Nailing down your Ideal client and your niche is probably one of the most difficult things for entrepreneurs to do. Entrepreneurs are talented and can do many things very well. However, to attract clients you need to narrow in on one thing and make it crystal clear in your message to the people you are trying to attract so they will notice you. Marketing for everyone about everything usually gets you nothing!
This is a make-or-break business step. Yet, we struggle with it because we want to serve everyone. We often suffer from the worry that we will miss opportunities if we talk about just one aspect of what we do.
The first step we can take to make this critical exercise easier is to break it apart and think of it as two separate things.
An Ideal Client is who you want to work with, and your Niche is better thought of as how you are here to serve and the problem you solve. Here’s a breakdown to support you in understanding the difference between the two.
Your Ideal Client
Who do you want to work with? The missed element here is who you want to work with. What kind of people do you enjoy? You have the freedom as an entrepreneur to decide that for yourself. It is a choice, and you should make it consciously.
Who you want to work with should be defined by the qualities, characteristics and values people have. For example, you probably want people that will show up, do the work, pay for your services on time, be engaged, and curious. It’s more about their values and behaviors than it is about their hobbies, what magazines they read or how many pets they have. Think of character.
The best way to define this is to start with who you don’t want to work with. Perhaps you don’t want to work with someone who doesn’t participate or isn’t present during meetings. Make a list of the non-negotiable negative characteristics you don’t want in any of your clients. From your list of negatives, turn the characteristics around to make them positive attributes. These are the non-negotiable traits you want in an ideal client.
Your Niche
Trying to niche solely on the characteristics of your ideal clients never gets your focus narrowed in like it needs to be for your messaging to attract your ideal client. This is where the big difficulty lies for most Entrepreneurs going through this exercise and thinking that ideal client and niche are the same thing.
Your Niche has three parts: the problem you solve, your learned expertise, and your natural expertise which is what makes you unique and establishes why a client would want to work with you over a competitor.
Your Niche: What Problem Do You Solve?
Your niche should focus on the problem you solve or the desire you make possible for your clients. The who part of Niche is who has the problem or desire and wants to pay you to solve it, not their personality characteristics.
What problem do you solve? It needs to be tangible. If you talk about good health, that is too broad. Focus on an aspect of good health like being unable to lose weight, or reducing blood pressure and getting off medication, real problems or desires that are top of mind for people. The best area to look for problems or desires revolves around time, money, health, relationships, security, and convenience.
Most importantly, the problem must be a problem that is severe and urgent enough that people want to pay to solve it in the immediate future.
Are you clear on what problem you solve or what desire you help people achieve? Is it severe, urgent and top-of-mind for people? Can you clearly articulate it in simple language the people with the problem use to talk about it?
Your Niche: Your Learned Expertise
We all have expertise we learned through formal education or experience. We can share and even teach this expertise to help solve problems. But what you can do doesn’t necessarily define your niche. Just because you know how to do something and can do it doesn’t mean you want to.
I was taught accounting in college. I can do it. I’m even good at it but I don’t want to be an accountant. So, if someone comes to me looking for help to balance their books or do their taxes, I do not want to leverage my learned experience there. That is not my niche.
Most of us have many skills and can make a business out of several of them. How do you choose? I see many entrepreneurs choose based on what they can do. I think this is another place where we get confused about niche.
Choose your problem-based niche around your purpose and business genius, something you want to do, are passionate about that you are naturally an expert in.
There are many parts of your Human Design that give you insight here. Your Energy Type, Profile, Centers, all give us clues. For example, Energy Types show us that. . .
- Manifesters can make transformations that really change people and are natural at helping people that are ready to transform.
- Generators go deep and help people gain mastery. They are great at helping people break through plateaus.
- Manifesting Generators are great at bringing things together and can help people make sense of things.
- Projectors have potent insightful advice and can be a huge help to people that are ready to listen.
- Reflectors encourage people to step into their higher purpose and can help people see themselves as if looking into a mirror.
We find a lot of information to help with niche in the Centers in the Human Design Chart. Our defined centers are areas where we have consistent energy. Each center brings different natural energies we use every day that define what we are experts in such as clarity, ideas, direction, and strategy. We also see how we naturally support our clients, and how we are designed to best deliver this expertise whether it be through teaching, coaching, guiding, mentoring, etc. All give clarity into how we solve the problem we solve, our niche.
Your Niche: What Makes You Unique, Why You?
The third part of niche has everything to do with your purpose, business genius and the natural talents you have.
To uncover your natural talents, we look at your Business Genius (your conscious Sun), who you are designed to naturally attract (your conscious Venus energy) and your core values.
For example, my conscious Sun is in Gate 8.6 Uniqueness. I am here to foster individualism and authenticity which aligns with my core values of freedom, honesty, and respect. My Venus energy is Gate 51. Clients are drawn to my ability to create breakthroughs around the freedom to be themselves.
These aspects of your Human Design can help you better define your niche, how to talk about it, and get clarity around the people you want to attract and serve. Create your niche by leaning into who you are.