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A common mistake that new coaches make is trying to serve everyone. This makes it really hard to market your services because everyone is potentially a client. A better way to approach your coaching business is to decide on a niche. This allows you to market your services to a specific group of people. What's a niche and how do you choose one? Here's a quick guide.
What is a niche?
The technical definition of a niche is that it's a specialized segment of a market. An easier way to think about a niche in coaching is that a niche is to a coach as a specialty is to a doctor. Your niche is how you specialize as a life coach. It's usually a specific need or group of people that you work with in your coaching practice.
What are some common niches?
There are common large niches in which coaches specialize. Some of them even have additional specialized certifications you can acquire. Examples include relationship coaching, spiritual coaching, wellness coaching, and business coaching. While these niches provide some guidance for developing specialized skills and narrowing your marketing efforts, they aren't narrow enough.
You'll want to narrow your niche even further. For example, if you're a relationship coach maybe your niche is that you work with divorced single dads who are reentering the dating scene. See how much more focused that is? You'll have a much easier time creating marketing geared toward divorced dads.
How do I find my niche?
There's no one method for deciding on your niche for your coaching but there are some things you should consider that will most likely point you in the right direction.
What are your passions?
What are you passionate about? Your niche should be something that really excites you. If you choose to work in a niche that doesn't excite you, it will come through in your marketing. What do you care about? Make a list of niches that you feel passionate about and then narrow them down.
What are your unique skills and experiences?
Each niche is going to have unique challenges. You might want to take an inventory of your unique skills and experiences. Then match these skills and experiences to your desired niche. For example, if you have prior experience in recruiting, you would have both skills and experience that would be highly relevant to career coaching. Some niches require some special skills. If the niche you feel passionate about requires skills that you don't yet have, you'll need to learn them.
What's a problem you've solved?
Clients hire a coach because they have a problem that they need help solving. Looking back at your own life, what's a challenge that you resolved? What steps did you take to solve it? This can provide really helpful clues about your niche and what kind of clients you could help. You really can't coach a client any deeper than you've personally worked. Being able to draw on your own experience will not only help you coach in that niche, but you'll be able to share your story in your marketing.
Choosing a coaching niche is going to be an important step to being successful as a coach. You want to be able to narrow down your ideal client and market to them specifically. Having a clear niche will help you do that. When choosing your niche, you can draw upon problems that you've solved in your own life, your passions, and your skills.
Is spiritual coaching a niche that you're considering? Starseed Academy offers an ICF-accredited spiritual coach certification program that will provide you with the special skills and tools to become a transformational coach in the spiritual coaching niche as well as help you define the niche you are meant to serve.