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As I’ve mentioned numerous times throughout the years, having a niche focus is critical to being successful in business. If you try to be everything to everyone, you will be nothing to no one and people will simply not pay attention to you. You have to come up with a specific area of expertise and focus on one market instead of many. This way, you will have the resources and time required to satisfy that particular market. Choosing the right vertical within your chosen industry will position you and your company for success later.
By taking a niche specialization, you can increase your chances of getting referrals because people will be able to easily communicate what you do and who you serve to their peers and colleagues. In the law field especially, if you are trying to be a generalist, your will not have the edge and advantage that attracts business. People who hire lawyers want the top person in the field to help them solve their problems. Whether it’s a family or business related matter, they don’t want a lawyer who is good at everything because he or she might only be somewhat good at solving your problems – and that’s simply not good enough.
One benefit of being a specialist is appearing higher in search results because your website will be optimized for that area of expertise. After all, people search for experts, not generalists. As a specialist, you should optimize your website by including keywords that relate to your specialty skills numerous times in your blog posts, headlines, website titles, and meta tags. By creating blog posts that utilize specific keywords, other sites will link back to you – and consequently, your site will rise in the Google rankings.
In order to further understand this important topic, I spoke to Michael Sterner, a lawyer with 14 years of international experience, now based in Gothenburg, Sweden. His unique focus on information technology and intellectual property law, has created a niche that leads to long-term business success.
Why is it so important for a law firm specifically to fill a niche?
“When you work in a pervasive space like law, in order to do outstanding work, you need to fill a niche,” Sterner explained. “You could fill several niches, but choosing one to specialize in is imperative. Otherwise, you will be spreading yourself too thin throughout the industry, making it difficult to do any one thing well.”
When asked why other companies and individuals should fill specific niches, Sterner noted, “When you do a lot of things decently, it’s difficult to do one thing perfectly. And that’s what people pay for: your expertise in one specific area. You might find that when you start doing one thing extremely well, people will start banging on your door to get access to your expertise – when before, they might have only knocked politely.”
Finding a niche may take some time, but it could be the single greatest competitive advantage you have in your business, so it’s well worth the effort involved. Take some time to think about what you’re the best at, what you’re most interested in, and what currently underserved market could benefit from your expertise.
