I’ve got five free webinars coming up on niching and a six week coaching program but I know that the timing and money won’t work out for everyone so . . .

In this blog post are links to a dozen or so of my favourite blogs on this whole topic of niching and why it matters.

Of course, the first thing you might be wondering is, “Is niching an issue for me?” Maybe. Maybe not, but I’ve found that there are sixteen common symptoms of businesses with weak, fuzzy or non-existent niches. It’s worth checking.

But, perhaps ore importantly, you might be wondering, “Why Does Niching Matter?”

It’s a fair question.

First of all, these cartoon bears have something to say about it . . .

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But on a more serious note, I believe that, even though it can freak us out, niching can actually, surprisingly be a healing force in your life for six particular reasons. This is not to say you should ignore your fears about it. Sometimes your fears about niching are actually a part of helping you figure out your niche.

One of my colleagues, Rob often talks about how specialization (another word for niching) is the next step for chinese medicine in the west. And, if you’re a chinese medical practitioner is a city with 100 other practitioners – you can begin to understand why. How else can you stand out?

My colleague Alex Baisley recorded a seven and a half minute video about his thoughts on the importance of ‘who’ you work with which points out that, all other arguments for niching aside – it makes the work so much more meaningful if you’re doing it for people you really care about.

My colleague Carrie Klassen of Pink Elephant points out that when you’re trying to be everything to everything to everybody your business no longer feels dear, cherished or special to anyone.

And yet, we still resist niching. There seem to five main reasons why we do this. But I think there are many reasons why it’s still well worth it to explore.

Niching Case Studies:

Consider Nancy Juetten, the PR specialist, who thought her target market were extroverts who loved and craved the spotlight . . . only to realize she really wanted to help introverts.

Or Dike Drummond who, a decade ago was a burned our family Doctor, who finally became a coach who helps Doctors deal with burn out as The Happy MD.

Or Toronto’s Tiina Veer who was tired of going to yoga classes where her rounder body didn’t fit in and wasn’t accommodated and so created Yoga for Round Bodies.

There are so many examples that I could share.

The bottom line is this. If you don’t already have a niche and you want help to make sure that whatever niche you pick has all three qualities of a profitable niche, consider joining me on one of the free, 90 minute webinars I’ll be hosting over the coming weeks.

In this 90 minute webinar, you’re going to learn:

• six reasons most people avoid niching (and why they’re not true)

• the nine biggest niching blunders

• my four simple steps to identifying and honing your niche

• lots of real life niche examples

• how even something like yoga (that can help everybody) can be niched a bunch of different ways.

Anyway, you can read more about it and sign up here: http://nichingforhippies101.eventbrite.com/

I’m also leading a six week coaching program on niching that you can check out here: https://marketingforhippies.com/niching-for-hippies/