The audience was humming with anticipation. They were there to find out how my software now could help them to create electronic circuits that operated in a highly reliable manner in harsh environments such as outer space.
The stage crew dimmed the lights, cuing the audience to go silent …. The spotlight turned to me.
I began with a story to make them smile. I asked them what their greatest reliability challenges were. What were they building?… What excited them the most about the electronics that were creating using my software?
Come to find out that I had a diverse crowd – ranging from aerospace designers to communications electronics engineers. I had only expected aerospace electronic designers to be present in the audience. What to do?
One of the great things about my software was that it did appeal to different vertical markets.
As I wrapped up the introductory conversation, it suddenly hit me like a brick …. I nervously scanned each head in the room, and realized …. that what I had planned to present would not serve the communications engineers very well.
Sure, the problem that my talk solved an emerging problem for them – After all, they lived and died by “high up-time” and reliability in the data centers that they operated and provided equipment for …
But I knew that the SOLUTION that they needed was different.
How they described the problem of creating high reliability electronics – the LANGUAGE THAT THEY USED – was very different from what I planned to present today.
So my talk would NOT RESONATE
- Communications guys talk about “high up-time”.
- Aerospace designers resonate with “fault-tolerant”, and “mission-critical electronics” . This was my intended audience
I was standing there…. facing a hundred communications engineers… staring at me, …… And I knew that I would not have the right answers for them in my presentation.
What to do?
I made the decision to proceed with the planned presentation.
And so, predictably, 10 minutes into the presentation, the aerospace folks were gripped by what I had to say…
…. but the communications guys had already resorted to checking emails on their cellphones …
With each person that mentally checked out or left the room, energy was sucked out of my body.
Half of me wanted to curl up in a ball.
Should I have spoken about the more general topic of reliability and up-time … to interest the entire audience?
ABSOLUTELY NOT!
Because NOBODY would have been interested.
“Speak to everyone and you speak to no-one”
… If my answer surprises you a bit….
…. Or if you feel like you sometimes get BLANK STARES when you present, read on !
NICHE DOWN, Profits UP
Specialists Get Paid More
…. The power of focusing and delivering NICHE-SPECIFIC content.
It attracted a niche audience that needed precisely what I offered – the aerospace guys … It repelled everyone else… and that’s OK
Every one of my intended audience found value in what I offered.
And, there was nothing to stop me from catering to another niche, the audience that I was repelling, on another day.
“Why does this work so well, Angela ?” …
Well, let me ask you this…
If you had a critical medical condition, would you rather visit to a specialist doctor, or a general practitioner?
… And … Who gets paid more? The specialist or the general practitioner?
A specialist is paid more because of perceived expertise in their niche.
The specialist is viewed as more likely to get results. A safer bet.
Can you see why you want to be perceived as a specialist in each niche that you sell to?
And there are other reasons to be a specialist in a niche
- A niche is a place to gain notoriety and differentiate. Be the big fish !
- A niche is a grand place for a new company to start – It’s an island of strength. A place from which to springboard into adjacent niches … or to define your own category.
Let’s take a look at your message to your customers.
Do you have any of these symptoms?
- You send the very same newsletter to all of your prospects and customers
- Your website, YouTube channel, collateral and presentations are organized by product name or function.
- Your datasheets, white papers and product pages list features and don’t state what type of customer they are for
- It takes website visitors more than 10 seconds to find the answer to their top question on your site.
- It’s unclear how, in their specific words, you make them more competitive … How you are different.
If you answered “YES” to any one of these, you are not alone. You are being a generalist without realizing it.
Want people to see you as a specialist in a niche?
Here’s what to do.
STEP 1: PICK NICHE WITH A BIG PROBLEM
Identify a group of customers (niche) that you serve well.
Choose a niche where YOU SOLVE A BIG PAINFUL PROBLEM.
Here’s what to do. Interview people in your niche and discover:
- THEIR EXACT WORDS – The EXPRESSIONS that they use to describe the ONE BIG PROBLEM AND OUTCOME THEY DESIRE – “High up-time” for my communications electronics niche, for example
- THEIR EXAMPLES
- THEIR WHY… Why the outcome that you provide matters. Why it makes them more competitive.
