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Do you still believe that you need to niche down to be successful in your business industry? 

I hope not, but if you do I’m going to break down why this whole concept of the riches are in the niches a little bit BS. 

I’m Celi Arias, and I’m the founder of the Grown Ass Business Method—the no-BS-truth to growing a business and scaling a business the easy way. 

Now for this niching business…

GIMME GUIDANCE TO NICHE MY BUSINESS

 

How did niching down become a thing?

It should be said that a lot of business gurus wrote this concept in books and content early on, and it spread like wildfire. So everyone was coaching and teaching this concept that you have to niche down in order to grow your business at all.

Why would business coaches do that? 

Well, because it makes their job easier. 

If I am coaching you and you are super specialized and specific about who you help, how you help them, what your one messaging statement is, what your one product is… You’ve just made my job a lot easier! And then—I’m a genius, right?

Of course, it is absolutely easier in many cases to niche down—but that doesn’t mean that you have to. And it doesn’t mean that that’s the only way that business works. It’s just easier on that coach or marketer. 

Why does it make it easier to niche down?

Clarifies Messaging:

If you were speaking to one product, one audience with one clear message over and over and over again, it makes your whole marketing funnel focused and simplifies your messaging. 

Tracking Metrics:

It makes it easier to measure what’s working and not working and easier to tweak. 

Makes You More Findable Online:

It also does make SEO and online visibility easier. You’re always targeting specific keywords and a specific audience who plays in specific places.

Establish Expertise:

And it makes it easier to position yourself or your product as the go-to expert person or product. 

Okay, so yes, it is easier.

 

But Niching Down Is Not the Only Way.

If you are a person who is deeply frustrated with being pushed to niche, I just want to let you know there are some other ways to think about this. 

Niching—if you think about it in a visual sense—is all about picking a silo and going deep. 

That is one way to do it. You’re picking your ideal customer, the product, the pricing, where they play, where they hang out, the marketing and the messaging and positioning, and the sales process that’s gonna work for them. We just go deeper and deeper and deeper down this one rabbit hole. Amazing. 

Another way to do it is to niche horizontally. 

What if you had one product that serves a lot of different silos on a horizontal line?

And this could be a service or product. 

Shoes are a product that serve many different types of people. A great example of this is the recent phenomenon with On Cloud Shoes. 

Very cool brand. Did you know that it’s actually meant for runners only? It was designed and made to be a very light lift shoe for runners. 

They’re not meant to be used for walking around in the city. They’re not meant to be used for standing around a lot if you are a waiter or a chef or somebody or a nurse who’s on their feet a lot. 

But somehow they’ve managed to become so cool and trendy across those different industries that this running shoe that’s talked about as being so light and comfortable is now across industries being used by many different people.

There are many different ways to niche!

And you could actually niche horizontally if you have a product that serves different people. 

This is also true for software. It’s almost like saying if I were to make a particular project management tool or an email tool but it’s only for dentists. You would look at me like I’m crazy and I’m losing out on all this market share—and you’d be right! 

So you can think about niching in the traditional sense that is being taught most often in a lot of the business coaching books and by online business coaches. 

Does it make your life easier? Absolutely. 

Does it make their life easier? Absolutely.

That is vertical niching down, thinking about your silo that you want to play in. 

If you are a person who might get really bored speaking to only one person forever—because remember, we’re building a business that’s going to last you for 20 to 25 years—you better love it! 

You better love what you’re doing. 

How to niche down the best way for your business…

If the thought of talking to the same person forever bores you to tears, can you take your skill or tool or product and flip it on the side and do a horizontal niching? 

For example, my tools in the Grown Ass Business Accelerator and my software serve many, many, many, different types of business industries. 

The metrics that we look at are relevant not only to online business owners, but to brick and mortar stores, physical products, and other kinds of businesses. 

And I’m very clear about the types of businesses that it doesn’t serve, but it can serve many types of businesses. 

Many of my colleagues think I’m crazy for saying that and that I should niche down. And I always explain to them, no, I’m niching horizontally. I’m serving an audience of different business owners with one tool that does things they need. 

Ask yourself…

How can you think about this if you are a multi-passionate entrepreneur who just cannot stand the thought of serving one person with really one messaging and one product forever? How can you think about your tool in a way that it could be horizontally niched? How can this one service skill or tool that you have serve many, many different people like the On Cloud shoe? 

