To All Communi-Creators:
Niche communication is a powerful thing. By identifying a narrow, but viable, target audience and orienting all communications toward that audience Communi-Creators best position their business as an expert on that niche's needs. If the goal is to sell Widget 2.0 to Lawyers - the company website should be "LawyerWidgetsOnly.com", the license plate on the company car should be "WIDG4LAW". By consistently positioning the business in all ways,as an expert in a thing, and only that thing, one finds the message soon dominates the niche.
To achieve niche marketing success the niche must be well-defined - for example, take a company who says they work with small business people. Well, the woman who owns the 50-employee factory making B2B equipment and the guy who is my dentist are both small business people - but no one can be a true expert on the unique needs of each. If the messaging is even this well-rounded it won't cut through anything. Instead the messaging needs to be sharp, honed to a point and ready to penetrate the chosen market. The company in the example above is better served avoiding the broad "small business owners" category and instead have their communications state repeatedly they are, "an expert on the needs of business owners operating manufacturing companies with 50-150 employees". That's a narrow, but viable, niche we can work with and become an expert in.
Now, being a niche communicator does not mean one sacrifices opportunities which may come along but are outside the niche - and this risk is feared by many. Which is too bad. So many businesses sacrifice the tangible, measurable benefits of niche marketing because they are afraid they will miss out on some grand opportunity which is outside the scope of their communication plan.
First - if the niche is truly viable and the communication program is both well-conceived and well-executed the business should have no problem generating traffic. Second, a business can orient their communications around a narrow niche, and still capitalize on unique opportunities when they develop.
To this point consider. . . "The Duck Hunting Story" (borrowed, by the way, from the mind of Phil Buchanan, CEO at the Cannon Financial Institute).
Four hunters are duck hunting. They are sitting in their duck hunting blind, with their duck calls, wearing their duck hunting hats and their duck hunting clothes, their duck decoys are in the water and their shotguns are loaded with duck hunting ammunition. They are fully prepared for a day of duck hunting, and are thus far having a great deal of success. One hunter needs a break and leaves the blind to take a short walk down a near-by trail. A few minutes later shots ring out and the rest of the hunters coming running to see what happened. When they find their wandering friend he is standing over a huge deer which he just shot. Amazed, because duck hunting ammunition has all the killing power of harsh language and would not bring down such a large animal, the hunters asked how he did it.
"I had a few slugs with me".
"Slugs?" the friends asked. "Why would you bring slugs when we're duck hunting?"
"'Cause you never know when you might need to stop hunting ducks," the wanderer responded.
"Stop hunting ducks? When did you need to stop hunting ducks?"
"The minute I saw that big deer walking down the trail."
THE POINT: The benefits of niche marketing don't require surrendering opportunity. A business can be 100% successful duck hunting, and still be able to bag the big deer when it comes along.
Niche communication is a powerful thing. By identifying a narrow, but viable, target audience and orienting all communications toward that audience Communi-Creators best position their business as an expert on that niche's needs. If the goal is to sell Widget 2.0 to Lawyers - the company website should be "LawyerWidgetsOnly.com", the license plate on the company car should be "WIDG4LAW". By consistently positioning the business in all ways,as an expert in a thing, and only that thing, one finds the message soon dominates the niche.
To achieve niche marketing success the niche must be well-defined - for example, take a company who says they work with small business people. Well, the woman who owns the 50-employee factory making B2B equipment and the guy who is my dentist are both small business people - but no one can be a true expert on the unique needs of each. If the messaging is even this well-rounded it won't cut through anything. Instead the messaging needs to be sharp, honed to a point and ready to penetrate the chosen market. The company in the example above is better served avoiding the broad "small business owners" category and instead have their communications state repeatedly they are, "an expert on the needs of business owners operating manufacturing companies with 50-150 employees". That's a narrow, but viable, niche we can work with and become an expert in.
Now, being a niche communicator does not mean one sacrifices opportunities which may come along but are outside the niche - and this risk is feared by many. Which is too bad. So many businesses sacrifice the tangible, measurable benefits of niche marketing because they are afraid they will miss out on some grand opportunity which is outside the scope of their communication plan.
First - if the niche is truly viable and the communication program is both well-conceived and well-executed the business should have no problem generating traffic. Second, a business can orient their communications around a narrow niche, and still capitalize on unique opportunities when they develop.
To this point consider. . . "The Duck Hunting Story" (borrowed, by the way, from the mind of Phil Buchanan, CEO at the Cannon Financial Institute).
Four hunters are duck hunting. They are sitting in their duck hunting blind, with their duck calls, wearing their duck hunting hats and their duck hunting clothes, their duck decoys are in the water and their shotguns are loaded with duck hunting ammunition. They are fully prepared for a day of duck hunting, and are thus far having a great deal of success. One hunter needs a break and leaves the blind to take a short walk down a near-by trail. A few minutes later shots ring out and the rest of the hunters coming running to see what happened. When they find their wandering friend he is standing over a huge deer which he just shot. Amazed, because duck hunting ammunition has all the killing power of harsh language and would not bring down such a large animal, the hunters asked how he did it.
"I had a few slugs with me".
"Slugs?" the friends asked. "Why would you bring slugs when we're duck hunting?"
"'Cause you never know when you might need to stop hunting ducks," the wanderer responded.
"Stop hunting ducks? When did you need to stop hunting ducks?"
"The minute I saw that big deer walking down the trail."
THE POINT: The benefits of niche marketing don't require surrendering opportunity. A business can be 100% successful duck hunting, and still be able to bag the big deer when it comes along.
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