Discussing competition in the consulting industry in our offsite meet made me revert to the basics of understanding the term consulting. In reality, where “consulting” could mean very high end services that help strategic decisions for the senior management in the client company, it could also mean services related to everyday workings of a client company that are not directly related to the high end strategic decisions taken, yet go a very long way to helping the senior management in doing so, by taking away the mundane regular tasks that can otherwise hit the bottom line results.
The vastness of the word “consulting” firmed by belief on the imperative for a consulting company to define its “consulting niche” In a business start up, one needs to take up jobs that come along. No saying “no” and that’s the way to go. Can business really go on servicing all clients and all proposals that come its way? What was a necessity for you in the beginning does not now turn to luxury but instead makes you face a reality of sorts – a reality that asks you “how long can we do this?” Time to define a niche and have a clearer picture folks! Efforts that were earlier “diluted” servicing all and sundry, now gets a new looks, a concentrated marketing focus.
Narrowing down focus on which industries and clients one needs to cater to, gives more business strength and power, a power to command demand and a power to attract re-demand. It gives a fresh start to an existing business, helps the right customers approach you and others soon following suit. Defining a niche sure may not be simple but it’s not tough either. Like any other ideas or thoughts, here too, we can find dots emerge as we go about analyzing the questions that arise from the realistic situation we are faced. When these dots are connected, they will finally form a pattern of understanding the “focused business”. Defining the niche has its risks but the benefits far outdo them when care is taken that the definition includes all of the “star demands” and not too narrowly described.
With that begins a whole new journey towards building new ideas for the focused customer , inviting more into the fold and preparing ourselves for the next step, that of “focused niche”.
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Yes, it is always a tough job to balance between opportunism and staying focused. Many businesses capitulate because of the pressures of the short term and find their value proposition diminishing.
On the other hand, one also has to take a pragmatic approach to developing focus- the text book approach of building all capabilities and then hitting the market may not work for everyone; instead, trying to connect the dots, as the post says, over time, and abstracting the knowledge gathered through repeat engagements in an area could work well.
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