Chris Dreyer - Niching Up: The Narrower the Market, the Bigger the Prize

Anything Ive been successful at can be attributed, in some way, to nich ing.

In 2006, I started doing affiliate marketing as a side hustle from my full - time job as a basketball coach and detention supervisor. The very first website I made was loseadoublechin.com. It started out as sort of a joke, but the reality behind it is that I was overwhelmed by the thought of tackling the diet and weight loss industry. I didnt feel secure in my knowledge, not being a physician or having a medical background, or about learning such a broad and complicated topic. On the other hand, chins are just a small part of the body, and I thought I could learn enough about this one area by reading as much information as possi ble.

So I created this site and I soon ranked number one for double chin on Google. It was a terrible site, but it ranked number one for several years. It was quite successful, and it made a lot of mo ney.

Then I started thinking, This one site did so well and its not even my best work. I bet I can do this aga in!

I ended up making eighty other websites. I earned a hundred dollars here, two hundred bucks there, but nothing like the success of the double chin site. My first mistakereflecting on this many years in the futurewas that I didnt appreciate what I had done right. I had nic hed!

I should have realized what worked and run with it.

When I decided to start my digital marketing agency, I initially launched attorneyrankings.org (though we are now rankings.io). I knew I wanted to work in the legal industry, but I was scared that every time I gave up a service, it would hurt my revenue or my positioning. In actuality, every time I chose to not do one thing, other doors opened. I discovered a propensity for search engine optimization (SEO), and I started to find more succ ess.

When I went to Vistage (which is a peer advisory group for CEOs) and had my first business review, I was told, You need to offer your services to physicians, home services, and these other niches, because youre doing so well with leg al.

I didnt take my own advice or learn from my previous experience with all those affiliate sites. Instead I listened to my peers (who, in retrospect, were in industries that were completely different from mine) and went after a larger cap.

I signed a dental practice and a few other clients in other nichesand my momentum slowed. I had more people to sell to, but I was growing at a slower pace. If youve seen those stock market charts with the zig - zag arrow showing ups and downs, this was a big red arrow pointing downward. I kept asking myself, Whats going on?

As youve probably guessed, I had severely discounted my positioning as an expert when I was only specializing in le gal.

Thankfully I didnt stay on this path too long. We fixed our positioning, and the arrow started pointing upward ag ain.

This time I learnedso well, in fact, that niching as a provider of SEO specifically to personal injury attorneys has contributed to our company being an Inc 5000 recipient for the past five years in a row.

I also learned that anything Ive ever been successful at is because Ive been obsessively focused. I won fourth place in a 14,000- player poker tournament because I focused on nothing else for a whole month and reviewed 40,000 hands of poker during that time. I was a top - rated collectible card player because there were many clans to play, but I learned the ins and outs of just a few. In sports, I was successful because I focused on basketball, went to summer basketball camp, and put all my hours and attention into training for just basketball. That focus led to me becoming captain of our conference and being offered scholarships to play college basketb all.

Ill tell these stories in more detail later, but for now suffice it to say that I owe my success to niching up .

Every time Ive considered niching up, it feels like stepping off a cliff. Its scary at first what if I dont know what Im doing? What if I fail? But every time Ive taken that step, it ends up being a really positive decis ion.

Why? Because niching up means moving forward from a place of abundance and gro wth.

The first thing many people think of when they hear niching is scarcity; they think of having fewer opportunities, of less ability to monetize or grow their business, of taking something away . Many individuals biggest fear with niching is that by saying yes to one area, theyre saying no to many others. Its true: niching does mean saying no to business and shrinking your market. For example, for me to become a standout basketball player, I had to focus on that one sportwhich meant I had to quit practicing baseball as m uch.

But in reality, niching provides opportunities and gives you optionality . Even after you choose a niche, if you get a lead thats not where your deep expertise lies, you dont have to say no. In many cases you will, because its not your main focus, but you always have the option of saying yes if its an opportunity you particularly want to explore. In some cases, you can genuinely help with something thats not specific to your niche, so you dont have to look at it only as black or white, yes or no.

By saying no to some things, niching opens the door to many thingsincluding more or better possibilit ies.

And that knowledgethat you dont have to slam the door shut on other business opportunities just because you choose to niche uptakes away some of that fear. I find it reassuring to know that just because I choose to focus on helping personal injury attorneys with SEO, that doesnt mean no other opportunities can ever come through my door. In reality, I do mostly personal injury (PI) but I have the option of saying yes to something else if it makes sense for me.

In fact, of my forty - five current clients, I have three that are not personal injury attorneys. Three may not be a lot, but thats three times I said yes outside my ni che.

Most recently, I had a divorce attorney come to me and say, Lets rock and ro ll!

I knew I could serve and help themtheir keywords and SEO strategy are similar, and they had the right attitudeso I said yes. But that doesnt mean that Im going to now market myself for both PI and divorce law SEO.

Far from narrowing your options, niching up opens a world of possibility to say yes to the people who are right for you and your businessthe ones you are best suited to h elp.

Telling stories has always been my go - to method for teach ing.

Ive spun tales for high schoolers about how an underdog hoops upstart was able to join the first string through good choices and hard work. Ive doled out yarns to website visitors about extreme double - chin reduction achieved through clean eating and exercise regimes. And, through the stories in this book, I hope I am able to help you learn from my journey with nichingboth from my mistakes and what I got ri ght.

Along the way, Ill help you to see your own existing business, or the business you dream of founding, through the niching lens. Youll understand the many benefits niching can offer, and how it can be easily applied to any business vertical. Youll learn how to figure out if niching is right for you simply by determining who it is that you are able to serve best and most efficiently. Finally, Ill show you that you dont need to undertake a ton of research or spend money to do any of it. You already collect all of the data that youll n eed.