Your Niche isn't your niche

Sam hello and good evening, everyone. I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and money mindset coach. I help ADHD business owners make more money in less time with fewer distractions by teaching you how to discover your profitable niche, create an offer that people actually want to buy and train you on how to sell and or market and sell your services without wanting to vomit because it is very vomit inducing when you haven't done it before. Anyway, tonight I want to talk about the first part of that. Picking a niche. So today is the kickoff of the 12 days to stop Being a Weenie. My play on the 12 Days of Christmas minus the Birds, where I'm giving anyone who signed up a lesson on something that is going to be a game changer in their business. Once you have it figured out, without a lot of this stuff, you will struggle to hit six figures next year. So if you're curious about registering for this. Hi, Laura, welcome, if you're interested, is absolutely free. This is my gift to you this holiday season. You can go to the link in my bio and you can register for it and the 12 days to stop Being a Weenie. Anyway, today the lesson was all about. Hello. The lesson was all about picking a niche. And I want to address first what a lot of people think a niche is because people get really crunchy about this because they think that they to narrow down to like a very specific demographic. Hi, welcome. And that is not what a niche is. Okay. It helps. It helps you like define the scope of your niche. Sure. And by demographics I mean like women who are between a certain age group, who maybe live in a certain geographic area, who are single, so on and so forth. That all does play into what your niche is, but it is not the complete story. Okay. And here's where I see a lot of new business owners get really, really frustrated. So they have started a business, they have a service, they've put together an offer, they've probably put together a website and they're out there and they're posting about it and they're marketing about their work and they're saying, hey everyone, I'm here and I work with these kinds of people come and sign up for my thing and no one signs up. And so then they like pour their heart out onto social media and they share really personal things and they're vulnerable and they storytel and they get like a lot of likes and a lot of comments but no one signs up. And I laugh because I seen this so often. I went through this very, very early on Before I realized what I was doing, coming from a sales and marketing background. Now, the issue here is, is that when you only name a demographic, you say, I work with women between the ages of 25 and 35 who have a job. You're not. You're getting people's attention. They're like, huh, yeah, that's me. But they're gonna blast past you because they don't care. There's nothing that you've said that is specific to what is going on in their life right then in that moment that hasn't been like, wait, wait, wait. You help with that? I have that problem. Oh, my God. Yes. We need to talk. So when you think about what your niche is, I really want you to think about what is the problem that you solve and what is the desired outcome that you help your clients get to. Okay? That is the backbone of your niche. Okay. It is not necessarily demographics. You know, like, you. You could absolutely say that you work with young moms, right? Young moms who are in their 20s. And a lot of the problems that they have are about, like, you know, money's tight, maybe they're trying to juggle work and child care and taking care of the kids. Maybe, like, a lot of their are still single. And, like, trying to, like, maintain those relationships is really, really hard. Now, if you were to only say them like, only young moms in their twenties and. And not name all those things like, that wouldn't be sticky enough for young moms in their 20s to think that you could help them with what they're dealing with. The other beautiful thing about it, so a lot of new business owners, when they hear about niching down, they're like, oh, no, I can't do that because I'm going to scare away a ton of people who could potentially be my client. Right? Which is false. Let's just. Let's say that right there on day three, I will be teaching all about one of the biggest mistakes that people make in their businesses, and not niching down is one of them. And so if you're curious about that, again, go to the link in my bio and register for the 12 days to stop being a weenie. So you can be sure to get that email, that little lesson. Anyway, the beautiful thing about getting really specific on the problems is that, yeah, sure, you might specialize in working with young moms in their 20s, right? But if you're naming the problem of, like, how do you maintain your friendships with your friends who do not have children? I mean, that could be true for A mom in her 40s, right. Who's. Who has a solid group of friends who maybe their kids are already out of the house or, or they decided to never have children and she's now the only one in her friend group who has a young child. Right. Those problems don't necessarily just stick to the demographic that you choose, right. It could also be, you know, a dad. It could be someone who. A dad in their 30s who like all their friends are single and they don't have kids and like, how do they deal with all this stuff? When you name the problems that people are facing in their day to day life, it opens the door for people who aren't