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One of the most haphazardly shouted words on the Internet is —- N-I-C-H-E.
The first annoying feature of this word is the many pronunciations:
Neesh
Nish
Nich
I even heard someone once say ‘Neeshay’ — pretty sure this is not an acceptable pronunciation — but who am I to judge? 
When Have We Niched Ourselves Right Out Of Business?
Gary Vaynerchuk is a well respected Internet marketing guru that built his fortune being passionate about wine and hustling hard to get where he wanted to go.
I have nothing but great things to say about him — I am, in fact, a huge fan — but sometimes when someone reaches “rock star” status — others have a difficult time criticizing what they are saying. Especially when they are talking about buzz words like “niche.”
This video didn’t sit well with me — take 1 minute and listen — see you in a sec…
Linchpin: GaryVee from Seth Godin on Vimeo.
At what point do we go too far with this “niche” business. Don’t get me wrong — I absolutely agree that there is an optimal size to your target market. I absolutely agree that it doesn’t have to be a huge market. In fact, my Tiny Business, Mighty Profits eBook goes into (some) depth about segmenting your market.
Nevertheless, there is certainly a point at which we lose because the market isn’t large enough. P-Diddy’s hair? I think that is too far.
I just think we need to be careful what we are advising people to do.
Tell me where you would draw the line in the following examples in the Comments Section below –
Food -> Ethnic Food -> Asian Food -> Thai Food -> Pad Thai -> Rice Noodle
Sports -> Team Sports -> Baseball -> Saint Louis Cardinals -> Albert Pujols -> Albert Pujols Hitting -> Albert Pujols Batting Stance
Is there enough:
- Content to produce
- Products/Services to sell
- or Potential Customers
in the Rice Noodle and Albert Pujols batting stance markets?
I think I would stop at ‘Thai Food’ and ‘Albert Pujols’ — I do believe there is money to be made in both of those niches — going any “nicher” is dangerous in my opinion.
What about you? Where would you stop?
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I am a very large fan of Gary. I recommended his book at the last meetup. I DO think he’s taking things a bit too far.
P-Diddy’s Hair? A)who cares, 2)what else is there to say except “He got a new cut” and D)WHO CARES?? What would it have been like if Gary did that for his Wine Library TV? He’d be talking about the smell of one particular brand of wine and that’s it. Just plain silly.
I do get his point though. People worry about achieving a large enough audience to make their dough. The problem is a downward spiral though: I blog, I get no traffic, I broaden my horizons for more appeal, I blog, I still get no traffic, I broaden more, etc. This is a problem because you’ll never become big enough to sustain yourself. Instead, start small, stay small, take your time and build your following. If you decide to broaden the horizons after you are a small time smash hit, then that’s a viable risk to take, but go big too early and you’re sure to fail.
I think you could conceivably talk at length about Pujols’ hitting or Pad Thai. There’s a lot to say, restaurants to review, games to watch, recipes to examine, batting stances and ball trajectories to analyze, but too small and nobody cares. I like to read about a local god and good thai food as much as the next person, but I’ll get about two posts into a blog post about some guys (unmistakable) batting stance or the phenomenally boring rice noodle (and I love all types of noodle) before I cut you out of my life altogether.
Don’t talk about mortgages, talk about VA loans. Don’t talk about insurance, talk about Surety Bonds. Don’t talk about rental properties, talk about lakefront rental properties. Don’t talk about siding, talk about aluminum siding. Don’t talk about soccer, equipment or accessories, talk about arsenal jerseys. Don’t talk about SEO, talk about SEO for small businesses.
Find your Niche. Keep your focus small (but not too small). Rule your space. Rule the world.
Awesome comment Nick. I think it is safe to say that Gary Vee didn’t really mean that we should try to launch a business on P Diddy’s hair — if Gary stops by perhaps he will correct me — it is far too extreme of an example.
I think his point is that it has to be something that you are bat shit about. You have to love it. If it’s wine you are bat shit about — build a biz about wine. If it’s champagne — build it around champagne. If it’s Chardonnay… you get the picture.
But don’t try to build a biz about wine, if what you are truly bat shit about it Chardonnay.
too far of an example for sure…point is though that peeps nned to drill to their core strength! PERIOD!
-gv