Episode 79: From Self-Doubt to Six Figures: The Marketing Consultant's Journey to Trusting Your Expertise

Season #1 January 29, 2026

Episode 79: Show Notes

What if the skills that come most naturally to you are actually your most valuable consulting assets, but self-doubt is keeping you from charging what you're worth?

In this episode, host AJ Riedel talks to Kit Friday, Owner & Chief Consultant of Kit Friday Consulting. Kit brings a unique perspective on building consulting confidence, having spent 15 years as a consultant with the last five truly embracing her expertise after overcoming years of imposter syndrome.

Why You Should Listen to This Episode

If you're struggling with self-doubt about your consulting abilities or undervaluing your expertise because it comes easily to you, this conversation will transform how you see yourself and your practice. Kit's journey from running parallel careers to building a thriving marketing consultancy reveals the critical mindset shifts that separate struggling consultants from those who command premium rates with confidence. You'll discover why the skills that feel effortless to you are often the most valuable to your clients, how to overcome the isolation that comes with solo consulting, and practical strategies for building the self-trust needed to take your practice to the next level. Whether you're just starting out or looking to break through a revenue plateau, Kit's hard-won wisdom about valuing your innate gifts will give you permission to step fully into your expertise.

What You'll Learn in This Episode

• Recognizing Your Natural Strengths - Discover why consultants often undervalue the skills that come easily to them and how to reframe your natural talents as your most marketable assets worth premium pricing.

• Overcoming Imposter Syndrome as a Consultant - Learn the specific mindset shifts that helped Kit move from self-doubt to confidence after 15 years in consulting, including how to differentiate between your authentic voice and the voice of fear.

• Building Community to Combat Isolation - Understand why working alone can be lonely and how finding your community of fellow consultants can provide essential support, validation, and perspective for your journey.

• Developing New Revenue Streams - Explore Kit's strategy for expanding beyond one-on-one client work into workshops and speaking engagements to serve clients at different price points while scaling your impact.

• Taking the Leap with Confidence - Get practical advice on how to trust yourself enough to make the jump to full-time consulting, even when fear and uncertainty are present.

• Creating Your Own Unique Path - Learn how to merge seemingly disparate skills and experiences into a consulting practice that honors both your analytical and creative sides.

Listen to These Key Moments

[00:00:18] From Paralegal to Marketing Consultant - Kit shares her non-linear path to self-employment and how she ran two parallel careers before finding the confidence to commit fully to consulting.

[00:02:18] The Trap of Undervaluing What Comes Easy - Discover why Kit didn't take her marketing work seriously initially because it came naturally, and how this common pattern holds consultants back from charging what they're worth.

[00:04:24] The Five-Year Confidence Journey - Learn why it took Kit five years of being a consultant to truly feel confident stepping into that role and what changed in her mindset during that time.

[00:05:43] Finding the Grit and Fortitude Within - Kit discusses the importance of discovering your inner strength and learning to trust that you can lean back on it, especially during the feast-or-famine cycles.

[00:07:01] Recognizing the Value of Your Innate Gifts - Understand how realizing the value of what comes naturally to you can bring calm and confidence to your consulting practice.

[00:11:16] Building Self-Trust Through Evidence - Kit explains how tracking your wins and client successes helps you build an evidence-based case for your own abilities that counters self-doubt.

[00:13:37] Differentiating Your Inner Voices - Learn Kit's powerful technique for distinguishing between your authentic voice and the voice of fear or self-doubt that holds you back.

[00:21:20] The Power of Community for Solo Consultants - Discover how Reddit's small business and marketing forums helped Kit feel less lonely and more connected to others navigating similar challenges.

[00:23:48] Reframing Client Problems as Opportunities - Kit shares her approach to helping clients see that solving their business challenges is about making their lives easier, not just fixing problems.

[00:28:10] Creating Accessible Services for Different Budgets - Learn why Kit is developing workshop programs to serve small businesses who can't afford full consulting fees while still delivering valuable teaching.

[00:41:23] The Most Important Advice for New Consultants - Kit's powerful message that you can totally do it, you have the strength, ability, smarts, and drive, even though it will be hard.

About Kit Friday

Kit Friday is the Owner & Chief Consultant of Kit Friday Consulting, where she helps businesses develop strategic marketing approaches that drive real results. With a background that spans from paralegal and private investigator to professional DJ, television host, and production company owner, Kit brings a unique blend of analytical thinking and creative strategy to her marketing consulting work. Over her 15-year consulting career, she has worked with Silicon Valley startups and businesses across diverse industries, applying deep analytical strategy work to creative marketing challenges. Kit is passionate about teaching and has recently expanded into developing workshop programs and speaking engagements to make her expertise accessible to small businesses at various stages of growth. Her journey from running parallel careers to fully embracing her consulting expertise offers valuable insights for anyone struggling with self-doubt or undervaluing their natural talents.

