Don't Choose a Niche; Create One

 

“Do I really need a niche?”

Read time: 4 minutes

Here’s our TTT for this week on how to grow your online teaching business.

What is TTT? A Tip, Takeaway, and Task. On Thursday.

Enjoy!

Have you joined our free teacherpreneur community?

Network with others on a similar trajectory.

Join Free Here

Tip: Yes, you need a niche

One of the most common questions we receive from teachers is “Do I REALLY need a niche?”

Our answer is quite simple: if you want to have a business and not just a hobby, yes.

Here's why.

The reality is that anyone can teach a range of people with a variety of goals who come from a friend's recommendation.

The foundation of a successful business is showing complete strangers that you can help them.

Developing a relationship with them, building community with them, and earning their trust over time.

And this really only happens when you understand them.

Takeaway: A niche isn't important for its own sake

A niche certainly isn’t important just to have one. Rather, it's important because it's impossible to speak to thousands of people like they're your best friend.

But when you understand:

  • their goals

  • their struggles

  • their reasons for past failures

  • their reasons for past successes

You can help them without ever meeting them.

And you get responses like the ones in the images below.

This is all top of the funnel stuff - an entry into you and your business world.

If prospects like what they see at the top, they go to the middle, and finally to the bottom of the funnel.

But it all starts at the top.

And if you can't display that you understand them right off the hop, they move on.

This is true for all of us. Think of the companies you continually buy from and also the ones that give you the heebie jeebies when they send you an email.

It's likely for the same reason.

Task: Create a niche of your own

So, if you're wondering if you need a niche, the answer is yes.

Not because of the work you do, but because of the work that's required to build the community a thriving business is built on.

The next question then becomes “which niche should I choose?” And, for us, this is the wrong question.

The most sustainable kind of niche is created, not chosen. We didn’t “choose” our niche. We started talking about our dissatisfaction with professional development opportunities, and thousands of teachers reached out to us that they, too, were also dissatisfied.

We then created a niche within that by learning more about what they were dissatisfied with, specifically.

So your task for this week is to listen, ask, and take notes. Start creating your own niche, not choosing one. When you create a niche, it comes from doing something you’re passionate about and not simply a desire to make money.

But the result is it allows you to do both of those things very well simultaneously.

Hope this helps.

 
 
Andrew Woodbury