And remember this, in many product-based businesses, one of the best ways to start in a product-based business is to do one product really well. 

• Skims did this. 
• Spanx did this. 
• Lululemon did this.

They were known for one particular item that did really well. 

And then they very quickly expanded into not only other items, other clothing items—and even other product categories! 

So you can also do this same type of thing. 

→ “Maybe I’m doing this one thing right now, this one service right now—but how can I also create so much success with this one thing that I move myself across the board and add products over time?”

This type of thinking will allow you to use your core strengths and skills and test new products, new offerings, new services over time. And do it based on what you’ve already done well, which is another interesting way of thinking about who am I without having to niche down to being one person all the time to everyone. 

So I’m curious…

If you completely disagree with me, cool. Let me know in the chats. 

And if you’ve answered the question: “How could I turn this on its head and think about niching horizontally?” → let me know as well! 

Come back again soon! So we can keep talking about all these fun business things.

SEE SOME OF THE BUSINESSES WE’VE HELPED NICHE HORIZONTALLY

Choose the words that you allow to take space in your mind carefully or risk them becoming true for you. Words are more powerful than we realize.

At the age 25, I started my first business. I was totally lost and overwhelmed. I didn’t know then that entrepreneurship and feeling overwhelmed often go hand-in-hand and I had many nay-sayers in my life who just wanted me to jump onto a predictable career path. Not feeling supported, I began working with a therapist to get clarity and confidence on my life decisions.  Keep in mind, I was in Argentina, far from my immediate family or friends, so I needed all the support and guidance I could get. There were no entrepreneurs in my family and this was far from what I had studied or prepared for and way out of my comfort zone.

Quick backstory detour. I’m Argentine. My family immigrated to America when I was a little girl and shortly after finishing college I decided to move back in order to pursue a second degree in fashion design. My plan was to only stay a year and then transition into an advanced design program based in NYC.  Those plans changed after I began dancing tango and realized that there was a mega business opportunity in tango fashion. Up until then, the dancewear was slightly dated, yet the scene had received a recent injection of young dancers wanting to keep the tradition alive. They were beginning to make it young and relevant by dancing to modern music and electronic remixes of classics.  New bands were being born and  updating the sound. This thing called ‘Nuevo tango’ had revolutionized the dance and the music, yet the clothing was far behind.  With my knowledge of dance, sports and activewear, I decided to bring these concepts into tango clothing. The first collection did better than an insecure 25-year-old could have expected and before I knew it, I’d rented a large apartment in Palermo, converting the living room into a cutting and sewing room and subleasing the spare rooms for more stability.  Many good stories came out of that apartment, but this one is about the power of the words we choose to believe.

Back to the therapist

We were working through some of my blocks by doing specific visualizations together. In one particular visualization, I envisioned “future-successful-career-woman-me.” You know the one. HERRR.  The one you secretly desire to be while feeling like she’s totally unattainable. She keeps pulling you forward, whether you are aware of her calling.

On one occasion, I clearly saw myself advising entrepreneurs all over the world on how to grow their businesses. I had no idea really, what I was even seeing.  I didn’t know that business consulting was a thing, let alone a possible career choice.  The thought of helping people with my accrued skills, talking business strategies and impacting some lives- that was a thrilling concept to me.  And, maybe even more importantly, this was the first time I had felt excited by the prospect of anything in…well, quite a while.

When I wasn’t completely overworked by managing every aspect of a manufacturing business (yes, all of you fashion people can laugh at how incredibly naive I was), I was fending off other people’s worries and fears for my career future.  If there happened to be any quiet moments in between, I was balancing my own self-doubt, criticism and negative talk. Those of course were easier to quiet  by just making myself busier. And busier became a stand-in for happier more and more of the time. The truth is, I’ve always been pretty good at appearing more confident than I actually am, when in fact, deep down I was worried about what I was doing with my life.

This visualization was the first time that I got excited about anything, even if it was something that wouldn’t exist until well into the future.  It meant that I could look forward to becoming this version of me!

As we wrapped up the visualization, I opened my eyes eagerly anticipating her to join in our celebration. Instead, she looked at my sternly, slightly concerned.

