What is niche marketing? According to businessdictionary.com, niche marketing is defined as Concentrating all marketing efforts on a small but specific and well-defined segment of the population. Niches do not ‘exist’ but are ‘created’ by identifying needs, wants, and requirements that are being addressed poorly or not at all by other firms, and developing and delivering goods or services to satisfy them. As a strategy, niche marketing is aimed at being a big fish in a small pond instead of being a small fish in a big pond. Also called micromarketing.
Pretty self-explanatory, right? So, what does it have to do with those who work in professional services? You know, accountants, architects, engineers, financial planners, IT consultants, lawyers, and management consultants. Niche marketing has everything to do with these folks if they want to build a profitable business, and maybe have some fun while doing it.
As food for thought, the following are possible niche markets. The accountant can create a niche representing the legal industry. The lawyer can market legal services to the accounting industry. We have seen many lawyers with niche practices such as cemetery law, food law, self-storage law, and equine law to name a few. The architect can market her expertise in all things regarding historic homes and buildings. A civil engineer can market a niche targeting school design and building. The management consultant can build a niche helping family-owned business or women-owned businesses. The possibilities are endless as long as there is a market for your services.
The benefits of building a niche are plenty. You can become a true leader in a narrow space. With this leadership, you can create a premium brand. As we all know, people will pay more for a premium brand – so be that brand. Also, premium brands, by their nature, are more in demand. Using simple math, your niche allows you to charge more, and there is a higher demand. That is a formula for high profits and a huge success.
Because this concept is not new to us, we have heard many of the common arguments against this approach. Niche marketing is about marketing. We have clients that will push back and tell us, we do more than that. Don’t fret, you can do other things, just market appropriately to the niche. Just because an accountant has many law firm clients doesn’t mean she can’t have a restaurant client.
As mentioned earlier, for a niche marketing to be successful, there has to be a market for the services. For the youngsters out there, you may not remember Y2K. Many lawyers thought that Y2K was going to be the next legal boom. They put all their marketing eggs into the Y2K basket. It was a bust. The point is to make sure there is a buying market for your niche. It may not be a good idea for the architect to market a historic building niche in a rural area with no historic buildings. However, maybe this architect can develop a niche, designing buildings for the agriculture industry.
Also, we highly recommend that whatever niche you choose, you have a passion for it. Or, at least an interest. Marrying your passion with your job can be very lucrative as well as fun and satisfying. We love the legal industry, saw a need for high-level marketing services in an underserved market. This was the birth of ESQuisite Marketing.
So, to sum, identify a niche that will have demand, build the niche using a strategic marketing plan, try to include a passion, make more money, and have more fun.
ESQuisite Marketing is a professional service marketing company with a niche in the legal industry. Clients include large and small law firms, solo practitioners, certified legal nurse consultants, public speakers, financial services firms, and nonprofits in the Lehigh Valley and throughout the U.S., including New Jersey, Florida, Nevada, Michigan, Tennessee, and New York.
