I remember starting my business years ago and people would always tell me: “You gotta find your niche!!”. That was real frustrating since I was always looking to find some obscure and small group that I could sell to. It seemed like the harder I looked the worse it got. When I say find your niche, apparently there is a salsa band called Groupo Niche. This is not what I am referring to. If you’re in the salsa business (and no not the chips and salsa but the music genre salsa) maybe this is your band to look up to.
I was talking with an Artist in Dallas Texas one year, I distinctively remember our conversation. He had just come over to check out the new office. I was glad to get his blessing on things since he has a very creative eye. I remember as we left for lunch that day, we were crossing the street and he said: “You have to find your thing.” He was talking about Artists and how they survive. He continued by saying: “Every Artist starts out the same way. First you get comfortable with a specific type of art. Second, you practice it and get better at it. Third, you realize that there is a thing about one way of doing this art that maybe someone else isn’t doing. Then you have your thing.” What I like about Frankie is that he is a great marketer. He does great work and he knows how to get it out there. What he said about finding your “thing” is right. It applies to business. In my case I operated for a while and I observed. Eventually I found a specific niche that was needed at the time.
Immediately after the sale of my business, I was looking for something to do next. One of my good friends told me to “Always think about the next deal”. I started The McKane Organization and got into Real-Estate. I noticed that in the development world, There was a vacuum of inventive marketing strategies. We started coming up with some really off the wall ways we could market a development. One of them was with my Aerobotics company. We would fly in places hard to reach by traditional aircraft and get these amazing shots showing a potential buyer why they would want to live there. We told a story and most people where more transaction based on their deals. A good friend of mine, Ed Okpa said:”Anyone can do a Real-Estate transaction, but can they make a change or difference?” I ultimately want to make a difference in the projects I do so naturally when I developed this concept I felt that it would enlighten others on how well a property was situated.
The point is, you need to find that area of expertise. Several weeks back, I talked about developing a gut feeling. I said that you need to ask a lot of questions to get a gut feeling. In business to get a niche, you have to get out there, If you don’t you will probably never find your niche. If you start today and keep going and don’t stop, Chances are you will find that Niche sooner than you think.