Niche problem? Use this intuitive process to uncover it

We all know that having a niche can help you stand from the crowd and attract your ideal customers more effectively.

There are plenty of websites out there teaching you SEO your keywords, in order to define and narrow down your niche. While SEO is important to a certain extent, ultimately you write for humans, not search engine right?

Is having a niche a bit like grocery shopping? You just pick and choose?

If it works for you, then great.

But if you struggle to “pick” a niche (eg, you need more clarity around your expertise, or you are multi-passionate – you simply don’t even know where to start), I’d love to show you a reverse process to uncover your niche instead.

Personally I believe this is a more natural approach. Instead of picking a niche, it’s more like pulling out a thread and discovering YOUR own unique offering.

So how to pull out the thread?

Firstly, you must know both side of the equation.

A) You

B) Your Ideal Client Avatar

On the basis that you know yourself (your strengths, skills and vision) pretty well (see a previous post if you need more resource here), it’s time to invest in the other side of the equation:

Ideal Client Avatar

In the modern online business world, knowing who your ideal clients are is the foundation of everything you build, offer and sell.

Having clarity around who you can serve the best, you will get positive results more easily:

– your niche will “appear” naturally;

– clarity around where your potential customers are, and more importantly, you can show up where they are, and can attract them instead of chasing them;

– you feel more confident working with them, by knowing who they are, what their biggest frustration is and how to turn it around;

– every product or service you offer will be around helping your ideal clients, things will come together instead of all over the place.

It’s a very exciting process, it’s a not just a business tool but also spiritual – wouldn’t it be wonderful to know the REAL vision from your own soul?

1. Ideal Client Avatar

Usually more ideal clients will show up once you’ve completed this process. Why does it work?

My understanding is that you use this process to sharpen your intention, given we are normally quite vague with our intentions.

This tool activates your emotions/thoughts, which is the bridge to manifest what’s in 5th dimension into 3rd dimension – physical world, ie actual money and clients.

When you do this process, you’ll make the Universe’s job a lot easier to deliver for you.

Also, in a more practical way, your marketing message is getting clearer, and people will feel like that you are speaking to them directly (see #3 below).

Ideal customers profile go WAY BEYOND the age bracket, geographic location, culture background, profession etc…

To help you to get started, I’ve made a story template for you (sometimes filling the blanks is easier than answering 100 questions). You can tweak it, or go even deeper, whichever you like.

Before you make up this story, it’s recommended to take a short meditation, pray and politely ask your higher self, guides and angels to drop inspirations.

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You can start off with something like this: my ideal client’s name is ______, ______[male/female], s/he is ____ years old.

S/he grew up in ________[location] from a _______________ [type of family].

S/he currently works in_______[or stays at home]? S/he has ____ children.

His/her friends usually describe him/her as _________, _________ and _________.

However s/he believes s/he is more like _____________________________________

His/her biggest dream is to ________________________________________________

S/he had this dream since s/he was young, but a few events changed his/her perception: _______________________________________________________________________

[eg. illness? awkward childhood? so not glamourous background? 8th grade teacher? ex-boyfriend/girlfriend? family? redundancy?]

S/he loves _______, ________, ______etc.

However ________________[specific fears or limitations, eg, self-talk of being not good enough? worried about uncertainty? fear of success? not enough time? ] stops him/her from enjoying him/herself more.

Most of her/his friends _____________________________________________________

His/her family/partner is ____________________________________________________

His/er core values in life is ________________________________________________,

this was mainly learnt from ______________________[eg, inherited from parents? formal education? own life experience?]

His/her guilty pleasures include _____________________________________________

The first time s/he visited a blog in your industry was because __________________________[triggered by an event?]

S/he found you through _______________ [eg, personal network? online forum? referral?]

S/he came to you for help and assistance because s/he believes that you can ___________________________________________________________________

The reason that s/he hesitates to buy from you immediately is because __________________________________________________________________

[eg, worried about friends laughing at her/him? spouse/family won’t support this action? the general public perception is that it is weak to ask for help? believes your product/service is not as good? or believes your stuff is good but s/he is not a good fit for this – although it’s not true given s/he is your ideal client, s/he still worries about it]

The magazines s/he reads are _____________________________________________________________

The blogs s/he visits are _____________________________________________________________

The networks s/he joins are _____________________________________________________________

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2. Your Niche

Now put yourself in your Ideal Client Avatar’s shoes.

Feel his/her pains.

You see – all her pains and fears have a reason/root, no matter how irrational it might appear.

Envision his/her dreams, and the hesitation/obstacles to go after these dreams…

Re-visit what you wrote above: “S/he came to you for help and assistance because s/he believes that you can______________”

Can you find a theme? Can you summarise in one sentence which exact problem you can solve for your client?

Don’t worry that if it might sound too narrow.

For example, you can help a new mother lose 10lb within 30 days. This could be your sub-niche, instead of website tagline. You can still expand to, eg, health coach for new mums, with a sub-niche, a specific paid service of weight loss.

3 Signs that you’ve got your niche right.

i) It is in line with your previous testimonials, in terms of where you helped your clients the most.

Reverse process it’s great. But it’s even better when you have real life examples to back you up. If you haven’t collected feedback or testimonials yet, please get it going now! When you have hard-core evidence in front of you, you’ll have so much more clarity.

ii) You feel a huge relief – finally you give yourself permission to do what you always secretly desired.

This shows that you have a very healthy relationship with your niche. You don’t want to pick a niche which might sound great on the surface, but it drains you instead of energising you.

Ultimately, you want to get paid by being who you are, right?

iii) You are so excited with the idea that you are fully turned on.

You need to feel turned on by your niche, otherwise there is no point having one.

The online marketing heroine Marie Forleo and her adventure mastermind group call this: CYP (cream your pants) factor.

3. Tweak your marketing message + improve conversion

Now you’ve built a good foundation of your niche. How can you use the insights to convert better?

Go back to the Ideal Client Avatar story, look through all the fears from your avatar’s perspective.

On your website, flyers etc, demonstrate that you understand where they are going through.

Cross off all words like “maybe”, “perhaps”….show that you know where their challenges are right now.

Show that you know their dreams and biggest frustrations.

Address their hesitations or fears of buying from you (see the story above).

Hesitation: “Your product looks good, but I don’t have time to go through”.

Solutions—->

offer complimentary time-management training on the side

And/or make your product easy to digest and implement.

Hesitation: “What if I spend hard-earned money and still don’t lose weight after your programme?”

Solutions—->

offer a money back guarantee as appropriate.

And/or use testimonials from clients who had similar concerns previously but got desired results from your offering.

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Remember: refining your niche is an on-going process, your ideal clients will evolve over the time. It’s much more important to get started instead of waiting for everything to be perfect.

Your current niche might be different from 5 years on (or even 6 months forward) – don’t let that stop you from getting started.

Your bottom line now is to use your niche and get a few quick wins, right? Starting an online business is not always easy, there are so much things going on, and quick wins are the motivation to keep the momentum going.

So take action now –> what can you implement TODAY to differentiate your service?

Leave a comment, we’d love to hear from you!

All my love,

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