704 – What To Look For In A Changing Market, and The Difference Between a Niche and an Ideal Client with Jessica Mehring

Today’s co-host is Jessica Mehring. Jessica is a marketing communications expert and the CEO of Horizon Peak Consulting, where she helps IT and software companies increase enterprise sales with targeted conversion content. In this episode, we dive into the difference between an ideal client and a niche. We also talk about the emotions and the fears of this iterative process, and the importance of personal conversations and pattern recognition.

Out of college, Jessica started in a corporate marketing position. She did content management, wrote product copy and online merchandising content, banner ads, and essentially anything related to marketing. While corporate life wasn’t her long-term plan, she used her time to immerse herself in marketing. When she went out on her own, she found herself most comfortable working with corporate clients because that’s where she cut her teeth.

Even though Jessica had many established relationships and good clients, she came to a point where clients began to dry up and she was having to defend her pricing against freelancers on other digital platforms. At the prompting of a business coach, she decided to niche down in order to find her true ideal clients, and started making progress in her business.

Successful marketing and sales don’t just happen. To achieve faster customer growth, focus on shortening the sales cycle, and most importantly, build long-term customer relationships. You have to talk to people and put in the work of figuring out your ideal client and your business’ niche in order to succeed.

"In the end, I feel like you have to talk to people. It can’t just be a piece of paper. It can’t be a PowerPoint deck on your computer of your buyer persona. You have to actually talk to people to get to know who they are and what keeps them up at night.”

In this episode Jessica talks about:

• The difference between ideal customers and a niche.
• How she screens her clients and learns more about them.
• What to look for when the market is changing and how to adapt to that change.

Main Takeaways

• A niche is a genre of business in which you work. You might have a million ideal customers inside that niche, and those ideal customers might continue to change during the course of operation within your niche.
• You can’t rely on data alone. You have to investigate and actually talk to the clients you want to work with. Getting personal and having them open up about their organization will help you deepen the relationship and land them as a client.
• Use your instincts and keep an eye out for red flags that show the market is drifting in a different direction. You need to be aware of these issues in order to avoid problems in your business and finances.

Important Mentions in this Episode

• Horizon Peak Consulting
• Jessica On Twitter
• Rapid Growth Academy

For full show notes and resources

• Live In The Feast - Episode 4 of Season 7