Niche’.  It’s a word that you may hear often when building a new business.  Some may be wondering “What exactly is a niche? Where can I find one? Amazon, perhaps?”

The word niche, pronounced [niCH, nēSH], refers to a specialized segment of the market for a particular kind of product or service. A major pitfall in business can be marketing to a generic crowd, basically everyone! But, in your attempt to sell to everyone, you may find yourself selling to absolutely no one.

And that’s why finding your niche can make a major difference in establishing yourself as an authority in your industry.  If you’re stuck on how to find your niche, here are some tips:

First, identify the thing you do well or the industry you desire to work in. After you know what you want to do, ask yourself, the following questions. What problem am I solving? How many other people are solving that problem? What makes me different from those people?

It’s the “what makes me different” that will lead you to finding a Niche’ market that you want to serve.  For example, let’s say I want to open the ice cream shop of my dreams (y’all know I love ice cream).  My ideal ice cream shop would have the feel of a Starbucks. I’d serve coffee, pastries, and gourmet ice-creams with specialty ingredients like imported chocolates, alcohol infusions (for the adults of course), and super fancy toppings for flavorful sundae combinations.  There would be comfy seating, free Wi-Fi, and light music; it would be a place where people wanted to just come hang out.  It would be a place that made people feel good!   That would be my niche’ – “A feel good product in a feel good place with a feel-good ambiance.”

Or maybe you have a product idea that no one’s invented. Think of all the crazy things out here that people invent every day that leave everyone saying, “why didn’t I think of that?”  Joy Mangano invented the no slip hangers.  They are hangers that are covered in a velvety texture to keep your clothes from slipping.  They are ultra-thin so you can get more clothes in your closet.  Hangers have been around for forever!  But Joy found a niche’ and made it work for her.  She took a very basic need, fixed the problem in a fairly simple manner, shared her product on QVC, and now her product can be found in all major retail stores.

Once you have gathered your “What, who, and how am I different”, your next step will be to research, research, research! I cannot stress that enough! The last thing you want is to get too deep into your one-of-a-kind business idea only to realize it’s been done…twice. You’ve got to do your Googles! Use the internet search engines (Bing, Yahoo, Google, social media etc.) to research your idea and your competitors.

If you’ve gotten this far and you’re still good to go, it’s now time to test your market (potential customers) and its profitability.  You should have tons and tons of data if you did your research right.  You should know the age range of your customer, their medium house income, their spending habits, available disposable income, etc.  If there is a product you are thinking of selling, set up a website, target your audience, run a targeted campaign with a link to your website, and ask if this would be a product or service they desire. That will let you know if this perfect niche’ can also be profitable.

Whew! How’d you do? 😊 I know some things are easier said/read, than done. But I promise you, once you find your niche there will be no turning back. 

Building a business is not one-size-fits-all and once you find your niche’ there are “a’whole’nother” set of steps to get your niched transformed into a registered business. If you still find yourself needing someone to work through the steps with you, reach out to a business coach like myself for help!

If you haven’t already, go hit the like button on my FB business page, follow me on IG, and sign up to receive my weekly emails with free products and tips.  I promise, I’m not the person that will email you every day.

Until next time,

Renay Butler

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