August 26, 2025 • 12 mins
Most solopreneurs make the mistake of trying to serve everyone and end up standing out to no one. In this short and punchy episode of The Aspiring Solopreneur, Carly and Joe dive into one of the most overlooked steps in building a successful solo business: positioning. They break down why niching down isn’t limiting, but rather the key to charging more, marketing smarter, and actually getting noticed. If you’ve ever said, “My product is for anybody,” this episode will make you rethink everything.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Carly Ries (00:00):
Ever feel like your business is for everyone, only
(00:03):
to realize that that means noone is really paying attention?
In this short episode of TheAspiring Solopreneur, Joe and I
continue our series on thesolopreneur success cycle and
break down the critical step ofpositioning your business so
that it actually gets noticed.From avoiding the generalist
trapped to zeroing in on thepeople you most want to serve,
we share why niching down is thesecret to standing out, charging
(00:25):
more, and making marketingeasier. If you've ever said, my
product is good for anybody,this one's especially for you.
You're listening to the AspiringSolopreneur, the podcast for
anyone on the solo businessjourney, whether you're just
toying with the idea, takingyour first bold step, or have
been running your own show foryears and want to keep growing,
(00:45):
refining, and thriving.
I'm Carly Ries, and along withmy cohost, Joe Rando, we're your
guides through the crazy butawesome world of being a company
of one. As part of LifeStarr, adigital hub dedicated to all
things solopreneurship, we helppeople design businesses that
align with their life'sambitions so they can work to
live, not live to work. Ifyou're looking for a get rich
(01:07):
quick scheme, this is not theplace for you. But if you want
real world insights fromindustry experts, lessons from
the successes and stumbles offellow solopreneurs, and
practical strategies forbuilding and sustaining a
business you love, you're in theright spot. Because flying solo
in business doesn't mean you'realone.
No matter where you are in yourjourney, we've got your back.
(01:28):
Joe, because of our book comingout in October 2025, or if
you're listening to this after,it is already out. We are
covering this entrepreneursuccess cycle. We're having a
series of these because that'smore or less what our book is
about. We've had this idea sincewhat?
2022 is when we came up with thesuccess cycle?
Joe Rando (01:48):
I think late twenty two or middle '22. Yeah.
Carly Ries (01:51):
Because I was out for maternity when you're this,
brainchild of yours came to be.
Joe Rando (01:55):
Both gave birth.
Carly Ries (01:57):
We did. We did. Just different ways. You didn't get
to take the time off that I did.But we've been going through, I
think, gosh, this is maybe ourseventh episode in this series.
And I think today, we're stillin the planning phase of the
success cycle. So listeners, ifyou haven't listened to the
other six episodes before this,we definitely recommend checking
those out so you can hear allthese sequentially. But this
(02:19):
will still be a good episoderegardless.
Joe Rando (02:21):
And they're short.
Carly Ries (02:22):
They're short. Yes
Joe Rando (02:23):
Yeah. They're not the long ones with the interviews.
They're like seven, eightminutes, I think, usually.
Carly Ries (02:28):
Yeah. And that's what we're gonna do here as
well. In this episode, we'lltry. We're gonna talk about
positioning your business andproduct in the market. So, Joe,
when people are thinking aboutthis, where should they start?
I feel like this might even besomething that people don't
think through that much whenthey're developing their
business. They just have a onetrack mind to get it out there.
(02:50):
But position positioning ishuge.
Joe Rando (02:53):
I mean, it's always been important, but in recent
times, it's really, really huge.It can make the difference
between failure and success. Andwhat we mean by positioning is
simply put, it's really nichingdown in certain dimensions. It's
really focusing your offer,focusing what you do and who you
(03:14):
do it for, to the point where arelatively small number of
people are going to feel likeyou made it just for them. And
the reason to do that is becauseotherwise, nobody notices you.
And it's worse now than it was.You know, I've been starting
businesses for decades, and it'snever been harder to get noticed
than it is now. I mean, just youcome out and you say, hey.
(03:38):
I do this, and nobody cares. Soyou really need to resonate with
a small group of people. Youknow, you're a solopreneur. You
don't usually need a 100,000customers. I mean, maybe
somebody has a low cost productthat they wanna sell to a
100,000 people.
Great. But you still want aniche style. You wanna be able
to go in there and focus youroffering in a way that will
resonate.
Carly Ries (03:59):
And Joe, we talk about niching down from a
marketing standpoint. How isthis different? Like, we're
actually talking aboutpositioning and, what you offer
as opposed to the messaging thatyou get out there from a niching
down standpoint.
Joe Rando (04:13):
I think they're completely related. I don't
think there's any realdifference other than what
you're doing. And it kindastarts with the business, and
that informs the marketing. But,the issue comes down to the fact
that people are afraid to limittheir offering because they feel
like they'll lose business, andit's obviously the opposite.
(04:33):
Because if you're a generalist,let's say, you're a life coach
or you're a web developer, youknow, you develop websites for
people. If you're just a lifecoach or a website developer,
you're a generalist. Right? Andbasically, it's hard to stand
out. You're not gonna getpremium rates because you're
(04:55):
just, like everybody else thatdoes websites or coaches people
in their life. you don't haveanything special, so your rates
are gonna be kinda industrystandard right down the middle.
