CFO-Berater: Nischen oder breit aufstellen?

0:00Unternehmer/Gast I turn around and grow companies, small to mid-size businesses. And um So my my background is in accounting and finance. That's what I came up through. So as a CFO of a unicorn tech company, then as a CFO of a billion dollar construction company. So in my business right now, the question is I know like the niches are in the riches, right? Or the riches are in the niches, whatever. You know what I'm saying, the other way around. 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.

0:35But 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 gym launch you just focus just on just on gym owners, which is you know, very specific and probably really easy to do. But um or easier to do than just go after Super easy. No one else No one else is able Well, easy No, easier to go after one ideal customer profile

1:03>> 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. Uh or I could do this really hard thing that I don't have the same experience in or could provide the same amount of value. Which one should I do?"

1:30Um >> [laughter] >> Not necessarily, no. But I'm 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? >> Yeah. So um I'll pick out the first two things that you said around pigeonholing and boredom.

1:57So that's what this is and then I'll answer the second part of the question. So 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. 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 often times 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.

2:45Every 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, your 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.

3:08And 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. So then your day-to-day from a boredom perspective, they all end up here.

3:34Alex And so I would not use boredom as a reason to not do something cuz if you win, then that's what happens. 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 is 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. Thanks.

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