- WHY WILL THEY PAY? What’s the cost to them if they do nothing to solve the One Big Problem. If there are objections or barriers to buying, now is a great time to find out so that you can knock them down
CONGRATS! You now have a niche that you know how to speak to.
You know what keeps them awake at night…. and how to give them an outcome that the care about deeply …
HOW TO RESONATE IN YOUR NICHE
FOCUS Your Message
I mean that you grab attention and gather interest by resonating immediately with your niche.
Here’s what to do next:
STEP 2: STAND OUT
The first order of events is to hook and veer folks in your niche to a place where they can immediately find answers to their deepest problems.
STAND APART by declaring your MISSION and POINT OF VIEW … What do you stand for ? …
Pick a bold and specific statement that grabs attention, and talks about a transformation
“I believe that__ ”
“ I stand for __” statements are great.
My Point of view could be that “If you are still building highly reliable electronics manually, you are leaving time and money on the table. Your competition will surpass you.. ”
STEP 3: CALL OUT
Call out your niche BY NAME, so that niche customers know that they are in the right place.
Do it in invitations to events, collateral, on your website, your online sales funnels and in any communication that you have.
I would call out “aerospace electronics designers looking to create highly reliable electronics quickly”.
STEP 4: SOLVE ONE BIG PROBLEM
Go back to the research that you did in STEP 1.
What is the ONE THING… the SPECIFIC and biggest problem … that your niche needs to solve ? … and how do you SPECIFICALLY and UNIQUELY solve it?
What is the TRANSFORMATION and RESULT that you provide?
Do not dilute the message by solving a laundry list of lower priority problems.
Solve one big problem !
You want to show expertise and drive prospects to the next stage of the sale. You do this by by peeking enough interest to warrant a sales conversation.
Is there one niche-specific problem that your offering solves in a unique way?
Talk about it in emails that you send, in webinars, online funnels … and your website.
HOW TO BE PROLIFIC
REACH Your Niche
Now that you have a focused message to deliver to your niche, let’s talk about finding audiences that belong to your niche … and how to leave a lasting impression.
We are going to position you as a specialist by showing your niche how to solve ONE BIG PROBLEM
This is how we will DIFFERENTIATE you from your competition.
This is how you become the DE-FACTO EXPERT in your niche.
Remember – Experts get less price pressure from customers.
Here’s what to do
STEP 5: BE PROLIFIC
- Organize helpful content by niche
On your website, have a niche-specific call to action link for easy navigation to content that interests each niche. Talk about the ONE BIG PROBLEM that they need to solve and show them how to solve it. Use this as a way to get email addresses and drive them into your sale funnel.
Conduct webinars and high-converting events that are short, sweet and focused solely on your niche
Create a separate YouTube Playlist for every niche or ONE BIG PROBLEM to solve. Again, the goal is to make it super easy for your customers to see how you specialize in solving their specific problem
- FOLLOW UP AUTOMATICALLY I
You know how the saying goes….
“The Money is in the follow up”
In the Digital marketing realm, we call follow-up technology “RE-TARGETING”
You know how, if you go to Amazon.com and view a product, and your don’t buy it. Then, lo-and-behold, you start seeing reminder ads about the products that you were interested in.
This is an example of re-targeting.
And it works.
You can do the same thing to help remind visitors in your niche about your solution
Re-targeting technology lets you keep delivering valuable content to viewers and visitors, EVEN WHEN YOU DON’T YET KNOW WHO THEY ARE….. in some web browsers.
THE HOLY GRAIL !
For example, you can deliver useful content 4x times to any anonymous website viewer who stopped by your niche page.
You can deliver more useful information to people who clicked on your ad or who watched your video … and then left.
Keep giving these viewers great content.
Because it takes at least 4 follow-up impressions and sometimes as many as 20 before they recognize and like you enough to give you their contact info.
Why does this work? Because most viewers are in research mode when they first visit. They don’t know you. They are unlikely to give you their email address when they first visit.
To address this, follow-up at least 4 times using re-targeting.
And visitors will grow to trust you and eventually tell you who they are.