necessarily your ideal client to come walking through. Case in point, when I started my business, I started off as a dating coach for men. Okay. Ore will remember this. She was there from the very beginning. But anyway, I lived in San Francisco, and if you've lived in San Francisco as a single woman, you know, dating there is absolutely miserable. And so when I first got trained as a coach, I was like, you know what, I'm gonna fix this. I'm going to fix these guys, I'm going to make them so much better to date, and I'm going to do this for like the good of all womankind. And so I went out and I started marketing and I started naming the problems as I thought. I hadn't done a whole lot of like market research on this. I started naming the problems as I thought. And yeah, I got some, I got some interest. Then I started doing some market research. And it's interesting, I got some guys to volunteer for the market research interviews, but I got mostly women. And I was like, this is great. Like, you know, if I'm really trying to help guys in dating, like, it's really great to understand what other women are looking for so I can communicate that to them. I ended up getting eight female clients and one dude. Okay. Women were the ones that were really struggling on the dating market. Men didn't give a fuck. They really didn't. I thought it would be this really awesome niche where I got to like, reach out, help them and, you know, build my business. And it didn't go that way at all. The universe, I always say this. The universe will always dance with you and correct you if necessary if you pick the wrong niche. Most of the time, people do pick the wrong niche in the beginning, so don't be afraid of that. However, I wouldn't have gone to coaching women and then to evolving into doing leadership coaching for those Women, because most of them did not actually need dating coaching. They needed executive leadership coaching because they were really shitty at setting boundaries around their personal time with their managers, their team, so on and so forth. So, anyway, so I evolved into that. And then a lot of my coaching friends, the people that I'd gone through my coach training program with, like, wait a minute, how are you getting clients? What are you doing? Like, how do you. How do you go from, like, just talking to someone and then all of a sudden they're paying you a certain amount every month to. To work with you? Like, we can't figure that out. It's hard. This is kind of. Because the advice we were given in coach training was really bad. Like, they told us to just go and give away sessions to anyone who would take one and that we get clients that way. And that's not how sales and marketing works. So anyway, I started showing them, and they kept, you know, asking me different questions. And I kind of took for granted that I had this whole background in sales and marketing. And they started getting clients and they started doing things in their businesses and being successful. And it's actually orit who's watching right now is one of the first friends who referred a client to me for this part of my service. And I was kind of surprised when I got that first referral. And I was like, well, why not? Like, I really enjoy teaching my friends this. Why don't I combine this know how with my coaching? It'll be a far superior service. And that's how I ended up doing this, right? So now that I'm here, when I first started, because I was really deep in the coaching world, back to the point I was naming a lot of the problems that new coaches have when they're starting up, right? And I was very specific to coaches, right? Because that was kind of my background, and that's what I had experience in. That's who is naturally coming to me anyway. But here's what's funny is I was talking a lot about the problems they faced and the desired outcomes that they wanted. And what happened was I got lawyers reaching out to me saying, hey, I know you only work with coaches, but the problems you're describing are exactly what's going on for me right now. And there's no one I feel comfortable talking to. And the way you talk about this, I feel like I can trust you. And then I got copywriters who were like, hey, I know you only work with coaches, but the problems you're talking about are exactly the things that are going on in my new business, and I'm really struggling. And you seem to know what I can do to get out of this. Can I work with you? And a bunch of different industries came to me to see if I would work with them. Now, this is the beauty of picking a niche around a common problem that your ideal clients have. Hi. The Gazelle Welcome. Is when you're marketing to the actual thing that's stressing the out of them every single morning and every single night. You're not just speaking to that small demographic that you've named. You're speaking to that small demographic and any other possible demographic out there in the world who has the same problem. Okay? It's common across the board. All right, so, like, if you work with new moms, like young new moms, the problems that they face could very easily be the same problems that new dads face and older moms face if you work. There's one fitness coach that I discovered during the pandemic. She wrote this post that went viral on Facebook, and she's a health coach specifically for people in the party industry. Right. So she works with people who are DJs, nightclub owners, bartenders, to help them break out of this unhealthy lifestyle and start building healthy, like, practices