I still remember to this day what she told me. “Lower your expectations. Set your eyes on a more realistic career.”  Heart – immediately deflated.  Back to depression and confusion, I spent my 20’s and even early 30’s a bit lost.  Sure, now in my 40’s, I understand it’s totally normal to feel lost at that age.  Yet at the time, I took her words as expert advice, therefor making my journey a much longer and harder one.  I kept wandering somewhat aimlessly, while ironically over-working myself to prove I was on the right path.  Years later that distant vision returned around the time that I contemplated pursuing an MBA.  It was then that I realized that it wasn’t too late to build the vision of myself I had once imagined.

That vision made that therapist uncomfortable. She couldn’t see what I saw. She didn’t know how to build that person, so she thought we should lower our sights and do something more “achievable.”

What I can say is, be careful what thoughts you let in, no matter who they are coming from.

The irony is that today, I am mostly paid by clients to see the road ahead for them, the one they can feel but not yet see.  This is literally what I do.  I advise entrepreneurs and all kids of businesses on how to materialize their visions and bring into the world those things which for so long had remained buried inside of them.  I lay out the path for their growth, the one they can’t see yet, because they’re still stuck in the weeds, and yes, often feeling that entrepreneurial overwhelm that can be crippling.  My ultimate goal with all my clients is to teach them the skills they need to become their own strategists. Once we get past some of their initial blocks… they are often on their way and send me postcards from their new destination. Which is exactly how I want it to be.

What you believe about yourself is true. If there is something deep down that you believe you can do, you probably can. This also holds true for the negative thoughts in your head.  If you believe you can’t do something, you’re probably right about that too.  What I can say is, be careful what thoughts you let in, no matter who they are coming from. They will guide you to the outcome whether you want that particular outcome or not.

And full disclosure, I currently have a pretty bad-ass therapist these days and I do believe her…most of the time.

What would you say if someone asked you to share the vision for your business?

 

You know… the thing that is the North Star of your business? That everyone on your team is on board with? Cat got your tongue? Let’s explore that…

 

You’re working on your business, and what you’re working on day in and day out, seems obvious. As long as you’re busy, and working over 8 hrs a day, you’re an entrepreneur and you’re doing the thing, building the thing, and you’re in the grind like everyone else.

 

Why developing a mission and vision is important to a business

 

How do you know you’re working on the right things, focusing on the right places for your business?

 

There are probably endless lists of to-dos, strategies, marketing plans, systems to build and coaches out there to tell you what you should be doing next. Here’s the little thing we often forget and no one is telling you. None of those things matter! None of those coaches or courses or programs, new tactics or webinars … you get the idea… NONE of it matters if you don’t have one thing. 

 

If you aren’t clear on what your vision is for you and for your business. Without a vision you will continue to add more tools to your tool-belt, spend more money, and still kinda feel like you’re running in circles.

 

The only way to know if the next “big thing” (or coach or program or course) is right for you, is by making sure it’s aligned with your vision. 

 

All of those courses you’re being sold every single day on every single platform? The coach you keep circling back to and checking out her website again and again wondering if the high ticket price is worth it? The webinars filling your calendar?

 

You’ll know what to ignore – if you can just understand what it is that you really really want (yes, cue the song).

 

How I Work with Clients to Formulate Their Business Visions

 

This is where I start with everyone.  Over time I’ve simplified the exercise down into 4 questions you need to answer for yourself. This is just for the sake of getting clear with yourself, quickly.  This is also a GREAT exercise to do when you just feel like you’ve trailed off the path and you’re not sure why.

 

Answer these 4 questions, ideally on one sheet of paper. Put it on your desk or at least in a place you’ll see it throughout the day, and refer back to it when you are feeling off or out of alignment with yourself.

 

That. Is. It.

Exercise: Celi’s 4-Question Business Vision Builder

 

1 – What’s your number?