Connect with Kit on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kitfriday/

Episode Transcript

Kit Friday Full Interview Transcript
Episode 79: Thriving Through Podcast

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INTRODUCTION
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AJ: Today my guest is Kit Friday. I'm delighted to welcome you to the show. Welcome, Kit.

Kit: Thank you so much, I'm so happy to be here.

AJ: So, Kit, tell me about your path to self-employment.

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KIT'S NON-LINEAR PATH TO CONSULTING
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Kit: My path to self-employment has not been linear, that's for sure. I feel like my path to self-employment has been kind of two parallel things running against each other.

I started my career as a paralegal and a private investigator in my early 20s. I really enjoyed the work that I did at the time. I'm very analytical. I really liked the strategy and the detail work that it required of me.

But at the same time, while I was working as a paralegal and private investigator, I had another career path that I was executing at the same time, which was in marketing. I have been a professional DJ for about 22 years. I have had a television show. I owned a production company for quite a few years. This really represented the creative aspects of my life that I wasn't getting from my real job. I think I always felt that I'm a very left-brain, right-brain person, and so I felt that I was meeting both of my needs that my brain had by kind of having this parallel path going on.

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UNDERVALUING WHAT COMES NATURALLY
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Kit: The funny thing was, the more marketing aspect of this path, I didn't take it as seriously because it came easily to me. And I think that in my mind, I put it as something as less important than this other, more structured path I was taking.

I got to a certain point in my career, I was probably in my late 20s, that I really wanted to find a way to make those two aspects of my working life intersect. And that's really where I started treating the marketing work that I was doing in the more creative job aspect of my life as something that was equally important and of equal weight.

And when I started doing that, I felt like I got freed from some of the things in my own brain that were holding me back from investing in maybe something, a job type that would be more challenging.

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TRANSITIONING TO MARKETING CONSULTING
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Kit: I started kind of casting my net about. I got hired to write for a really successful lifestyle blog. And from there, I was hired directly into the marketing space, where I worked with Silicon Valley startups, all different kinds of companies. And really started honing in on my strengths as a marketer, and really applying and finding that in the pursuit of this more creative job aspect, I didn't have to shed the other elements of my former career that I really liked a lot, this deep analytical strategy work.

For me, I think when I finally made the leap to be 100% self-employed as a consultant, it was scary, very scary. But I think that I had finally overcome myself. And once I overcame that self-doubt, and I started applying these very real-world examples of my success, and that those successes were the product of me, and not necessarily a company, it really helped me to restructure my thinking process.

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THE FIVE-YEAR CONFIDENCE JOURNEY
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Kit: I have been a consultant for a long time, about 15 years, but I think it's really only been the past five years that I've really felt confident, felt the confidence of really stepping into that role of myself.

AJ: That's a great story, and especially of how long it can take for us to kind of grow into who we really are and to gain complete confidence. I think it probably took me about the same amount of time when I became a self-employed consultant.

Kit: Yeah, and I think that's one of the things that I have a lot of friends who are consultants and small business owners. And I think that was one of the things that I wish I had talked more about with them, of how do you find the strength of self, this grit, this fortitude that you have and to trust that you can lean back on it?

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VALUING YOUR NATURAL GIFTS
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AJ: You know, you said something that I see so often. You said that the marketing aspect, you didn't value it quite as much because it came so easy. And I think that that is such a natural tendency, is that because it comes easy to us, we don't think it really is that important, or something that other people would value, and in reality, that's really probably our sweet spot, because it comes easy to us, and it doesn't come easy to a lot of other people.

Kit: Yeah, exactly, and I think we're each equipped with our own unique gifts. And I think, exactly what you said, when we doubt the things that come easy to us, it took me a long time to realize the value of these innate things that I bring to the table. And I have such, I feel so much calmer in my life and my practice now that I do. We're all human, we all make mistakes, but I think that that's part of the process too, is finding that within yourself. I feel like I found myself a couple years ago, and it has revolutionized the way that I practice.

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BUILDING SELF-TRUST THROUGH EVIDENCE
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AJ: Yeah, you know what was that turning point for you when you actually started embracing the skills that you bring to the table?

Kit: You know, I think I would be lying to everybody if I said I remember a specific moment in time. I think it was a slow build of kind of wins and of references and building up more and more of a case against my self-doubt. I think at a certain point, there was enough evidence in front of me that told me differently, and I started to believe that evidence more than maybe what the nagging voice was in my head.

