A guide to narrowing down your niche

The riches are in the niches. It’s one of my favorite sayings. Why? Because increasing revenue, raising capital, scaling your team - whatever you’re working on for your business - is dependent on having a specific, well-defined niche.

What got you to where you are right now - your success, the hustle - that's not what is going to get you to the next level. What's going to help you meet your current business goals is defining your ideal client, your niche.

So let’s back up. What is a niche?

I was an English major, which means anytime the concept of a definition comes up, I have to go straight to the dictionary.

niche
/niCH,nēSH/
noun

Business definition:
an opportunity to sell a particular product to a particular group of people
Example: They spotted a niche in the market with no serious competition.

Biology definition:
the conditions of its environment within which a particular type of living thing can live successfully
Example: Within each niche, similar animals avoid competing with each other.

These are both solid definitions, but the biology def offers a powerful nuance. The business world is extremely competitive. The more general your business, the more people you’re competing with. Just like if all animals in the sea preyed on the exact same animal, they’d run out of food.

Here’s a more human example; let’s say you’re a real estate agent. If you’re a real estate agent who works with everyone, you’re in competition with every other real estate agent in your city. Now let’s say you’re a real estate agent who works with buyers in a specific area of town who are buying their first single family home within a certain price range. Now you can collaborate with and befriend the other real estate agents in your area and refer clients in each other’s niches. Collaboration instead of competition.

“When you define your niche properly, not only do you identify a place in the market that’s specific and that you can serve your true fans, but also a place that differentiates you and even allows you to collaborate with your competitors.”

More good reasons you need a niche

The most important reason you need a niche is so that you can grow a business you are truly passionate about. If you are truly passionate about your clients, you will be driven to help them. Chasing any and all clients may land you in a business serving people you don’t even enjoy helping.

Next, if you know your niche, you can hone your skills. Become an expert in a specific area, which will be more fulfilling for you. Now let’s say you know your niche, you’re passionate about your niche, and you’ve become an expert in your niche. At this point, you can craft messaging that truly speaks to your niche. If you attempt speaking to everybody, you end up speaking to no one. You get lost in the sea of the businesses offering that same general service and your message is not specific enough to resonate with the client you’re actually passionate about serving.

Knowing your niche will also help you make smarter goals. When making decisions for your business, you can check if they’re aligned with your goals.

How to define your niche

The way many people have been taught to hone in on their niche is to define their customer by demographics such as geography, industry, job role, income level, etc. But I want you to narrow your niche down a lot further.

Let's pretend I'm a business coach. My niche could be:
Entrepreneurs (not very specific)
Entrepreneurs who want to scale their business (ok, better)
Entrepreneurs in retail financial services who want to scale their business (better, let’s go even further)
Startup entrepreneurs in retail financial services who want to scale their business (now we’re talking)

Now, why does that nuance matter? Because if my client is a startup entrepreneur, they’re probably cash strapped. They are probably investing everything they have back into this business. Even if their business is doing great, they’re in a very different financial situation than an entrepreneur who is established or maybe even gearing up to sell their business.

An entrepreneur who is gearing up to sell their business may have the opposite phenomenon happening, where they're going to be flushed with cash when they sell their business. And that has a whole different set of challenges and opportunities. This is how specific I want you to get when you're thinking about your niche. I’ve got a free workbook for you if you’re ready to get started.

Download the free workbook

How to reach your niche

The power of a niche is that if you speak specifically about the challenges your clients are facing or the opportunities they want to harness, they’ll pick up what you're puttin’ down and reach out to you.

Once you’ve defined your niche, become an expert in your niche, and crafted your messaging to solving your niche’s problems / harness an opportunity, here’s how you can establish yourself as a credible guide:

Blog as a thought leader for your niche
Add valuable content to your social media platforms to help your niche
Be a guest on podcasts your niche audience listens to
Write tutorials for your niche
Host a webinar for your niche

This is the concept of inbound marketing, establishing your credibility and putting out valuable content so that your ideal customers come knocking down your door.

Allow yourself to evolve.

Now you might be saying, “But Stacy, I like to work with everyone. I want to work with all entrepreneurs. I don't want to turn anyone away.” That is absolutely an option, but let’s revisit the idea that what got you to the point you’re at is not going to get you to the next level.

When you first start your business and you're growing, you want to help everyone and you hustle to do so. But to take your business to the next level, to scale it or increase your revenue, you need to put structure around who you serve. That doesn’t mean you define your ideal client and turn the spigot off on everyone else tomorrow. It is an evolution, a starting point to reach the day when you’re serving the customers you’re most passionate about, confident that you are the best guide for them.