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"Get Niched! Spotlight On Specialization"

By Josh Vasquez
Advantages: 2004DECEMBER

Ever want to be the "go-to" guy for an entire group or industry? Then you might want to consider niche marketing. You may not think of yourself as a niche marketer or seller, and you might not think you could qualify as one. But your ticket to niche prosperity may be right under your nose - you just have to sniff it out. But where do you start? The answer to this riddle is much less elusive than you might think.

When you think of a niche marketer (a salesperson with an expertise on a single demographic, industry, program or product), do you think of someone who sits back and waits for promotional products buyers to come for ideas, solutions and witticisms? If so, your perception may be a little off. Salespeople who specialize often start out just like anyone else and then study - or stumble - upon the likes, dislikes and tastes, of a certain populace or market and take action. You may have run into the same knowledge too, but never consciously acted on it.

Not Just For Gurus Anymore

Think about it: What is niche marketing? It's a loose expression, leaving differing points of view to see it from varying angles. And "nicheing" can be done in countless ways.

"It's finding a specific industry, whether it's golf tournaments, healthcare, automotive, etc. You focus more than 50% of your time hitting and pursuing it," says Mike Grzesiak, chairman and general manager of Dogleg-Left Advertising Specialties Inc. (asi/181596).
For Barbara Burcham, president of Advertising Specialties & More Ltd. (asi/113357), it's finding your favorite kind of client or sector in your client list and sticking to it. Take the financial industry, she says. If that's a favorite area of yours, target the banks in your area or any company that has anything to do with finances, such as mortgage and abstract companies.

It shouldn't be hard to find your own niche: Can't you recall promotions you particularly liked? Or maybe there's an industry or age demographic for which you have an especially creative eye. It could even be as simple as a group of people you admire or like to work with.

"To me, niche marketing is taking a look at the entire set of demographics or higher market and narrowing it down to a small group where you can concentrate all your efforts on taking care of their needs," says Tom Haines, vice president of TNH Enterprises/Standupstuff (asi/341101), and niche marketer to comedians and comedy clubs.

If that seems too provincial of a client base, it's not; Haines does more than 90% of his company's business with the comedy circuit. It's not always the size of the niche that matters, it's how far you can become entrenched.

What's In A Niche?

If you give it a little thought, niches are all around you. From the most trivial to the most vital and everywhere in between. Let's take a look at just a few categories we were able to come up with:
Demographic niches. This category deals with groups of people linked through the statistical characteristics of human populations, as in age, income, race, etc. For example:

And these demographics can be booming with economic opportunity, says Burcham: "For example, Baby-Boomers are a definite niche and an easy and lucrative one to latch onto. For instance, they're interested in financial planning, home building, early retirement and so on."

If you want to focus your efforts with this segment, learn everything you can about Baby-Boomers - subscribe to magazines or newsletters from organizations like AARP, American Demographics, etc.
Industry niches. Just what the name implies:

These, too, present huge opportunities, as the scope of an industry can run the gamut from a small, narrowly defined nook to broader targets. "Look at me," says Haines. "I'm in a very small sector - standup comedy. But that's also part of the entertainment industry which includes plays, radio, T.V., and onto movies."

Moreover, each subset comes with its own set of niche possibilities. Consider automotive for one. In that industry alone, you're dealing with dealerships, mechanics, lube joints, detailing, specialty shops and so on. Remember also that cars are the second-biggest investment in most Americans' lives (homes being the first).

Program niches. Here you can flex some of your creative talents and skills in:

Bert Williams of Williams & Associates Ltd. (asi/360450) has carved a niche in program sales, as he consistently generates highly successful tiered, or staged, promotions. He's so impressed with the results that he puts together a few tiered promotions for his own company several times a year.

And since this isn't a niche focusing on clientele but the program, your client base can be diversified.

Product niches. Product specialization is another place your industry skills can pay off with knowledge of product and product lines alike:

And some of these categories are highly complicated, especially in wearables, where the idiosyncrasies of imprinting, embroidery and polo shirt styles are mind-boggling. "I specialize in the golf market so more than half of my product line is made up of golf products," says Grzesiak. "So I not only have an idea of what the golf tournaments want, but what they can get."

