Niche marketing, niche marketing, corner marketing, cornering in the market, niche marketing, corner of the market, cozy marketing, micromarketing and micromarketing are all synonyms and refer to the same concept.
Suppose you want to enter a new market and launch your products in it. But you are facing a serious challenge, and that is that there are very strong and big competitors in that field; Those whose advertising costs for one year may be equal to your sales for the next few years.
How should your market entry strategy be? What can you do to enter the market without upsetting the elders?
One common option is to go after a segment of the market that the big guys haven’t.
But why should the elders leave a part of the market? Several reasons for this problem can be imagined, but in short, it can be said that there are usually small parts of the market that large companies have not seen; Either they didn’t want to or couldn’t provide a suitable product for them.
These sectors are known as the cozy corners of the market or Niche Marketing, and providing their needs and providing products for them is a good opportunity for small businesses.
When you base your marketing strategy on these corners of the market, it is said that you have gone to niche marketing.
Characteristics of niche marketing
Usually, the first question that comes to mind is what is the difference between a niche market and a segment of the market?
The most important characteristic of a niche market is that it is usually smaller than a specific market segment.
For example, think of a shoe manufacturing company that may decide after market segmentation that it wants to produce and sell its products only for one segment such as children; Or a beverage manufacturer who decides to produce only diet drinks.
In this type of market segmentation, the segments are still very large and it cannot be considered a niche market.
But consider the following examples:
- A website design company that designs websites specifically for shoe stores.
- A GPS manufacturing company that focuses exclusively on GPS for cars.
- A map design company that prints exclusive paper maps for tourists.
Many site designers, GPS manufacturers, and map design and printing companies consider these segments too small and simply refuse to use the segment name for them.
But being small is not enough for you to choose them as your target market. Niche markets should also have other characteristics. including:
- Their size should be such that it is profitable to work with them.
- there is no real competitor in that market; Or if there is a competitor, you can be sure that you can implement the differentiation strategy in the best possible way.
- This small corner of the market has the potential to grow.
- There are needs in this sector that others have not seen and provided.
- Customers have the ability to buy your product.
Reasons for adopting niche marketing
It can be said that niche marketing is as old as sales and commerce. There have always been those who chose a limited market for their business and preferred a more specialized activity for a small group to a more general activity for a large group.
But if we want to examine the last few decades specifically, we must say that the powerful wave of niche marketing was formed after the subsidence of the wave of mass production.
Several drivers contributed to the development of this strategy, including the following:
Gradually, the variety of tastes and the extent of the market reached such an extent that even the largest companies could not cover the entire market.
The increasing desire for entrepreneurship and setting up startups made newcomers look for a suitable strategy to enter the market, and niche marketing was a good option for these types of people.
Technology and technology tools made it easier to access the needs and tastes and concerns of each and every customer. Therefore, gathering information and implementing appropriate niche marketing processes became simpler and cheaper.
The share of mass advertising decreased from the total advertising portfolio and people began to consume new ads. Mass and expensive advertising was practically an obstacle that made it difficult for small businesses to grow.
The widespread communication of humans all over the planet caused demands to form in different parts of the world that did not exist before. People were inspired by each other’s lifestyles and expected businesses to provide them with the goods and services necessary for the new lifestyle.
Changes became faster and faster every day, and large companies could not quickly adapt to market changes due to their lack of agility.
Other factors can be added to this list. But anyway, the main point is that the rapid developments and increasing diversity in needs and tastes caused niche marketing to be noticed and welcomed by businesses every day more than the previous days.
Success in niche marketing
First of all, remember that niche marketing has one important difference from market segmentation.
In market segmentation, you start with the entire market and break it down until you reach a target segment.
But in niche marketing, you find a customer in the cozy corner of the market who has a need and that need is not met, and by the way, you can meet his need. Then you think about who else has a similar unmet need.
Gradually, around that one customer, a group of customers will form and form your niche market.
In other words, niche marketing makes sense from the bottom up or from micro to macro.
So, don’t look for market segments in niche marketing; First, look for that one person whose need you have not seen or seen and not taken seriously by the adults in the market.
Leaving aside this one point, the following few points can be very useful for success in niche marketing.
Self Knowledge
Think about your strengths and weaknesses and see in which areas you have a competitive advantage. What can you do uniquely?
What advantages do you have that help you differentiate?
Did the mere sight of a customer group inspire you to a niche strategy, or do you have capabilities that you can use to create economic value in this cozy corner of the market now?
Clientology
In mass marketing, they usually make assumptions about customer preferences and interests and define characteristics for each segment from the start. Then along the way, if these assumptions are incorrect or inaccurate, they correct them.
But you have chosen a very small part of the market. You cannot base anything on assumptions. Be sure to talk to customers, see their needs, get continuous feedback from them and make sure you know them well.
Your closeness to the customer and the ability to see and take seriously the smallest tastes and preferences can put you ahead of the big companies in the market. If you do not build this close relationship and do not consider the customer’s taste to the smallest detail, sooner or later you will be forced to hand over your market to your competitors.
Competitiveness
It’s rare to find a niche in the market that no one else has discovered before you.
The problem is that there were and are others who intended and are targeting this corner. If they could not and were not successful in this task, the reason should be sought.
Knowing the competitors is actually knowing the weaknesses and holes in the competitors’ strategy. The same factors that have created a gap and caused you to present a special offer to this niche market today.
Powerful information system
Big companies in their marketing department define only one persona for a segment and continue working with the same persona . In fact, for them, a segment of 100,000 people is one person that has been repeated 100,000 times.
But all your life is this corner of the market. Therefore, the more you can create a more powerful database of your customers and record their preferences, desires and tastes more accurately, the closer you are to them and the more you will dominate the market.
Remember that in niche marketing, your trump card is knowing each and every customer.
Do not overextend
Whoever can find the first niche market will quickly find the second and third niche markets.
There is nothing wrong with setting a specific offer for each niche market and covering several niche markets.
But remember not to overdo it. If you over-develop this strategy and exceed your resource capacity, you will lose operational flexibility and deep market knowledge, and in this situation, your competitive power in the market will decrease.
Introducing the book for niche marketing
Reading the book Crossing the Gap can paint a better picture of implementing a niche marketing strategy in your mind. Of course, the main focus of the book Crossing the Chasm is not niche marketing. But Jeffrey Moore has explained in this book how using niche marketing can promote innovative products in the market and take over the market.
Do you have successful examples of niche marketing in mind? We are happy to share your comments with us.
