“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”
― Confucius
Your Niche
Welcome to day number 2 of your 30-Day Offline Marketing Empire Private Coaching. This training will cover one very important topic, choosing your niche. When most internet marketers decided to venture in the world of offline marketing they are looking for any business they can find. However dealing with multiple niches / industries / verticals can be an absolute nightmare. So today you will be choosing a niche that you can laser focus your marketing efforts on and completely dominate.
By the way, this is how all of the big marketing companies do it. In fact when I worked with the fortune 500 marketing firm all we did was work in the HVAC (Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning) industry… NOTHING ELSE. But we did it well, and we served over 500 of the top HVAC dealer across the US.
So I want to make this training so simple that no one can fail. When deciding what niche to target there are a couple of things that you should consider to ensure that you are working in niche that will be profitable in the long run. To do this simply ensure that your niche falls within one of the following criteria:
- High Profit Margin: ensure that every new customer you bring in the client almost covers (or very nearly) the cost of your services. This will help justify the prices your charge. This is basic business principles here, if your marketing services cost $2,000 per month but you bring the business in $6,000 in new customers then any business owner will be happy to pay that.
- High Repeat Customer Percentage: these types of businesses charge an average on a per customer basis however those customers come back multiple times per year. So if you bring a business 5 new customers per month, and those same customers visit 3-5 times per year then the company is happy to pay for your services
- Highly Aggressive / Competitive Marketing: the highly competitive markets are already spending a lot of money on aggressive types of advertising. The also tend to have large marketing budgets. Best of all these markets still focus mainly on traditional advertising, and what little online marketing they do employ tends to be ineffective
- Medical Professions
- Home Remodeling Companies
- Lawyer / Attorneys
- Construction Companies
- Accounts / CPAs
- HVAC Company
- Plumbers
- Mechanics
- Hair Salons
- Electricians
- Carpet Cleaners
- Real Estate Agents
- Insurance Brokers
- Independent Car Dealership
- Nursing Homes / Retirement Homes
There are certainly more business that fall under the above categories, these are simply ideas to help get your mind going in the right direction. When deciding on your niche just be sure it meets one of the above mentioned criteria. Do some research find the niche that fits you best. Maybe you want a high profit margin niche so you can charge premium prices. Or maybe you want niche with more repeat customer so you can deliver more leads monthly. Whatever it is for you find the right balance between one or multiple of the criteria.
Now some may suggest that you find a niche that you are passionate about or have past experience with. However that is not necessary, what is important is that you choose a niche in which you can spend a lot of time researching. So if you hate going to the dentist and don’t want to learn about dentistry, then you should avoid that niche.
Throughout the coming months you will spend a lot time researching and learning about the niche you choose. You will be heavily involved with the niche on a daily basis. Therefore it is imperative that you choose a niche that you don’t mind learning about and work with for the foreseeable future.
Niche Prospecting
Now before you begin prospecting, you must clearly understand the difference between prospecting and lead generation. Prospecting is when you research information about potential leads. For example simply finding the phone numbers of 100 Lawyers is prospecting. These prospects must be filtered before you can actually consider them a viable lead. This section of the training will be about prospecting for potential leads in your niche.
To begin it is good to start in a local area which you are familiar with. For most this will likely be the location they currently reside. Next simply combine your area with the niche you will begin focusing on. For the sake of this training we will use the “Houston, TX” area and the “Kitchen Remodel” niche. Now before we even begin for businesses that fit this description we must first set some basic prospecting guidelines.
- The business must meet our niche criteria
- The business must already have some type of online presence
- They must have invested in online marketing (past or present)
If you have an area and a niche that meets theses guidelines then you are ready to begin prospecting for new leads!
The first place to start is Yellow Pages. Simply start by typing in your keyword phrase (niche + area) or in this case “Kitchen Remodel Houston, TX”
We are prospecting on yellow pages for a very specific reason. All of the businesses that advertising on Yellow Pages have pay to be here.
You will be able to click on any of the business listings because they already meet all of our prospecting guidelines. From Yellow Pages you can then go to the business’ website and record some basic information including: business name, address, phone number, email, website address etc.
Pay close attention to the business listed on the top and side under “Sponsored Listing” or “Featured Listing.” Much like Google PPC ads these businesses have paid ever more in an effort to get more customers!
Here are some other resources that list businesses with paid advertising:
Prospecting is a critical step in not only getting your first client but also in building your business. Use all of the resources listed above to find as many prospective companies as possible before continuing onto the next training. If you local area is small, expand into neighboring city or towns until you have multiple businesses. The more business you collect in the prospecting the higher you chances of success!
What’s Next
Now that you’ve made it through training number two, its time to take some ACTION!
Make sure you pick a niche that you are comfortable with and meets the criteria for long term success. Once you have chosen your niche and area you want to focus on its time to start prospecting for potential leads. Remember there is a difference between prospects and leads, so be sure to remain conscience of this fact during this stage. Finally be sure to visit all of the resources provide so you can find prospects the meet the guidelines of a good prospects. Record as many businesses as possible because the more effort you put in now the more new clients in the long run.