Tommy was riding his tricycle and his Daddy said, “Tommy, don’t go riding your tricycle past the corner!”
And little Tommy said, “OK, Daddy.”
Daddy looked cross, but Tommy figured he could fix that. He gave Daddy a big, sweet smile.
A bit later, Daddy was yelling at Tommy again. “Tommy, I said don’t go past the corner!”
This time Tommy looked at Daddy and said “OK, Daddy.” But with no smile. Something wasn’t quite right, but his two year old brain couldn’t put it into words.
A few minutes later, Tommy looked up in time to see his angry Daddy coming at him. Daddy lifted little Tommy from his tricycle and said “It told you three times not to go past the corner!”
The spanking hurt.
Little Tommy looked at his Daddy and said, with tears streaming down his face. “But Daddy, what’s the ‘corner?’”
Yes, the spanking hurt. But the misunderstanding hurt even more.
And that was Daddy’s fault.
——
Last week I found myself in Daddy’s role.
A reporter asked me what advice I would give a business owner who is struggling and barely making it. “What can they do to break through and build a real business?”
Well, I thought to myself, a struggling business owner probably can’t tell me who his ideal customer is. So he’s unfocused and all his hard work isn’t adding up.
So I said “Well, the first thing you need to do is pick a niche and really come to understand what people in that niche want.”
As I was talking, I realized that it sounded like so much blah, blah, blah.
You know why? Because everyone KNOWS you need a niche. And like Daddy, Tommy and and the corner, everyone thinks they know what it means. Only after receiving the business world’s equivalent of a beating (being ignored) do you discover that they’re missing SOMETHING.
I realized that I needed to make my advice very real, or it would be useless.
The reporter had shared that she was also a freelance book editor. I stopped and took the conversation in a new direction.
“In your freelance book editing business, who is your target market?”
“Anyone who’s writing a book.”
“Anyone?” I asked. “If someone is publishing with a mainstream publisher, aren’t they usually given an editor?”
“Well, usually. Yeah.”
“So you’re probably looking mostly at people who are self-publishing or some similar arrangement.”
“Right.”
“And let’s look at those people. Tell me about them. What problem do they have that you can solve?” I asked.
“Usually their books are not as well organized as they should be. And the writing isn’t as clear as it needs to be. I can fix that,” she said.
“And…?”
“Well, my problem,” she continued “is that most people don’t want to pay for editing. They think it’s good enough.”
I said, “So for most of them, even though YOU perceive they have a problem, THEY don’t. Or at least not a problem worth paying to get rid of, right?”
“Right. So what should I do?”
“Well, let’s peel off a layer. Why do people want to publish a book? Many just want to get their story in book form. But there are some for whom a book is part of something bigger. Maybe it’s going to be a vehicle for promoting their business, for speaking engagements, for world domination. Who knows what. Those people are far more likely to appreciate how you can make them look good.”
“Hmm. I’ve never thought about it that way.”
“Yes. And now when people ask ‘What do you do?’ you don’t say ‘I’m a freelance book editor.’ You say ‘I help people who are publishing a book as part of a bigger plan to get their message out there. I edit the book so that it makes them and their ideas look really good and compelling to their audience.” Or something like that.
“And now that you have that clarity about your niche, you can begin to build a simple marketing and selling system for yourself.
“Ask: Who else knows people looking to self-publish a book as part of a bigger plan?” Publicists and PR firms are a natural fit. So you can start targeting them as referral sources. And now, by focusing on a clear niche, you suddenly have the skeleton of a simple, step-by-step marketing and selling system: Cultivate referral relationships with publicists so they introduce you to their clients who are writing books.”
—
Daddy looked at Tommy in disbelief. His anger melted away and tears came to his own eyes as he realized what had happened. He gave Tommy a long, loving hug.
“Tommy, I’m sooooo sorry. I didn’t realize that you didn’t know what I was talking about. You see over there where the two roads meet? That’s the corner. When you go past the corner, Daddy can’t see you anymore. Please make sure you don’t ride past the corner.”
Little Tommy looked relieved and smiled through his tears. Even daddies can’t be perfect. They can only do their best.
—
If you’re in a business where you know you’re capable of so much more, you probably don’t have a clear niche. I hope I’ve helped you see that more clearly.
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