I’ve quadrupled leads using re-targeting.
- Laser target your content – We’ve all received generic emails loaded with topics that we are not interested in…. They end up in the recycle folder, if we bother to open them at all.
The lesson? Only send content that is of interest
For your newsletter list, ask what people are interested in when they sign up to your list.
Send them only content on that specific topic.
- Grow your reach by re-purposing content to highly targeted audiences on social media.
The beauty of social media is that it lets you target very specific groups of individuals.
For example, you can post helpful content to appropriate LinkedIn Groups, Facebook Groups, Forums, targeted Intagram and Facebook audiences… and the list goes on !
Create pay-for Facebook ads that you only send to people with specific interests, behaviors or the fans of influencers in your niche.
Send pay-for ads with your content to people on your email lists using Facebook custom audiences
These are just a few of the great ways to automatically stay in front of people that have showed interest in your offering.
And the best thing? You can keep reaching them, whether or not they have told you who they are
STEP 6: CONVERT VISITORS TO LEADS
Do this by directing people into your online sales funnel, a place where they get immense value for free and you gain a lead that learns to know, like and trust you. Refer to this article for details.
At least one of the approaches above may have opened your eyes to reaching more people, more effectively in your niche.
Let’s put it into action below !
HOW TO PROFIT
AMPLIFY The Impact
CONGRATS… You now know how to “niche down” to grow your profits.
And how to amplify your sales impact by catering to the specific needs of your niche
… How to transform yourself into the go-to niche expert … How to not be salesy.
Here’s your 6-step action plan
- PICK NICHE WITH BIG PROBLEM
Segment your customers into niches and find out what they need.
Validate that the niche that you want to serve plays to your strengths and is lucrative.
2, STAND OUT
STAND APART by declaring your MISSION and POINT OF VIEW for that niche
“I believe that__ ”
“ I stand for __”
3. . CALL OUT
Call out to your niche by name. This tells viewers that they are in the right place. Use the specific words that THEY use. Do this everywhere – in all content, at events and on your website.
4. . SOLVE ONE BIG PROBLEM
“Show your niche how”.
How do you solve one big problem that ails your niche.
Focus on the TRANSFORMATION and OUTCOME… because that is what drives sales.
5. BE PROLIFIC
Deliver your specific message at least 4 times.
Deliver to anonymous website visitors that view pages about your niche, even when you don’t yet know who these people are.. using re-targeting.
Deliver to your niche mailing list and media channels.
TIP: If you don’t re-target your website and online sales funnel visitors, you are leaving 80% of the money on the table
TIP: Never rely on just one social media platform to distribute your content.
Because rules can change overnight and you could lose all of your followers.
Be prolific and publish across multiple platforms and interest groups.
6. CONVERT VIEWERS INTO STRONG PROSPECTS
TIP: Do include a call to action on all social media posts. This should drive people into your ONLINE SALES FUNNEL. An online funnel is a sequence of web pages that educates, entertains and inspires visitors and drives them toward a sale.
An online funnel is where you encourage visitors to enter their contact info, and where they learn to know, like and trust you
THE 6-STEP PLAN RESULTS?
- You become highly differentiated in your niche.
- You attract qualified people in your niche.
- You don’t have to worry about price pressure.
You grow profits without being salesy.
What are your thoughts about “niching down” in order to grow your bookings?
Questions?
COMMENT BELOW !
ACTION PLAN
Niche Down, Profits Up
BE A SPECIALIST IN YOUR NICHE
FOCUS THE MESSAGE
REACH YOUR NICHE
AMPLIFY THE IMPACT
FOLLOW UP to grow profits
BE THE KEY TO YOUR CUSTOMER's
SUCCESS
NEED MORE HELP?
TRAINING
Business Consulting
SPEAKER ENGAGEMENTS
Simply wish to say your article is as amazing. The clearness
in your post is just excellent and i can assume you are an expert on this subject.
Well with your permission allow me to grab your feed to keep updated with forthcoming post.
Thanks a million and please carry on the enjoyable work.
I’m so glad that I could help. I hope that everything is going well for you. More articles to come soon!