The possibilities are endless. And if you look close and hard enough, you'll find you found a niche in something. It's just a matter of knowing what to look for.

Finding A Way

You needn't knock yourself out looking for your niche. Think back to when you went about finding your own purpose in life. Likely, what you did was discover the things you did well when you pursued a career. As a potential niche marketer, you can apply that same kind of thought process to discover your specialty. Like we said, it might be within a certain industry or it could be with a specific type of sales promotion.

Go down every road and don't leave a stone unturned. Think about what you're passionate about. Look at your hobbies, your extracurricular activities and the clubs and organizations you're involved with. And don't forget to consider your prior background and field of employment; you might uncover a niche that you and few others are qualified to fill. That's how it was with Haines.

"It was an offshoot from my previous job," he says about the comedy circuit he serves. "I was a comedy booking agent. I already had an 'in' with a large number of comedians." Aside from that, it's his familiarity with that culture that gives him the upper hand. "I know how they think," he adds. "That's important, because I'm seen as a peer."

That's what sets Haines apart. And it affords him to go beyond someone who sells "stuff." There's value in that because he's now a valuable resource. "A guy came over to me, not because of my prices, but because he needed to ask questions that would make Joe Schmuck go, 'Huh?'" says Haines.

There are other ways to discovering the niches that work right for you. And there are certain advantages to doing so. "You want to go after something that not everybody is already going after," says Burcham. "You might see a trend coming. For instance, the Hispanic market. It's become enormous and that could be a niche market. Even though it's a very wide niche market, there's a lot of business to be had."

So what do you do if a market like this seems primed for you to focus on? How do you get started? "To better serve them, we've joined a Chamber of Commerce for Hispanics and we're all taking Spanish classes," she says. By doing so they're showing the market that they care about helping them and providing them with the best possible service. "It's amazing," say Burcham. "They're thrilled that we're here to help them."

Another thing you should do to help find a niche that's right for you is study your clients. You need to know them inside and out. Do this as a collective thing and create a spreadsheet that shows all the different promotions and events that they get involved with over the course of a year. Keep tabs on things like summer picnics, holiday dinners, fund-raising, sales contests, safety programs, golf tournaments, etc. What you'll discover is that you're satisfying a lot of the same needs for all your clients and you should see your niche. From there it's as easy as going out and building that niche with others.

If you're good at something, like golf tournaments, then do what Grzesiak did and get a list of all the local golf events. Check out all the local golf courses and see what they have coming up and find the person responsible for running the events. And be ready to start small and grow the business from there. It might start with tee gifts or a simple sleeve of balls and grow into something bigger that includes event planning.

But be careful not to get locked into niches being only market- or program-based. "Niche is a weird word," says Jim Ruhman, executive vice president at Williams & Associates Ltd. "A niche can be a whole industry or just a part of what you're doing within that industry."

Niches with a product line are common and not always recognized. Do you do a lot of business in wearables or calendars? If so, think about all the little details and intricacies of the products you've learned over the years, thus turning you into a virtual expert. "Every so often when I deal with a large defense contractor, I find that all-of-a-sudden I'm doing a lot of a certain item for, perhaps, a commemoration," says Ruhman. "Then I find people start using me for that particular item. Is that a niche?" Our answer: Yes, it is.

Why Specialize?

When you see how simple setting up a niche can be, you may be asking, "Then why doesn't everybody do it?" A lot of people think catering to everyone is the way to go - a shotgun approach. But for those who know, having a niche is a potentially fast way to big business.
For one, as we've said, it can set you up as an expert. "They definitely know who to call when it comes to advertising or a promotional challenge," says Burcham. "And because you're their perceived expert and you've done a good job for them in the past, they don't think twice."

Also, setting yourself up as that expert can save you during downtimes. "It's like insurance," Burcham adds. "Because if they trust you as an expert, they'll believe you when you tell them if they don't advertise, nothing is going to happen."

