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Find a niche, fill the niche and kill the niche

By Becky McCray

The sharpest marketing advice I’ve heard came not from some marketing guru but from a small town photographer, one who built a global business from a home base in a small town.

Mike Klemme
Mike Klemme found a niche, filled it,
and killed it. And that is how he
built a global business.

Mike Klemme is a professional photographer from Enid, Oklahoma (population 47,000). He said he built his business on the Red Adair model: be the one to call. That niche marketing has taken him around the world to do what he does best: photograph golf courses.

I heard his marketing advice at a photography event back in 2010.

Find a niche, fill the niche and kill the niche, Klemme said.

Here’s how he outlined the process:

  1. Pick a niche without an existing specialist, one that capitalizes on your skills and abilities. 
  2. Start learning all you can about it; read the trade publications. 
  3. Network, meet everyone involved, know the industry players and become a guru in your specialty. 
  4. Get beyond the obvious; develop your own perspective and your own style. 
  5. Slam the door on that niche by being the absolute best.
  6. Find your tribe of people who are passionate about the topic. Communicate directly with them.
  7. Build great partnerships. Find compatible professionals, and grow your work together. 

Klemme may have been thinking about photographers when he put together his points, but I’m thinking about how many different small-town professionals could use these ideas to build their own global business and kill their niche.

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About Becky McCray

Becky started Small Biz Survival in 2006 to share rural business and community building stories and ideas with other small town business people. She and her husband have a small cattle ranch and are lifelong entrepreneurs. Becky is an international speaker on small business and rural topics.
  • Zoom Towns: attracting and supporting remote workers in rural small towns - December 10, 2020
  • In an economic crisis, spend your brainpower before your dollars - November 25, 2020
  • Video: How to fill empty car dealership buildings for the holidays - November 6, 2020
  • How has 2020 changed the challenges rural small towns face? Tell us here - October 20, 2020
  • The Idea Friendly Method to surviving a business crisis - October 6, 2020
  • Join me for the Rural Renewal Symposium online Oct 13 - September 26, 2020
  • Cheap placemaking idea: instant murals - September 11, 2020
  • Refilling the rural business pipeline - July 7, 2020
  • Huge vacant buildings: grants to renovate? - June 9, 2020
  • Economic self defense for small towns  - June 7, 2020

March 4, 2013 Filed Under: entrepreneurship, marketing, rural Tagged With: service businesses

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Comments

  1. Shari Thomas says

    March 4, 2013 at 2:22 pm

    Oh yeah, I’ve done it once before, and now I’m gonna do it again. Believe me, when you become the “go-to” you’ll always be able to name your own price, have a full bucket of customers, with more wanting your services or your product.

    • Becky McCray says

      March 4, 2013 at 5:56 pm

      Shari, I agree! When you’re the one, you’re in a much better position than the generalist who tries to do it all.

Trackbacks

  1. Why focus on your photographic niche? — Marketing4Photographers says:
    June 29, 2013 at 7:12 am

    […] post from SmallBizSurvival.com provides great suggestions from Mike Klemme, a photographer who has built a global business out of […]

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