So you wanna start a business, but the idea hasn't quite come to you yet? Let me guess, you know what you like and what you don't from past experience, but the landing your niche business topic isn't 100% registering? Believe me, you and everyone else out there wanting to start a business has had this issue. One would think that if you wanted to start a business it should come easy to us, right? The answer is not necessarily and you are not alone. Most people have a real hard time defining and narrowing in on their niche. Here is how to land a business niche you are passionate about so that you can lead a life of happiness in a career that you enjoy.
How to land a business niche you are passionate about
It takes time to sort through the details, understand the problem you want to solve, and determine who you want to target. I searched the internet for days, even weeks, and it seemed no one could help me figure out what my business niche should be. Then I thought, why not be the resource for others.
Below are the steps that I found to work for me and I believe they will work for you too! If your ready to begin defining your niche today and are serious about it, then I recommend that you skip to the good stuff. Download my FREE workbook: How to find the perfect niche for your business. The workbook goes into depth on assisting you to define each of steps below in detail so that you are able to come out on the other side with a much better understanding of yourself, what you want, your particular favored niche and your target market. Click the workbook below to download yours today.
The steps to landing your business niche
Here are the 6 ways to narrow in on your business idea and determine your niche.
- Go back to your reason
- Awareness of your strengths
- Define your passions
- Keyword analysis
- Know your competition
- Define your difference
Now, let's take a closer look at each step and how you can take actionable strides to narrow in on your niche.
1. Go back to your reason
In order to truly understand our motivations and refine what we are meant to do, we need to know our reason. We need to be intentional with ourselves and fully define why we wanted to start a business in the first place.
Is it money? Freedom? For the cause? You have to DEFINE YOUR WHY, and only then will you be able to understand your next steps. For example if your reason is money, then it is more important to bring in the dollars rather than working in a remote location ie) having a storefront. If freedom was a large contributor then the opposite would be so. If it is neither and you want to contribute to a cause, something larger than yourself, then maybe its not as large of a factor. Whatever your reason, be honest with yourself. No one will judge you here;)
2. Awareness of your strengths
“Gallup analysis reveals that people who use their strengths every day are three times more likely to report having an excellent quality of life, six times more likely to be engaged at work, 8% more productive and 15% less likely to quit their jobs” (Gallup, 2015).
In order to best understand your strengths you need to be very clear on what you are good at. You know that feeling when you are performing an activity and time passes by so quickly you barely notice? That is most likely a strength of yours and you should lean into this ability. You will find that these strengths come easier to you and you more than likely enjoy them. Be sure to write these strengths down and incorporate them into your job daily.
To really drill into your strengths, I have found that Strengthfinders (affiliate link) is a phenomenal way to truly understand and develop your talents.
The book can be purchased online and prior to reading through it you will take a quiz online. They will then be able to break down your answers in a way that will allow you to further understand your unique strengths. The second step is to then read through the top 5 strengths that they assigned to you and navigate those sections of the book for clear and actionable ways to act upon these strengths in in your career. Strengthfinders is one of the best affordable investments to date!
3. Define your passions
The next step is to define your passions through conducting a brainstorm. Write down all the hobbies that you enjoy doing as well as the activities that you perform and enjoy on a consistent basis. Write down the things you spend your leisure time on and those that you enjoy on the weekends. Work to understand the things that spark joy and excitement for you, and really drill down on the things you love and want to know or learn more about.
Try to then make these ideas unique by combining two of them. If you like gardening and your a fan of the water maybe you should open up a lake/beach landscaping business. If you are a huge fan of football and love to run, maybe you start a shoe company that gears toward football athletes. The sky is the limit with this exercise. I do, however, recommend that you put together a minimum of 3 ideas in this phase.
4. Keywords
Once you have narrowed this list down to 3 different ideas, you should take the time to understand the ranking of those keywords online. You want to know if your ideas could be profitable right? Then you will need to perform a search on Google to see how broad and popular your topics are. Below the search bar you will see how many results come back. The less results, the more niche your topic is.
Next, leverage Google Trends to understand how your topic is trending. Google trends is a search feature that allows you to search a particular topic and view the results over a period of time. You are able to change the time range as well to meet your needs. It also allows you to see the topic searched by geographical region.
I would recommend searching for more than one term and comparing the two. By selecting the plus symbol feature next to the search term, you are able to compare both terms over a period of time. After comparing your top three you should have a good idea of which stands out to you as being the most appealing.
5. Know Your Competition
Okay, now take the top three niche topics that you compared above, and narrow down from three to one topic.
How?
In order to narrow your niche down, take a look at each of your three choices. Use the following considerations when examining each:
Does this niche topic incorporate your strengths?
Do you have the knowledge and expertise in this area?
Does your niche fit in with one of your passions?
Now, go back to the first step and re-read your original reason for wanting to start your own business. Really drill into that reason and it will allow you to further understand your new target market. If freedom was important to you would it be more beneficial to have this be online only? A pop-up shop? If your reason was money, would you have a storefront? Once you have an idea of the type of niche business you truly want, then you can zero in on your target market.
If you are online only, who else is out there? Work to understand your competition. Is the marker saturate or is there room to grow? Are there different social platforms you can try etc? If you are looking at having a storefront, where would it be located and what type of competition in the area would you have? As a local business, would you have competitors online? Really define this target market and your competition as it will become a huge part of your business.
6. Define your difference
What makes this niche different? What would you bring to the table that many are not doing? How are you going to stand out from the crowd?
We all have something or place that we love, but it has one issue. Now it is your turn to SOLVE THAT PROBLEM.
It may sound crazy, but the more niche you go, the more likely you will find true followers and customers that want your product. This is because you will meet their specific need. Some people think that if you keep your idea broad you will cast a wider net. I am here to tell you that will not be as successful as you may think. You will need to have something different to define your business from the rest of your competition.
Keep in mind, altering the product or service may not be necessary. The variation may be better served within the products’ or services' marketing, price point, delivery, customer service, values, or social, or environmental conscious strategies.
Download the Workbook!
If you really want to hone in on your niche, download my free workbook, "How to find the Perfect Business Niche" ! It will take you step-by-step through the process so that you don't have to go it alone. I elaborated on all these topics to make sure that you were given the best possible cheat sheet that is easy to use. Download the FREE WORKBOOK TODAY!
Best of luck to you in finding your niche. For more business tips and recommendations along your entrepreneurial journey be sure to sign up for my email list! I will be sure to send you actionable and profitable recommendations that you will be able to start implementing today!