• How much money do you want to make in your business? Do you want to replace your full-time salary with your own business? Are you trying to grow your business 20%, 50%?
•  Be VERY Clear on what your number is. Do not sway, do not change it when people ask, and ideally, get comfortable with saying it out loud. If you can’t say it to others, say it out loud to yourself in the mirror until it feels real.
• Why a number? Because it’s so easy to overwork, take free calls, not charge the right amount to hit your number, volunteer your time – etc.  Your number keeps you focused on the work that actually makes that number even a possibility, like in real dollar bills.
• Ex: I’ve had a tendency to overwork (mentor for free, take “brain picking” calls, and spend time over complicating my systems). I love what I do so it’s easy for me to overwork. A number that feels like a stretch to me, keeps me focused on the projects that will get me to the goal, and helps me politely bow out of all of those things that will make me feel drained at the end of the day.

 

2. What’s the impact? 

• A business that lights you up, has an impact on your, your community and your clients. What does that impact look like?
• This should be exciting and make you feel all warm inside – you’re living your dream and impacting others.
• Ex: I grow people’s businesses because I love making complex systems fun,easy and digestible and using my skills to help others with their journey is my deepest calling.

 

3. How do you want to FEEL?

• Yes we’re going to talk about our feelings. How you want to feel is the source of your deepest desires, so we want to make sure we cultivate those.
• Make a long list of all the ways you want to feel in your life. This can be a wild range, so let yourself sit and list out your desired feeling states. Then go have a cup of tea and take a break from the list.
• When you’re ready, come back to the list and circle the top 4-7 words that truly define how you want to feel. Write them down, several times, in several places.
• Make sure they are in sight or easy to remember and write them down whenever you need a reminder.  Having a bad day?  Write you feeling words and see which one you’re not hitting on today.
• In case you’re curious, some of my words are: Creative, Joy, Space, Divine feminine, Communion, Abundance, Embodied

 

4. If you have a team, what do you want for them?

• This is a chance to make sure those who are key to your success are also feeling supported and lit up by their life. Guess what a happy team looks like?  One that is a really productive team. One that sticks around for the long-term.
• What does success and happiness look like for them and why do they love working with you?
• If you don’t know the answer to what they would like, go ask them.  This helps remind you that every decision you make, every new product you launch or system you decide to build, has an effect on someone else.
• You are only as good as your team, make sure they know it and feel it.

 

And that’s your one-page personal compass. (AKA: the easiest business vision ever!) 

 

When in doubt, when feeling frustrated, take a glance at your list. See what you’re currently doing that’s working or not working. And redirect from this guide as your compass first.

We like 4’s around here! When you’re ready to solidify those business foundations of yours so you can easily scale to that next-level vision of your business ↓

CHECK OUT THE 4-DAY G.A.B. ACCELERATOR

The creative process brings to surface a lot of our deepest hidden parts we don’t like to show. We come up against our own fears, insecurities, doubts and yes, mostly our egos. As the nature of our current creative work at “Tribes” becomes more personal, I’ve noticed we’ve been getting very sensitive about our ideas, our projects and what the future holds for them. Is it the personal nature of the work that has us getting so touchy, or is it the process of creating itself?  Either way, we keep getting stuck in the discussion stages of what we’re about to make. Getting super sensitive, feeling like someone shot down an idea right away or feeling like we need to over explain ourselves to our audience and defend our recent artistic pivot (as if our audience even cares).

Associating with our egos, and thinking that our ideas, or our unfinished work for that matter, are somehow who we are as a person, is true resistance at work. This is where we begin to get very uncomfortable. What if our audience doesn’t get it, or like us on instagram, or God-forbid someone actively criticizes our work? My SELF as I know myself to be, might not be any longer!

Oddly, this is where the creative process begins to get fun for me. Masochist? Yes, probably very much so. Stay with me though. If we can take a step back, look at the bigger picture and what’s playing out on the stage, we begin to see our thoughts and ideas, insecurities and egos interact together, making one big mess of a jig. It’s entertaining and all, but you know the one thing that isn’t happening?

Right. Your work isn’t being created.

This entertaining dance of our egos intertwining with the work that’s fighting to be seen, makes me very grateful for art school. The painful lessons I learned after years and years of enduring Feedback Fridays, are now super useful for my creative work, for business consulting, and heck even relationships. Here are 4 of my favorite takeaways from art school, which can be applied to anything and everything:

1: Kill your babies

Ok yes, I went to art school in the south for the most part, and yes, this is a saying.

If there’s something you’re really holding onto, take a closer look: That idea that no one seems to understand, the project that doesn’t land for anyone else, or the detail that you feel is so precious and central to your message? That’s the thing you have to give up. The thing you hold on to is most likely the thing that is holding you back. Frustrating, I know.

