Picking a super specific niche can unintentionally keep your products from ever being found and going too broad with a niche will probably just confuse your customers to the point that they leave without ever giving you a chance. So which do we choose?

Today, I’m going to go over the 3 things you need to check off for each product you make to make sure your niche is aligned to your ideal customer. Because, if you are struggling to sell your handmade crafts, it very well could be that your niche is out of wack, so – let’s talk about it!

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What is a Niche and Who Cares?

The definition of a niche is – “products or services that appeal to a small, specialized section of the population.”

This is very important to know, because the more we understand our niche, the more we can understand our customer. And when we understand our customer, we can sell to them much easier.

It’s up to you if you want to go more broad with your niche, or very narrow. This is also referred to as “niching down”.

You can go many tiers down into a niche, kind of like a funnel.

For example a coffee mug would start as an adult niche, because babies don’t use mugs. Then one half step down for mug drinkers specifically. To bring it down to another tier would be to put a gamer oriented graphic on there. One step more because that graphic says “Level 3 Coffee” and once more with some dnd styled stats on there. Now we’re not just after coffee drinkers, we’re after this precise type of tabletop gamer nerds.

So, with this product creation, we now have a little bit of insight into our customer. We can take this product and other similar products to gaming conventions, maybe get some reviews by dnd influencers, and stuff like that. Selling gets easier when you know who is buying your product.

Here’s an example of how we can really miss the mark on aligning our ideal customer with our products, and might even be what’s holding you back.

Let’s say you make a laser engraved a leather wallet with a little picture of a cat that says “World’s Best Cat Dad.”

Now let’s break down the niche. We are separating out the population of people who like bi-fold wallets. Then, out of that group, we are separating out specifically men. Of those men, they have a cat or a few cats that they consider their children.

So that’s about 3 tiers focused into a niche. Perfect! So, who is your target customer?

Is it:
A} Bi-Fold Wallet Collectors.
B} Dudes who have Cats. or
C} Friends of dudes who have cats.

The answer is C! Sure, there will probably be a person or 2 who would buy this for themselves, like how Michael in the Office got himself the “World’s Best Boss” mug, but 9.9 times out of 10 this product is going to be a present from family or friends.

So, you’d have a much better chance driving sales by getting featured in a “Woman’s World” magazine in a gifts for him section than paying for a full spread ad in a “Sports Illustrated”. Kind of like how Macy’s plays children’s clothing ads during “the Bachelor”, not “Bluey”.

So, keep in mind the “end user” isn’t always the customer.

If you are still in the product discovery phase, it might be worth it to figure out who you want your customer to be first, so you can plan products around what it is they want.

If you already have products, consider who is the one forking over the cash.

What Products Need Niches?

There are 2 drastically different ways to approach a niche.

Let’s use these Colorado State Flag Styled Stud Earrings. I make these. If you had no idea whatsoever what my business was, and ran across just these first you would think one of two things:

~This maker makes exclusively Colorado merch. (Which is a Narrow Niche.)
OR
~This maker makes jewelry. (Which is a Broad Niche.)

Both could be true. Both are niches. Yet, both are very different from eachother.

So ask yourself this, what do you want to be known for?

If I made exclusively Colorado things, right out of the gate I can easily envision my ideal customer and find them online and in person. I could wholesale to tourist spots, get featured on Colorado instagram influencers and magazines, and more! Marketing becomes easier, and sales are practically guaranteed.

If I just made a bunch of earrings, which IS what I do, my selling tactics change. Instead, I would be targeting people who like handmade jewelry. I go after a broader audience and try to find an overlap of “A Person who wears Stud Earrings & Colorado Flag” when before it’s more like finding an overlap of a “Coloradoan who happens to wear Stud Earrings.”

Either way you approach a niche with your products, there is an audience for it, so long as you know who your customers are – which we already covered earlier.

Now, you don’t need to put a dog on a thing and try to sell your handmade goods to dog people.

Obvious examples like these are used a lot to teach about niches. But what if you don’t want to pick dogs, or mom, or soccer, or any of that. What if you just make pretty generic things?

If you make generic things, I betcha there is still a niche focus to them, even if you don’t realize it. Even the process in which you make a thing, is a niche.

Hand knit – that’s a niche. Hand painted – niche. Laser engraved – niche. Sustainable Materials – Recycled Materials – Organic – Home Grown – One of a Kind – Big & Tall – Woman Owned – Etcetera, Etcetera – All Niches. Well, qualifiers for a niche, at least.

People search for all sorts of things that mean something to them. Even boring ass wooden circle earrings like this.

– But, with a title like “Laser Cut Sustainable Walnut Wood Circle Studs with Hypoallergenic Posts, Handcrafted Small Batch, Woman Owned Biz.” Now there are a lot more connection points for your ideal customer.

So, what products need niches? Every single one of them.

Now, let me tell you why I prefer a broad niche, as opposed to a narrow one.

The Secret Power of a Broad Niche

The niche I have for my laser cut business is summed up as “Quirky Handmade Jewelry”. My ideal customer is eccentric, dresses to impress and is always searching for conversation starting jewelry.

Over the years, I have found a balance between a broad niche and a rather specific customer.