I think I've always wanted to please people in any job I've had. I've always wanted to be really successful in that way. And I think that I finally had a pattern of success that I couldn't dismiss anymore. My clients were getting really successful with the practices and tactics and strategies that I was teaching them. I couldn't chalk that up to chance anymore. At a certain point, you kind of just have to be like, maybe I'm just really good at this, maybe this is what I'm supposed to be doing.

AJ: Right, that's a really good point because most of us, we look for that evidence, and we're not tracking it. If we tracked it, we would have that evidence in front of us sooner.

Kit: Exactly.

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DIFFERENTIATING BETWEEN INNER VOICES
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AJ: What do you do when that voice of doubt comes in and says maybe this is not right, maybe you're not on the right path?

Kit: I try to be really kind with myself and acknowledge it and think about where it's coming from. Am I nervous or anxious about something real in this moment or in a future that I'm building toward? Or is this my past kind of dragging my heels? And the more I've been able to ask myself that question in a given moment and think through kind of where this is coming from, it's really helped me understand that this is not my voice.

This is somebody else's voice. If I were at my most confident, knowing the most information, knowing what I know about myself and where I've come from and what I'm capable of, this is not really my thought process. This is just something that is trying to hold me back from moving forward to achieve the things I want to achieve. I've really started being able to differentiate between those two voices. And it took me a long time to be able to do that, but the ability to differentiate from those two voices has changed my life.

AJ: That is excellent advice because I think so often we can attribute that voice to ourselves and our thoughts, when really I think it's based on past experiences or beliefs that we created probably when we were really young.

Kit: I totally agree. I think every person, if they can take a second and kind of really examine and ask yourself, if I were my most confident self, is this what I would believe? And then maybe you can kind of, I don't know, quiet the noise a little bit.

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BALANCING CLIENT ACQUISITION AND DELIVERY
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AJ: What are some of the challenges you faced in your consulting business? I think one of the things I hear a lot is, they're constantly either feast or famine, where they have so much work they don't have time to do any client acquisition, or they're in the time of client acquisition and they don't have any revenue coming in. Has that been an issue?

Kit: It has. I think I've done a little bit better of a job at managing that in more recent years than I have in the past, but there definitely have been times where I've had to stop seeking clients because I'm just inundated. And I'm learning to set better boundaries with that.

I think my initial, when I first started, I wasn't valuing my time and I wasn't valuing my weekends and I wasn't valuing the free time that I had. And so I'd say yes to way too much, which obviously is a luxury problem because you want to be at a place where you're making that much work. But then the flipside of that is that you are going to have, you are going to get burnt out. And it's not good for my clients to try to be my best when I'm also exhausted.

There have been times where I've had to take a month off from seeking clients while I get caught up. And the fortunate part of this is having been in business for a while now, I have a really strong referral network. So I'm not worried generally about things drying up. But earlier in my career, I think it was scarier for me because I didn't have that network yet.

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DEVELOPING SYSTEMS AND BOUNDARIES
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Kit: I think it's really important to develop those boundaries for yourself, to develop systems for your practice, to have templates for the things that you're teaching people or the intake forms that you're filling out or whatever. So that you get to a certain point where you are getting more efficient. And that means that it takes you less time, which means you can take on more clients without necessarily just stacking on more and more time against yourself.

I'm still working on this. I'm a work in progress in this way, but I definitely think that that is something that has been really important to my being successful and being happier.

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THE IMPORTANCE OF COMMUNITY FOR SOLO CONSULTANTS
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AJ: So you mentioned Reddit earlier, and I think you were saying that that was one of your resources that you've found helpful. Talk about that a little bit more and why that's a good resource for you.

Kit: Working by yourself can be really lonely. It's nice to feel like there's an ecosystem of people who are also with it, in me, together, who get all this craziness. So as far as resources go, I spend a lot of time on Reddit, and I really have gotten a lot from the Reddit small business and marketing forums of just feeling less alone in this journey.

I think that so much of being a consultant and a small business owner can be isolating. And when you are working through problems or when you're thinking about taking a leap and you don't necessarily know who to talk to about it, or you're afraid to talk to your corporate friends about it because they just don't understand what it's like, it's really nice to have a community of people who are navigating similar waters even if it's not the exact same thing.

I think Reddit is a really good place for that because you can remain pretty anonymous if you want to, but you can get really real advice from people who are experiencing similar things. So that's been a really valuable resource for me.

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REFRAMING CLIENT PROBLEMS AS OPPORTUNITIES
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AJ: I think one of the things when consultants are talking about their services is framing it in a way that helps people see that solving this problem will actually make their lives easier. What's your take on that? How do you frame your services?

Kit: I think a lot of my clients, when they first come to me, they're viewing whatever the issue is as a problem. And I think my first job is to help them see that this is actually an opportunity for them to grow, to learn something new, to implement a system that's going to make their life easier in the long run.

