With yesterday's self-check of your fit with self-employment, and a general sense of what your ‘genius zone’ looks like, we now want to look outwards to the market to help answer the question:

“Who do I want to help?”

If you’re brand new to solo consulting, the natural tendency may be to cast as wide a net as possible to start building a client base.

I refer to this as the ‘Cheesecake Factory approach’ where you try to be all things to all people, but end up being mediocre across the board.

(See also: 💡 The “risk” of niching)

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Instead, why not take the time to consider just a few different profiles of people who may require and benefit from your unique expertise.

From there you can narrow down to one ideal client profile (ICP) to reap the benefits of specialization.

This can be done in a few steps:

1. Think of types of people you know in real-life that may benefit from your domain expertise and genius zone
   ​💡 Stuck on your ICP? Go broad then narrow​
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2. Put words to the problem they’re facing and the pain they’re feeling
   ​💡 Putting words to their pain​
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3. Validate with simple market discovery interviews
   ​💡 Ask them what hurts​
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4. Identify the urgency of their pain
   ​💡 Molasses in your pipeline​
   ​💡 Spotting their urgency​

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All in all, you’re looking for a single ICP that features an overlap of the their problem with your expertise, and heightened urgency.

This exploration of ICPs can take a few weeks, but you’ll be surprised at the convergence of data points after even just a handful of market interviews.

In fact, you’ll probably need to rein yourself in from thinking too far ahead to business model, pricing, etc. in order to take the all-important next step:

Ironing out your signature POV.

This will be your unique foundation to attract your ICP and deliver a service that will relieve their pain.

More on that as we continue tomorrow…

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💡

-Wes

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