Let’s bring up those Cat Dad wallets again.

The ideal customer of that wallet is a friend or family member of a man with a cat baby. So when you are making products, ask yourself – “What else do they need?”

Maybe they know a “World’s Best Dog Dad.” Or “World’s Best Cat Mom.”

That’s where Kittl.com comes in. If you’ve watched my video on how much this site is a game changer for us Laser Makers specifically, then you already know. Even if you don’t make things with lasers, let me show you how powerful this website is, and it will become obvious why I’ve been using it more and more lately.

The first place I always look when starting a new design is in their templates. Not only are there a zillion templates in a every style and feel on the planet, but it makes starting a design so much faster than starting from scratch.

This Cat Mom design is a great start! My absolutely favorite part about kittl is the amazing ability to alter text. Thanks to the text edit function, we can completely alter the shape, perspective, vibe and feel of our text!

It’s wicked easy to make a copy, and change the text. We can perfect the look and I’ve got 2 designs now that took me less than 5 minutes in real time to make.

The text features might be my favorite part, but it’s not the coolest part. In my opinion, the most impressive feature so far is the set generator functions.

You can take an image, like this cat, and have their ai generate similar pictures in it’s image! Now I can make a dog in the same style!

AND! With their vectorize function, you can turn these images into perfectly scalable and edit-able images and even save them as an SVG. Freaking radical.

This makes designing products SO much easier, especially within a niche. If you are focused on one genre in particular, you can generate so many designs to test out with your customers! Your perfect product is waiting to be designed.

And, if you ever want to branch out of your particular style of product, try out some of your designs in their mockup generator. If your customers like a design on a wallet, maybe they’d like it as as a sticker or a tote bag!

PLUS! Get 25% off ALL kittl.com plans with my code LASERLADYYT. You could make your money back with just one sale, so you’ve got nothing to loose. I wouldn’t recommend this site if I didn’t use it myself and I encourage you to check out my link and give it a try!

Whether you want to go broad or super duper narrowed down, kittl.com has everything you need to make more products in your cozy little niche. But, just because you picked a comfy little spot in the niche world, it doesn’t mean more sales until we check off that final checkmark.

Why Do Niches Sell So Well?

Our number one job as a creator of products is to figure out the connection between our wares and our customers. Without a connection, we just have a collection of meaningless objects we spent a dumb amount of time making.

I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase, “If you build it, they will come.”

It’s not inspiring.

The movie that came from was about a crazy guy who sank his family into debt building a full-on baseball field in the middle of farm country. I guarantee if that happened in real life that dude would have ended up filing for bankruptcy, gotten divorced and wound up in the loonie bin.

We don’t want that. So, to avoid that, all we need to do –

Now that we have the Who and the What, is to figure out the Why.

One of my biggest pet peeves is when I hear a kid ask their parents why and they respond with, “Cuz I told you so.” You can’t just tell a customer they need your keychain because you told them so.

Mr. Cat Father probably already has a wallet, but his best friend is going to want to get it for him because it’s a great present! The problem it is solving is that you need a gift for your friend. You know this guy and now we’ve made a personal connection between you being a great friend and knowing that he is a prideful cat dad-erino. You get friend points for being caring and funny, and he gets a wallet.

Think of the last thing you bought online. How many times in the description did it tell you why you needed the thing?

I just bought some bug netting for my plants and the description promised me that thanks to their netting all my gardening efforts would not be wasted because the bugs won’t eat my harvests!

You remember those boring wood earrings from before? Well, the why someone might buy those is because they like supporting women businesses because it makes them feel like they are making a difference. They are by the way. Shop small as much as you possibly can. 😉

Answering why would someone buy your product doesn’t always have to be that your life is going to change for the better. It can just be funny and a great gift. It can be helpful for organizing.

A sign with an affirmation on it will make your customers feel good about themselves. Like putting Live, Laugh, Love, on everything made people feel like Julia Roberts, or whatever.

You could be selling convenience, feelings, tools, memories, necessities and more!

If I can satisfy my eclectic jewelry collectors with a couple pairs of earrings they’re sure to get compliments on, we’re all better off.

If you are still trying to find out WHY people should buy your items (besides the fact that your items are awesome) I’m going to be doing product reviews very soon, so sign up to my email list, and keep your eyes peeled for that.

So, here’s the ultimate takeaway – if you are just getting started, try everything. Make wallets, and mugs, and signs and keychains. Have your topics cover animals, planes, plants and holidays. You will get a feel for your customer base and in time, your products will naturally narrow itself down and bonus! You will have a buttload of experience to take forward with you in to your business journey.

Alternatively, if you’ve been around a while and need to switch it up, pick one or two things that are working and focus on those. HARD. Focus on only those topics and products. You might find a whole new customer base emerge that is easier to market to.

This is where I find myself presently. I was throwing darts all willy nilly, but now that I’ve landed some darts, I have an area to focus on.

So, keep on keepin’ on! I promise, when you takes steps forward, you always end up ahead.

And make one of those steps checking out kittl.com! Save 25% on all plans with code LASERLADYYT.

Thank you so much for watching and Happy Crafting!

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