Building a niche can also brush aside those pesky other distributors that can get between you and your client. "Not everybody can do it, so we therefore eliminate a lot of our competition," says Dan Weisberg, president of Branded Solutions (asi/230240). "You need the logistics, the economics, the space and experience in order to provide the services."

And it's less difficult to call new prospects because they've probably already heard of your company, says Grzesiak. "Then it's easier to get your foot in the door from that standpoint. This is unlike the very slim success rate of blanket cold calls," he says. Plus, think of the quality of relationships you can build with a downsized, regular client list - talk about loyalty.

That loyalty can go a long way when it comes to referrals. Burcham says if you do this right, it can get your name spread in some of the most bizarre ways: "If you're far enough into a niche sometimes companies, for example utility companies, will not only tell other companies about how well we've done for them but even tell their direct competitors," she says.

A little tender love and care goes a long way when you're making someone's job easier. "When you focus on people like that, with a niche, they look at you as the guy who takes care of them," says Haines. "And just as important, the guy that knows their needs."

E Pluribus, Plus

There are, however, a few cons to look out for. Competing with already established niche marketers can leave you fighting for even a trickling of business, so nicher beware and research your local market for other industry sector specialists. Another potential business bummer is the effect of limiting one's business into a small and potentially weak niche.

However, there is a way to both prevent disaster and expand business and that's to pluralize your niches. After all, if you can set yourself up as a specialist in two categories, that's potentially twice the business and so on.

"You should have more than one niche, not just for more money but for company safety reasons," says Burcham. "Because the floor to that niche could suddenly drop out and then you have nothing to fall back on. [Pluralizing] is a way of keeping that pipeline full."

Of course, just because you have a niche doesn't mean you're set for life - it means you should start looking for your next niche, she says. "Sometimes you get comfortable and think, 'Hey, I've got these banks to myself. I'll just stay on with them. But you have to keep up with the trends and upcoming changes," she says.

As mentioned, there are also niches within niches. Grzesiak says the healthcare industry is a perfect example of tapping the many smaller, more narrow niches that exist under one umbrella. Industries like this, what he calls "layered," are fertile places for internal referrals. "I started focusing on nurses and nurse recruiters," he says. "But now I have various departments in healthcare and even clients who sell pacemakers."

Remember though, before you can grow within, you need to break in.

Posture and Position

When you go to position yourself as a niche marketer or expert or authority on an industry, demographic or program, you have to flex a little mental muscle. Basically, talk the talk and walk the walk.

"I show them case histories of things I've done in the past that have worked for other companies in the same industry, even if it's a competitor and that seems to be the most concrete way to show them what I know," says Burcham.

This is good, says Grzesiak, because it shows tangible, real-life experiences. And though this may seem obvious, do you have case histories or samples to show? How about a client's response to a great promotion you put together for them? If not, collecting them now would be a good idea.

Case histories though, are not the only way to show your wit. Burning the midnight oil and researching is also a way of selling your specialists' swagger. "After you identify a niche, then you need to research and put together a list of products that you can take to a buyer to show them you are the authority on their field and show them what you found and tell them why it will work," says Grzesiak. And it helps to know their language: "If I went into a nurse recruitment client and I didn't know what a CNR or an RN or any of the other medical staff did, they wouldn't take me seriously."

Weisberg uses a combination of things including case histories, expert knowledge and a little hard copy: a brochure and planning worksheet. "This demonstrates that we have done it before, know how to do it right and that we know the right questions to ask and answers to have," he says.

But fear not. If all else fails and you're just trying to get in the door, you can wing it using what you know and adding a dash of courage. "If you're not prepared the way you'd like to be but you are still hungry for their business, if you can, fake it and sell well," says Grzesiak. "Hey, I don't claim to know everything about healthcare, but I know enough to be dangerous."

Action-Packed

Now that you've got the basics, here are a few action points for you to start with:

Josh Vasquez is assistant editor of Advantages.

Used with permission of The Advertising Specialty Institute copyright 2005

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