You help so many people! You’ve been through so many experiences! You have so many tools!

Yet, just because you can help “everyone,” doesn’t mean you should.

Don’t get me wrong, I get it.

I was the queen of “I can help everyone.” I was literally trained to help all the people with all the things.

If you’ve ever heard me speak or received coaching from me at an event or in a session, you may have already heard this story. Of the years I struggled to find my niche.

About how my training as a Spiritual Practitioner consisted of being required to cultivate a binder. This binder was to hold all the categories of life’s challenges, along with which tools I would provide my client for each challenge.

Needless to say, I felt ready to take on whatever my client had going on.

The problem was, when I left the Spiritual Center and tried to take my “I can help you with everything” message out into the world, I stopped getting clients.

I went from giving sessions on a regular basis to wondering what I’d done wrong.

Thankfully, I had a close friend who started me on the path of understanding. I went to her house hoping she’d “help me figure out what to say on my website to get clients,” and I left with a packet of questions she printed out from her friend and Marketing Coach, Ronnie Noize, of the wonderful DIY Marketing Center. From there, my whole practice – and life – began to change.

Key Ingredient #1: Who You Serve

This was a place I flip-flopped a lot, and also the most powerful shift that got me results. Why?

Because you need the power of people talking behind your back!

When I was helping “everyone,” no one knew how to talk about me to others, so I rarely got referrals. Even my own clients, who raved about our sessions, couldn’t articulate clearly what I did, so they couldn’t tell all their friends about me.

Deciding Who You Serve is also really powerful because it allows you to dig deep, focus in, and get more clarity around what it is you’re really providing.

But first, you have to understand who these people are.

Do you pass the Face Test?

A great way to see how strong your “who” is, is by describing them briefly to a friend. Does your friend immediately come up with the face of someone in mind? If not, you may have some more refining to do.

This part was a challenge for me for a funny reason: through my Spiritual training at the Centers for Spiritual Living, I was taught to not even affirm problems exist!

After years of training my brain to see life through the eyes of Oneness, it was a real challenge to begin framing my potential client’s experiences as “problems.”

Honestly, at the beginning, I went too far, thinking that there had to be something “wrong” with someone for them to want to work with me. Oops!

So, this isn’t about seeing people as broken, or even “needing your help.”

Deciding what problem you solve is more about matching up your unique genius with real-life issues that your clients face.

This makes it not only easier for you to hone in on your messaging and offers, but for them to find you and decide that you’re the one to guide them through this life situation.

Does it fit into one of the Three Mega-niches?

When just getting started on deciding a niche, it’s great to look at the three main areas people invest in on a regular basis: Health, Wealth/Career, Relationships.

Key Ingredient #3: What’s Your Solution?

Alright! So, you have an idea of who you serve and what their problem is, but what do they really get from working with you?

What is the final solution they’re looking for?

I’ll admit, while I did struggle with niche all around, this area had me stumped the longest.

Figuring out how to describe the supposed “end result” seemed to be so elusive to me, that it kept me from getting clients for a while.

I could tell in conversations with potential clients that if they could just have a better understanding of what “they’d get” from working with me, we’d be a great match.

Yet I didn’t, so they didn’t. Often times they’d end up signing up with someone else, and every time I’d look at the other coach’s messaging, the “what you get” or “solution” was always super clear.

While our hearts may yearn for change, the truth is our ego holds the key to taking the leap. And our ego wants to know what we’ll get out of it, or it won’t go through the risk of perceived “failure” to get there.

We fear that which we don’t understand, and if we don’t understand what end results we’re after, it’ll be too scary to step toward. That’s why the final ingredient to your niche is getting really clear on the solution or results you provide.

Not only does that make it easier for them to say yes (if it is a match), it also adds to the referral factor I discussed in Key Ingredient #1. When people can clearly describe the results they got from working with you, they’ll happily tell all their friends about it!

Are you talking their language?

The most powerful marketing messages are those that talk in the language of the potential client. There’s a lot of power in crafting a message that gets the response, “I was just saying that to myself yesterday!”

Final Pitch:

 We’ve covered the 3 Key Ingredients to your Niche:

1. Who You Serve
2. What’s Their Problem
3. What’s Your Solution

And while you may be nodding your head, ready to get going on your clarity, it’s just as likely that you’re still hanging out on the niche fence. You may still have that voice that says, “Ya, but you don’t know my approach – it really can help everyone!”

Well, for fun’s sake, let’s say that’s true… Let’s say you really CAN help all the people with all the things.

Here’s the deal: you are still ONE PERSON.

Which means you have limited time every day.

And no matter how big your heart, you’ll still only be able to help a portion of the population.

Why not make it easier on yourself, and clarify which portion?

As my mentor, Jesse Koren, teaches:

When you “help everyone” you’re a little fish in a big pond. When you pick a niche, you become the big fish in a small pond.

You end up being easier to find, easier to talk about, and easier to book for speaking or interviews.

It gets easier to get traction, and easier to become an expert in your field.

In the end, people share and get excited about what they understand. The more clearly you understand your own work, the more clearly your community can as well.

Did you find this helpful? Share your biggest insight in the comments below!

Already know your niche? Comment below!