into their normal schedule. Because they weren't going to be changing their career. They just wanted to be healthier. Now, you could totally see someone who maybe works in the movie industry who is a cameraman, who has a really, really demanding job, has really late hours, you know, just really wonky times that they have to be in the stud. You could totally see someone like that who has one of these really demanding jobs. Hi, Todd. Welcome. You could totally see them reaching out to her and be like, hey, I know you only work with people in the nightclub and and party industry, but my life is crazy. And the things that you're talking about, about unhealthy lifestyles, that's me. You know, I'm working all day. We have, like, unhealthy food on set all the time. This is happening. That is happening. Can you help me? So when you really get clear on the niche that you serve and by niche, the problems that you help solve, you actually draw in people who are outside of your demographic niche. Okay. It is absolutely magic when you do this because it keeps you engaged. I mean, I have adhd and a lot of my clients have adhd. It's one of the reasons why I now mainly work with people with ADHD is I was attracting them anyway. This is Another thing like, as you start working in your business, you're going to really understand who's naturally drawn to work with you. And you can't know that before you start. Anyway, for those of us with adhd, we have a need for variety. Okay? We get bored if we're doing the same thing over and over and over and over again. No, it's just not going to work for us. So when you focus in on these problems that you help solve and the desired outcomes, rather than the type of poison person that you're trying to work with, you invite variety. You invite people who have all different kinds of backgrounds, who are all different ages, genders, orientations, who are. Have all different kinds of interests, who speak different languages, everything. You attract them all because what you're speaking to is the thing that's keeping them up at night and not just are. Do you check this box? This box? This box? No. Anyway, if you would like more information on this, I invite you to join me in the 12 days to stop Being Weenie. It is my gift to you this holiday season. It's kind of like the 12 Days of Christmas, like I said before, but no birds will be sent to you, I promise you. No drummers drumming, no maids and milking. You don't have to buy any cows. It's not, not a thing every single day in your inbox, starting today. So if you missed today's email, obvious, if you're not registered, I will send it to you if you want it. But every single day in the morning, you'll get a simple email lesson. They are short, sweet, to the point, because I know it's the holiday season, we're all like bonkers, crazy busy. But all these things, all these lessons are designed to help you figure out your unique personalized strategy to hit six figures in your business next year. Okay, I want to name, just because we're here anyway, your plan, how you get to six figures is going to be very different to how other people get there. There's no two businesses that are exactly alike unless you're in a franchise. But there's also no one like you. There's no one with your personality. There's no one with your specific set of talents. There's no one with your specific set of challenges and fears and weaknesses and all that stuff and things that you want to avoid doing. There's also no one who has the exact same work style as you. Right? So what works for someone else? Their pathway to making a certain amount of money in their business. Great for them. Love that for them. So often I talk to new business owners after they've tried to follow someone else's plan and it didn't go very well. And they're like, they feel like there's something wrong with them. There's nothing, nothing wrong with you, okay? You have to build your business. You have to figure out your strategy to do this. Someone else's plan, someone else's strategy will not cut it for you, okay? Because that strategy was for them, for their business type, for their personality, their work style, their challenges, their weaknesses, all the things. So over these next 11 days now, these different parts, these different lessons will show you how you can really understand the things you need to consider as you develop this strategy. I will also be offering something on the 28th that will help you put all the pieces together. So if you want to keep your ears out for that and your eyes out, then I will be announcing that in the coming days. And anyway, want to say such incredible advice, Katie. Thank you. Oh, thank you, Laura. I'm so happy. And thank you so much for being here. And thank you to Todd and the gazelle and Orit and Laura again and to anyone else who's watching on the Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube. I will be going live every single day through the 12 days to stop being a weenie. There will be days where I'm a little extra tired because I have some crazy days coming up, so forgive me if I'm not as high energy. Anyway, and again, if you want to join this, if you would like to register and get these emails, then again, that link is just in my bio, so you can go check it out there. Anyway, thank you so much for being here, guys. I hope this is really useful to you and I cannot wait to see you soon. I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and money mindset coach. Happy Tuesday, everyone. Good night. It.