How to find and own your niche in 3 easy steps

When I started my marketing agency, I had to make a lot of choices about the services I could offer. I discovered that the hardest part was not choosing which services to offer, but which ones not offer. It was easy enough to start with one service, but then a client asked, “I also need a website, can you help me with that too?”

The challenge was not only in the services we offered, but also to whom we offered them. Some agencies focus exclusively on healthcare, others opt for self-storage companies as clients. Some agencies work with startups, while others focus on large, well-established companies.

No matter what type of client you want to work with, there is no right or wrong answer to the niche you choose, as long as you can create a space that you can call your own. Here are three steps to get started.

Related: How to Find Your Startup’s Niche

Step 1: Determine your goals

What do you want your company to become? What is the purpose? What do you want to achieve with it?

Some entrepreneurs start a business because it seems like a nice alternative to a normal job (advice: you might want to think about this more carefully). Others want to build a fortune. Still others want to change the world. None of these reasons are better than the others, but if you want to build a business that generates $1 million a year and gives you a good income, you’re going to focus on a different niche than if you want to create a $1 billion business . that disrupts an industry. Therefore, the first question is “What do you want?”

Step 2: Find your genius zone

In his book The big jump, author Gay Hendricks shared the concept of what he calls your “Zone of Genius.” This is the area of ​​focus where the combination of our experience, skills, knowledge, and interests enables us to do amazing things—things that seem magical to others. To find your genius zone, start by listing all the things you’re at least half good at. Then look for combinations that are unique to you.

For example, there are tens of thousands of marketers, possibly hundreds of thousands, so when I started my digital marketing agency it made a lot of sense to focus our efforts on higher education to differentiate ourselves a bit more. The fact that I worked in higher education as a digital advertising manager made us a little more unique. My Genius Zone allowed us to partner with colleges and universities across North America.

You can also take your personal interests into account. For example, a dream client for me would be chess.com as I use their platform on a weekly basis. If they were choosing a marketing agency, it would make sense for them to hire someone who is exceptional with digital marketing, but also partnered with someone who is an avid chess player as opposed to someone who doesn’t know how the game works.

What is your zone of genius? Where can you use your knowledge, skills and experience to make the biggest impact?

Related: The step-by-step guide to finding your niche and target market

Step 3: Identify your ideal audience

Who is your ideal customer? If you could have an unlimited number of customers, but only one type of customer, how would you describe them?

An executive coach might say, “I want to work with all executives,” but do all executives want to work with that coach? They can have an uphill battle to get customers. One way to find your ideal audience of customers is to look at yourself. If you’re a female executive who has transitioned into academia and become a university president, your ideal audience may be female executives who want to transition into academia or those who have already transitioned and become a university president. By serving them, you would be able to serve from a place of deep experience and authority.

Many marketers talk about niches and finding that one type of person that fits your product or service perfectly, but there’s a pitfall here. “It’s easier to sell to a roofer and plumber who are both in Miami than a roofer in New York and a roofer in Miami,” said JC Hite, CEO of Hite Digital. “Just because you’ve sold to a lot of roofers in Miami doesn’t mean roofers in New York will be as interested.” Depending on the nature of your business, geography can play a big role in who your ideal target audience is.

Basically, the ultimate goal is to create a market of one. A market of one is when your ideal customer has only one option: you. As an businessroundups.org, the closer we get to creating a market of one, the more profit we can make, enabling us to invest and better serve our customers, improve our relationship with them, and make an impact on the world. Finding the right niche for you will take you one big step closer to creating that market.

Related: Understanding the Niching Down Concept for Beginning Entrepreneurs