Many solo professionals find it difficult to define a specific core message. They feel they will lose out on clients by limiting themselves, so they stay more general or they choose to define several niches because they aren’t sure how to pick just one.
Staying too broad can cause more harm than good. The larger your audience, the more time and effort it takes to market to that audience. Also, it makes it too difficult to really speak to your audience in a tone that will resonate with them. How can you be specific with your message when you are marketing to too many people? You will earn more profits if your audience thinks you are speaking directly to them.
Defining one narrow message doesn’t mean that you can’t accept work outside of your niche. What it does mean is that you are limiting who you need to market to and network with.
I have been a web developer for years. I work as a consultant. If I market my services as being just a developer, I wouldn’t get many clients. My clients need to know that I’m specialized to a certain type of programming. I am actually a Web Application Developer working with Adobe Flex. This is a very specific area of development. I can take on other projects outside of this niche, but I usually don’t need to.
I market myself to clients who are in need of that specific type of development. By narrowing myself, I accomplish two major things.
- It’s easy for me to find out where my clients hang out and where I need to market myself for them to find me.
- I am telling clients that I am an expert in this one area, and this causes me to be in high demand. I can actually charge twice as much per project by marketing myself as such an expert. As it turns out, there are thousands of developers, but there aren’t many developers in my specific niche. So when potential clients find me, they want to keep hiring me.
What is your core message? Is it narrow enough? Does it resonate with you and fit with your skills and experience?
