"Should I Niche Down or Stay a Generalist?"

0:00Hey, what's up? Hey, it's a question for you. It's my business. I turn around and grow companies, small to mid-size businesses. And um So, my my background is in accounting and finance. That That's what I came up through. So, as a CFO of a unicorn tech company, then as a CFO of a a billion-dollar construction company. So, in my business right now, the question is, I know like the niches are in the riches,

0:26>> Mhm. >> right? Or the riches are in the niches, whatever. You know, as they say in another era. Um but like I know I could crush it in construction. That's where I spent like my entire career like working with all types of construction companies. But I don't want to get pigeonholed and I don't want to get bored by just working in one industry. So, it's kind of a a long question here, but like I know with Jim launch, you just focused just on just on gym owners, which is you know, very specific and probably really easy to do. But or easier to do than just go after

0:58>> [laughter] >> Super easy. No one else No one else has been able to do it. >> No, easier to go after one ideal customer profile >> Yeah. >> is what I meant versus I go after You know, I I work with all different types of businesses right now. >> Yeah. >> Is it a mistake to do that or should I just like crush it in construction and then go from there later? >> Yeah. >> You're drawing a picture >> you're like, "Hey, I've got this really easy thing that I'm really good at and everyone loves me and I have all the credibility.

1:28Uh or I could do this really hard thing that I don't have the same experience in, or can provide the same amount of value. Which one should I do?" Um [laughter] >> Not necessarily, no. But I I'm not I'm not trying to go after like HR consulting and strategy, finance, marketing, all that stuff. It's It's strategy and finance. It's just whether I niche down even further and just work with construction companies or I go more broad, right?

1:54>> Yeah. So, um I'll pick out the first two things that you said around pigeonholing and boredom. So, that's what this is and then I'll answer the second part of the question. So, um, one, you won't be pigeonholed because if you're in a niche, you can charge niche prices, which are higher, you'll have better All your case studies will be relevant to those customers. They'll be like, "Oh, this is for me." It'll be a shoe-in deal. You'll sell more like You'll have more customers in a niche than if you go broad. >> Okay.

2:20>> That's the thing that's counterintuitive. So, like if I said, "I help businesses," I will get Well, if I have a track record in gyms, then if I advertise all businesses, I will get fewer gyms than if I advertise I'm good at business in general. And so, oftentimes you'll get higher response rates by just pairing down the messaging and be more specific. But, this is the thing that I want to talk about with the boredom thing cuz it'll apply to everybody here.

2:48Every business, chunked up to the highest level, is you with five to seven direct reports. And they're going to be your marketing person, your sales person, HR person, your legal, IT, finance, CS, whatever, right? And so, in my opinion, every business, if you succeed at it at the highest level, ends up becoming the same thing. And so, the idea of like, "Oh, I feel like I'm going to be in construction forever." You're not. You're going to be managing seven people who run a business.

3:12And so, whether I'm building software or I'm building, you know, you know, an acquisition you know, a PE firm or I'm building, you know, a chain of whitening stores, the actual the actual day-to-day is more or less the same once you get high enough up, in my opinion, especially if you are, I'm assuming, kind of a business strategy generalist. >> Right. >> So, then your day-to-day from a boredom perspective, they all end up here.

3:37And so, I would not use boredom as a reason to not do something cuz if you win, then that's what happens. >> Got it. >> Right? So, one. Two, the pigeonholing, I think you're just going to end up getting better success for better people and be able to charge all all the reasons I talk about niche stuff. Um, and so, for you, my TLDR I do think that you should just focus on the thing that you have this massive track record in that you also know how to you can crush it for them. >> Okay. >> That's what I would do. >> Cool. >> If you like this video and you're a business owner who wants to break through your current revenue ceiling, I distilled every lesson from scaling 10 businesses past 10 million and three businesses past 100 million into a completely free scaling roadmap that I've used to go from zero to one, zero to 10, and zero to 100 plus. And so, you can click here and you can check it out.

4:18Again, absolutely free, and since you're a business owner, appreciate you and uh enjoy.