Your niche may choose you.

If you're not sure what your niche should be, pay close attention to the messages coming through from your (potential) customers and clients.

When I started in journalism, in 2008, working on Hackney newspapers, I was writing about feminism and the arts. These were the subjects I chose to focus on.

In 2013, I became pregnant with my first baby and while being interviewed on radio, about a feminist issue, the interviewer asked if my niche would become ‘motherhood’.

I scoffed.

Of course it won’t, I said, there is still too much to talk about in terms of feminism.

And then I had a baby and realised that motherhood was the greatest feminist issue I’d ever encountered and I quickly did slip into writing about it.

Because I couldn’t not share what I was seeing and experiencing.

Later, I launched a parenting platform and then I started being commissioned to write about motherhood for the nationals and women’s magazines.

It was never intentional; I just fell into it.

When I launched my online course business, I started writing regularly for Forbes. Now, my niche was becoming more freelance/business focused.

Especially having written a book on it (The Freelance Mum).

I was writing about business with a note on motherhood, work-life balance and making it all work around young children.

The niche that wasn’t to be

Off the back of The Freelance Mum, people had been keen to learn more about growing their profile and getting press for their businesses.

So that was my first online course.

I came at it from the perspective of a journalist - who knew how to pitch - and as the editor of my own digital magazine with people regularly pitching to me (badly).

I taught the art of pitching well and forming relationships with editors.

Really, that niche - PR - was chosen for me. It’s what people were asking for. And so I gave it to them. And then they wanted more.

But I didn’t want to narrow down to just teaching PR, as I still identified - and worked as - a journalist and author.

So instead of accepting the proposed niche, I spread out a little and continued to create other business courses.

On starting your own business and launching your own online course.

The latter really flew off the shelf, as there were lots of talented and skilled women who wanted to package their knowledge up in a course and sell it (from home).

It was the ultimate income stream for freelance mums; the laptop dream.

We (my husband, Rich, and I) then created a course teaching you how to sell spaces on your online course.

And that one went very well too. People had amazing success off the back of it.

Rich suggested we make that our niche: launching and selling online courses. And we started to make it happen.

But then I realised I didn’t want to be ‘the online course woman’. And that’s what I was quickly becoming.

People were literally saying to me: ‘aren’t you the online course woman’? And the way I felt, when they said that, made it clear that it wasn’t the one for me.

I wanted to keep learning and doing - and then teaching.

So I became clear that PR wouldn’t become my niche and online courses wouldn’t, either.

I was happy to teach both, but only if it was alongside other courses.

The business/freelance umbrella was comfortable and narrow enough. And in fact, it was women in business, and often women with kids. That was the niche.

Trends and online behaviour

One of the things I find most interesting about running a business is looking at shifts and trends in behaviour.

I observe what’s selling from my online shop, as well as paying attention to the messages women are sending me on Instagram and, more recently, on Substack.

Right now, I have seven online courses in the shop on my personal website and there are two that are massively outselling the others:

1. How to launch a successful online course.

2. DIY PR: Secure press coverage and grow your profile.

They have always been the most popular but it’s interesting to see that almost all attention is in those areas at the moment, in terms of standalone courses.

That might be because those are the two courses are most likely to help you to make money yourself, and potentially quite quickly.

Either by launching and selling your own course or getting press coverage for your business that may well generate sales.

But it might also be symptomatic of a wider trend.

For instance, immediately post-pandemic, these were the courses people flocked to:

• Design your dream life (and work towards it)

• Revive (a coaching course to get you back on track)

They wanted to feel better, and they wanted to make changes to their lives. That’s what the courses helped them to do.

I love that people are still coming to the PR and ‘online course’ courses - and finding their own success by using what they learn.

But what’s also interesting is that what people are sending me DMs about, and asking for coaching/consultancy on, is something completely different.

The new niche

I’ve had several messages from women recently about getting a non-fiction book deal or self-publishing their poetry.

Someone messaged me on Substack on Friday saying she would like to get a book deal, or to self-publish, but either way, she needs her book out in the world.

I love this woman’s writing. I love her niche. I love the sound of her book. So I got all excited because I could see exactly how I could help her.

Another woman has written her first poetry collection and would like to learn about self-publishing because, again, she wants her words out in the world.

As people ask for help with writing non-fiction book proposals and self-publishing poetry collections, I can see a new niche forming.

And I’m into it.

It makes sense. I’m a writer, being published, I’ve also self-published and I ghostwrite other women’s books. So I have a good perspective on the publishing industry.

What works; what doesn’t. Crucially: what might sell. And how to get yourself in a good position to be picked up by an agent and/or publisher.

Alignment

I wrote a piece about how I’m finding Substack, a year in, and said that I now want to focus on writing my own non-fiction, ghostwriting, Substacking and teaching.

And this last one - teaching - will be through online courses, coaching/consultancy and, hopefully, lecturing in journalism and non-fiction book-writing.

I am going to pitch myself out this week.

So I was starting to pull everything that I’m doing towards ‘writing’: doing it and teaching it.

And then these requests started coming in, for help with non-fiction book proposals and poetry collections, and I could see that everything was perfectly aligning.

I was becoming clearer on my direction, behind-the-scenes, and this was being reflected back to me via my community.

If you’re trying to work out your niche…

• Look at the questions potential customers/clients are asking you, and what they want help with.

• Think about which questions you like being asked and what help you want to give.

• Notice how you feel, in your body, when you imagine that being your niche.

• If you feel light and excitable, maybe it’s a good one for you. If it feels heavy, with a sense of dread - maybe it’s not.

• Remember: your niche doesn’t have to be the same for ever; it can evolve with you and your career.

Annie x

By the way:

If you’d like to have a non-fiction book published, you will find this course very helpful. Or if you’re keen to self-publish, try this one.

Or if you’re looking for a coaching/consultancy power hour, to talk through ideas and to make a solid plan of action, you can sign up for that here.