing blank stares over and over again, or continually fielding questions that seem off-topic. When this happens, founders can get increasingly uncomfortable with not just their sales pitch but also their entire way of discussing the company.

Even worse, most founders are at a loss for what to do to fix this disconnect.

If you just wish people would understand your product’s value right away — but aren’t really sure where you’re going wrong — it’s probably a positioning problem. There are tons of benefits to better positioning, but the one that founders usually feel immediately, in the first conversation they have after a positioning exercise (either internal or with a consultant like me) is increased confidence.