Most business owners want to cast their net far and wide, in an attempt to attract as many customers as possible, without alienating anyone. However, the truth is that a more targeted approach can be highly effective, more cost effective and can result in attracting the right customers, not just a sea of enquiries, some of which may be unprofitable. Here are three benefits to finding a niche for you business.
3 benefits of niche marketing
Niche marketing is targeted marketing. It involves finding a specific “niche” audience and focusing your attention and marketing budget on that.
A niche market is often a specific sector or industry, but it can also be a specific profile of customer, including age group, geographical location or personal interests, as examples.
Here are 3 key benefits of targeted marketing:
(1) Less wastage of your marketing budget
Targeting your energy and resources, effectively means more control, less wastage and easier management. This goes for the business element in general, as well as marketing.
When you market to the masses, you essentially take a stab in the dark.
Whatever campaign you put out there, you are to all extents and purposes, crossing your fingers and hoping your product, service and message appeals to someone…. anyone?
Whilst a blanket approach does work for many large corporations where their product or service appeals to virtually anyone, it isn’t always the most effective for smaller businesses, where budget is more precious.
Once your target audience is defined, your marketing budget can be targeted on campaigns that will appeal. For example, place an advert in an industry-specific publication that your potential clients would read and track the response.
(2) Use their language to connect with your target audience
When focusing your resources on a target audience you are able to use language that connects with them specifically.
This helps to quickly build rapport, as your customer will feel that you understand their bespoke needs better than someone with just general knowledge.
People typically feel reassured when you have direct experience helping people just like them.
Even if you are a tax specialist, a builder is going to feel more confident if you are tax specialist for builders, as an example.
The more clients you can accumulate within your niche, the more authority you can speak with as you collect more testimonials, case studies and experiences from your clients.
(3) Tailor your systems and processes to suit
When you target a niche market, your internal and external systems and can be built to specifically cater for your target audience.
This again saves much time and reduces wastage, but also means you can develop a set of bespoke, tailored tools for your customers.
This could include calculators, factsheets, downloadable guides, publications or FAQ’s.
Not only does your customer get added value from all the extra items you can add to your package. Also, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel time and time again.
It’s a win:win and gives you plenty of reason to shout about it in your marketing campaigns too!
Finding your niche
Finding a niche to suit your business sometimes happens organically. Maybe you collect a few doctors, or a few contractors, or a few hairdressers, and there it begins.
However, if you are a start-up, or have a complete mix of customers at present and want to become more specialist in your service offering, there are a few things that you can do to help determine a good niche for you.
- Look for gaps in the market – see what other firms are specialising in, or not.
- Consider profitable sectors – if you are going to specialise, you want it to be with a profile of customer that will be time-efficient for you, and be able to afford your fees.
- Assess your network – do you have influential friends or family in specific trades or sectors?
- Calculate demand – various online tools show how many people search each month for certain services or products, within specific sectors. This can be a good indicator for demand, online.
- Harness your skills and those of your team – if you know you are well equipped to perform bookkeeping, VAT, CIS, PAYE, tax advice etc etc, find a profile of client that will enable you to perform the best service possible, by using all your strengths.