I try to reframe the conversation from this is a problem that needs fixing to this is an opportunity for you to build something better. And I think when people can see it that way, they're much more engaged in the process. They're much more willing to do the work that needs to be done. And they're much more excited about the outcomes.

I think that's really important because if your clients see you as just someone who's fixing problems, you become sort of like a bandaid. But if they see you as someone who's helping them build something better, you become a partner in their success. And that's a much more sustainable relationship for both of you.

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EXPANDING INTO WORKSHOPS AND TEACHING
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AJ: So what's next for you? Where do you see your business going in the next three to five years?

Kit: Client work is always going to be part of my practice. In the next three to five years, I have, in the past six months, been really invested in developing some workshop programs. I work with a lot of small businesses, and I do a lot of initial consultations with small businesses who just don't have the capital to work with me, which is completely fine. But I still want to be able to give folks who might not be able to afford the full one-on-one consulting experience access to what it is that I'm teaching, because it is valuable. All of my clients are succeeding for following the practices that we've developed together.

So I really want to step more into the teaching space. I love teaching. I also mentioned I'm doing more speakerships now. I'd like to be pursuing more of that. I just want things to continue to get smoother, and I want to continue to learn. I feel like every year, I get closer and closer to feeling truly stable and secure, and I'm really grateful for that, and I'm looking forward to that trend just continuing.

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CHALLENGES IN SCALING THROUGH WORKSHOPS AND SPEAKING
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AJ: What do you think are the biggest challenges you're going to face in achieving that goal of moving more into the workshops and the teaching component and speaking?

Kit: There's obviously differentiation, right? What do I bring to the table that's different from a zillion other marketing consultants? So that differentiation is really important. But as far as launching it, I am very, so far, since I made this goal of wanting to do workshops and speaking more earlier this year, I wrote that on my big goal list. And since then, for speakerships, I get contacted really regularly to speak at events.

I think I'm in the place of building more contacts and networks within it, and expanding the types of events that I'm speaking at, and stuff like that, so just kind of building that process. As far as workshops go, what I'm teaching is unique, and what I'm teaching has very real-world value. So I think in that instance, for me, it's more of committing to the architecture and actually creating and actually putting the messaging out there.

This past weekend, I had been anti-having a newsletter for a very long time, just because I didn't have the capacity for it. And so this past weekend, I'm like, alright, if I really want workshops and speaking engagements to really take off, I need to be talking to my audience.

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ADDING NEW MARKETING ACTIVITIES
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AJ: Okay, so you're adding a new marketing activity.

Kit: Yeah, totally. And I can add it now because I have the capacity to add it. I have enough things to talk about. I have the vision that I can communicate to people. And also, I think sometimes, and I tell my clients this all the time, they're like, oh, I don't want to send this, it's embarrassing, I don't want to ask people to join my workshop. And it's also just those kinds of feelings. It's like, come on!

AJ: Oh, yeah. A little bit of that self-doubt checking in.

Kit: Exactly.

AJ: No, it never completely goes away. It kind of comes in and sneaks in every once in a while.

Kit: Sure, sure, but it's the ability to differentiate from those two voices has changed my life.

AJ: Love it.

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RAPID-FIRE WRAP-UP QUESTIONS
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AJ: As we near the end of the podcast, I have a couple rapid-fire wrap-up questions.

Kit: Excellent. So, I'm ready to go.

AJ: So the first question is, what is one book, podcast, or resource that's been invaluable to your consulting practice?

Kit: As far as resources go, for me, something that has been incredibly useful has been I spend a lot of time on Reddit, and so I really have gotten a lot from the Reddit small business and marketing forums of just working by yourself can be really lonely, and it's nice to feel like there's an ecosystem of people who are also with it, in me, together, who get all this craziness.

AJ: Okay, so Reddit is finding your community on Reddit.

AJ: What is one piece of advice you wish someone had given you when you started consulting?

Kit: That you can do it. That you can totally do it. You have the strength and the ability, and the smarts, and the drive to do it. You can do it. It's gonna be hard, but that doesn't mean you can't do it.

AJ: Awesome. Yes, that's an important piece of advice all consultants need when they're starting out.

Kit: Yeah, I think we all need to hear that.

AJ: We do, yes. And this last question is the most important question. How can listeners connect with you if they want to learn more about you and your work?

Kit: Absolutely! Probably the best place to find me is my website. It's KitFriday.com, and I am also on LinkedIn, somewhat sporadically. But my website's probably the best place to find me.

AJ: Okay, so KitFriday.com, and I will also put the link in the show notes.

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CLOSING
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AJ: Well, Kit, it has been fantastic talking to you today. I really appreciate it. And for all you listeners out there, until next time, keep thriving through.