Perhaps the most important principle for starting and running a successful online business is “Find Your Niche!”
This is great advice.
The only problem: most people will never really tell you what a niche is or how to go about finding one.
Much of this problem is directly related to the definition itself. I recently hunted around for an appropriate explanation of “niche” and turned up these two interesting definitions:
1. a position or activity that particularly suits somebody’s talents and personality or that somebody can make his or her own;
AND,
2. an area of the market specializing in a particular type of product.
So here’s the problem:
The second definition is the very general approach you’ll hear most of the time. “Go find an area of speciality,” they say. “Look for your target market.”
Good advice? You bet it is. But something is definitely missing here. This is where we need to reconnect with the first definition, especially the part about what “somebody can make his or her own.”
The bottom line is if you’re going to be successful in any niche, it must *suit* you – it must be an appropriate fit for who you are.
I recently read about one Harvard professors theory of “Multiple Intelligences” and how each of us occupies one or more areas specific to who we are and where we excel – whether in kinesthetic, linguistic, spiritual, musical or other such areas.
This is a great place to begin looking for your niche.
The key, of course, is to bridge that gap between what’s unique to you in personality and what can be developed into a valuable product and service for a hungry marketplace.