Yes it will seem painful, yes it will feel like you are killing a part of yourself, or your baby. Implied in the title, I know. See- you got the reference, and this sentence is now overkill. Like what I did there? (let it go Celi)

That feeling in the pit of your stomach that you are losing a battle, or that you might be wrong, or that you’re not seeing your own idea clearly- will go away faster than you can imagine. If of course, you can just let go! Maybe listen to feedback, trust your team or just imagine what life would be like without your one precious idea. It could very well possibly be the opening to something all-together new and more exciting.  I know, roll your eyes. And then just try it.

 

2: Don’t apologize for your work

The moment you start apologizing about your work, especially before you’ve even shown it, you not only show me your doubts, you also give me permission to discredit your work. The whole point of this process is for me to give you feedback so you can grow. I can no longer do that if you don’t take your work seriously. I can’t believe you if you don’t believe you. Also, your excuses tell me you’re not ready for feedback, so then, what are we doing here?
If you want feedback and collaboration and growth, keep it simple and let your work speak for itself.  Let me experience it before you apologize for where it’s at.

Apologies are subject to look like: ‘I’m not finished,’ ‘I’m still going to add XYZ’, ‘it’s not really ready’, showing up late to the meeting, not showing the work at all and only talking to me about it.

 

3: Don’t waste your breath getting defensive-

Now comes the fun part, the graciously accepting of the feedback. Just breathe. Let it be. Stand there and smile and accept where you are, I mean, where your work is. You may not agree with all the feedback you get. You may not agree with your friends’ opinion, or aesthetic, or choice of language, or approach, or point of view, or you may even, gasp, feel misunderstood. You know what?  It’s ALL ok. It is in fact all part of the creative process. Would you like to know what makes the process more painfully tedious and slower than it could be?

When you get defensive. If you take things personally, or feel like you have to get someone to see things your way, you just waste so much energy that you could be putting into- that’s right- making your work better. This isn’t politics or even a debate. This is art and creation and juicy and fun and a fluid process. And you will have much more fun when you can just smile, and say, “Thank you. I hear you. I will think about your feedback.”

 

4. Get over yourself, even if for just a little bit-

You’ve probably noticed a theme here.  Creating work, whether you’re an artist or not, is ultimately an exploration of who you are in the world. Fellini said that we are always making the same movie over and over, because ultimately we only have one story to tell.  Our own.

So don’t think it’s so important that it has to be perfect before sharing it, or that it can’t withstand a little feedback from others. Ok yea sure, putting our work out there is scary.  It hurts a little and in my case, has even taken me years to do. For instance, I love to read about a book a week but hate my own writing. So here I am, taking my own advice and getting over myself.

The main lesson: You’re not that precious, you’re not breakable, and this is all a part of the journey to becoming more fully you. So put it out there, be ok with it, and keep it moving. The getting over yourself and your identification with your ego, as Freud might say, will be a really healthy exercise for you as a person.

Wait, is it Freud or Jung? I can never remember. And you get the idea.

There’s something to be said for just saying yes. To the things that scare you, to life, to the things you want to do and never do… to the things you even don’t want to do. John Lennon met Yoko Ono because of an art piece that she made which was a ladder leaning up against a wall, and when you looked up there was a sing that read yes. One of my friends, who has a rule about having a “Yes Day” once a month, ended up training and running a marathon and therefor changing his health journey, all because of a yes day.

The power of yes can be transformative, life-changing, challenging. Because it’s so easy to say no. Because it’s so easy to stay where we are. Because it’s so easy to stay in our comfort zones and then complain about where we are. It’s so easy to see where others are stuck and holding themselves back, yet it’s so hard to see it in ourselves. So sometimes I just say yes. When something challenges me, when something seems scary, when I really feel all my resistance come up… I just simply say “YES”. And then of course, try my best and keep it moving.

So, as someone who reads tons of useful books and articles, even though I’m not a particular fan of my own writing, I decided to stop worrying about my writing technique. It’s more important to be able to share information that can be useful to you, rather than store it all in my brain, for only a small handful of people. So I’m saying yes to starting this website, to writing this blog, and to sharing my thoughts with more of you. May it serve you in some way.