Yes, You Can Thrive Without A Niche (sort of)
You can be an 'industry-focused generalist' or a 'non-industry-aligned specialist', but you can't be a 'non-industry-aligned generalist'.
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Struggling To Find A Niche?
On a recent coaching call, a client struggled to find a distinct industry (niche) she wanted to serve. The problem was that she didn’t feel comfortable claiming deep experience in any particular niche.
She was an expert in a problem, but didn’t want to limit herself or focus on any distinct niche.
The key question arose: Can I focus on a problem instead of an industry?
It’s worth exploring this in a little depth.
Why Is Picking A Niche Usually A Good Idea?
The first part of that answer is to understand why we select a niche.
A niche is about focus.
When you try to serve everyone, you end up serving nobody.
Your appeal is instantly much weaker if you’re a broad generalist.
Here’s a comparison:
If you’re going to a restaurant, do you think the food will be better at an Asian restaurant that offers Sushi, Thai, Chinese, and Japanese food? Or do you think the food will be better at a Japanese-only restaurant?
You don’t assume the ‘Asian’ restaurant is a master of all four. Instead, you unconsciously downgrade your perception of each because your brain averages them.
If the restaurant only claimed to do sushi, you would assume deep expertise in sushi.
And if they claimed they only did one specific type of sushi, say, Nigiri, you would assume it would be excellent.
This is known as the dilution effect.
When you say you serve multiple niches, you’re not assumed to be a master in any of them - and you’re likely to lose out to those who claim they are.
Better yet, those in that niche are more likely to hire those who focus solely on it.
Generally, we prefer hiring specialists rather than generalists to solve our problems.
But, fortunately, a niche can mean different things.
Two Categories of Niches
Typically, when people struggle to think of a niche, they’re thinking of an industry to serve. And selecting an industry to serve is usually a good idea. More on that in a moment. But the other type of niche —one we don’t explore quite as much —is a discipline.
We focus on solving a problem or providing a very specific service we know lots of organisations across many disciplines are likely to need.
You can think of this as the horizontal vs. the vertical.
As we wrote about previously, you can select a vertical (an industry) and offer a variety of services to that industry. The more specific the industry, the better (i.e., tech B2B startups are a better option than tech companies).
However, you can also select a horizontal (essentially, a problem) and focus on selling that service across multiple niches.
The critical thing about the horizontal, however, is that you have to be highly focused on what you offer.
If you’re just getting started, you’re not going to do well by offering generic marketing, sales, or accounting services. You have to be able to solve a very clear and very narrow problem extremely well.
Each approach has pros and cons; it’s worth being aware of them.
The Industry Niche - Pros and Cons
The most common niche is the industry you choose to serve.
The reason for this is apparent. When you have an industry, you have an identifiable community you serve.
It makes all your promotions significantly easier. You know exactly who you’re writing for, who you want to meet, and who you’re trying to earn the trust of.
This lets you be targeted and hyper-focused in your efforts.
Also, when you work with one organisation within an industry, you’re more likely to attract others within that industry. Word spreads, people move between organisations in the same industry, and your reputation begins to grow.
It’s easier to build a reputation when you have a defined audience to grow that reputation amongst.
You’re not trying to boil the ocean anymore - you know exactly who you want to earn the trust of. For most of the six client acquisition methods, you need to know who you’re serving to increase the odds of success massively.
The challenge, however, is that many people don’t feel they have a niche. They struggle to select one. They are more interested in the problem than in an industry.
Thus, the alternative approach to selecting a niche is to select a problem and become an expert in it.
Problem-Focused Niche - Pros and Cons
When I launched my consulting practice, I had no idea who would hire me. I simply began writing about something I knew: building online communities, and gradually people gravitated towards that.
And, over the years, that’s precisely what happened. I’ve worked with tiny non-profits, mid-tier firms, and the largest companies in the world. I’ve worked in a remarkably diverse range of industries and situations.
I’ve worked with archivists, students, activists, employees, governments, and an eclectic range of businesses, including Apple, Microsoft, Meta, Alphabet, Oracle, and SAP.
It was only in more recent years that I’ve begun to zero in more closely on the larger SaaS organisations (and seen better results as a result).
But the lesson is that you can focus on a problem rather than an entire industry.
Many people, such as Wes Kao and Priya Parker, among others, target problems rather than industries. I’d argue that there’s ultimately more opportunity in becoming the leading expert on a known problem than in a particular niche.
But it’s harder today to be problem-focused.
It’s harder to build an audience, gain awareness, and figure out where and to whom you need to show up. If you have a long enough financial runway, this can work. But it will take time.
Make A Choice - Then Embrace It
The critical thing is that you make a clear choice and then embrace its pros and cons.
If you’re selecting an industry niche, you need to start connecting with people in that niche, following others in it, attending events, and creating content for and about it.
If you’re selecting a niche problem, you need to figure out how to create content that attracts attention. You need a distinct, unique methodology and approach. You need to be very good at promoting yourself and showing up in search or in LLMs. You need to make sure the problem you’re solving is narrow enough that there isn’t much competition.
Both can work, just be clear which path you’re following.
Good luck!
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