And so if you're a specialist,if you come in with something,
unique, an offering for a smallgroup of people that's really
unique to them, you stand out.You can charge more because
(05:18):
you're solving specific problemsfor specific people that are
gonna want you versus all theother people out there being
generalists. And you don't haveto market everywhere either.
You usually can figure out whereyou wanna show up. So it can
help your marketing be easierand less expensive. So those
kinds of things are a reason tofocus down. But again, the
(05:39):
business positioning informs allthe communications. So to answer
your question, I think that'sthe relationship here. that's my
take on it at least.
Carly Ries (05:50):
Yeah. I mean, nothing makes me hit my head
against the table harder thanwhen people say, well, my
product and service are good foranybody.
Joe Rando (05:56):
Right. And like, they might be.
Carly Ries (05:58):
They might be. But that doesn't mean you should
create it to be.
Joe Rando (06:02):
Right. You can always expand, You niche down, and over
time, it grows. I mean, thinkabout, one of my favorite
companies, HubSpot.
When they first started, theywere just about inbound
marketing. That's all they weretalking about. Inbound
marketing, it was all aboutmarketing. It was all about
creating content, blogs, andgetting people to subscribe and,
(06:24):
collecting email addresses andlanding pages, but it was all
about inbound marketing. Well,if you look at HubSpot today,
you wouldn't even recognize it.I mean, the only inbound I hear
about most of the time is thename of the conference. Right?
They have the inboundconference, but everything's
about, service and sales andother kinds of marketing and
video and AI. And so theyexpanded over time, and I think
(06:47):
solopreneurs can do the samething. But starting with a niche
is the difference betweengetting ignored and getting
noticed.
Carly Ries (06:55):
Any other helpful tips you think for this episode?
Joe Rando (06:59):
I have a bunch. So first, I think where do I start?
Where I'm gonna niche down abit. Where do I start? Well,
start with who do you like towork with?
You know, what kind of people doyou like to work with? And then
think about, what kinds ofproblems that you can solve for
them. You know, think aboutspecific pain points. And then
(07:21):
where do you have credibility?So if you can find something
that you like to do and aproblem that you can solve
really well for people to havethat problem and that you're
credible in, it gets a loteasier. So that's one way to
think about it. It's not theonly way to niche down, but it's
really a good way to think aboutit to start at least. But, in
general terms, I mean, you canniche down in a lot of different
(07:41):
ways. You can niche down byindustry. you can say, I'm an HR
consultant, but I only work forthe hospitality industry. Right?
So now anybody in hospitalitylooking for an HR consultant
goes, oh, they get what I'mdoing. and it helps if you used
to be an HR person in ahospitality company. So those
(08:01):
kinds of things are great. Youcan focus on the audience. You
know, we talk about personas.
And that's something we'vetalked about in the show a lot
in the past. And finding, youknow, the people that you serve
and coming with a persona. So ifyou have that persona, you can
make sure that you focus whatyou're doing and what you're
offering on that persona'sneeds. And, speaking to them and
(08:25):
going back to the marketing sideof this niching down, speaking
their language, speaking tothem, talking about their
problems, and what they need,and what they want. the pain
point, I mentioned already, ifyou can focus in on a pain point
that people have, that can be areally great way. you might say,
I'm a life coach for, men over50. Well, that's good. But if
(08:48):
I'm a life coach for men over 50that have sold their business
and now don't wanna spend therest of their life golfing, you
know, looking for some next act,that's better. Right?
So somebody that sold theirbusiness and they're 57 years
old and they're like, ugh, Ijust can't think about not doing
something else. Wow. you'respeaking their language. They're
(09:09):
gonna reach out. Some peoplefocus on things like platforms
or tools or ecosystems. you canbecome a HubSpot expert, or
Kajabi or Mailch whatever. Youknow, you can focus in using
platforms, and you can helpother businesses by focusing on
the stage. You know, if you helpstartups or you help, certain
(09:31):
kinds of, businesses that arestruggling and using multiple
dimensions that I've just walkedthrough can be really powerful.
So you could say, I work forhospitality companies as an HR
consultant when those companieshave just made an acquisition.
(09:51):
So that you've got the industry,you've got the stage of
business. So combining two andthree of these are really great
ways to focus your offer suchthat whoever whenever you get
that person or company thatreally, needs what you're
talking about, they listeninstead of just clicking to the
next thing.
Carly Ries (10:11):
Yeah. Joe, you're just skimming the surface of
everything that we talk about inour book. The one thing I wanna
say is whether it's in ourpodcast, whether it's in
community, whether it's in ourbook, we talk about pain points
over and over again. And we knowwe're not inventing that idea.
Everybody, marketers, successfulbusiness owners, it's not so
(10:32):
secret that we all know thatpain points are key to a
successful business.
We have to say it over and overand over again because no matter
how many times we say it, nomatter how many times we write
it, it doesn't always stick. Soif you've heard us talk about
this before, you will hear ustalk about this again and again
and again and again to get it inyour minds as a solo business
(10:55):
owner. But yeah, Joe, this iskind of the carrot. If you
wanted to know more about this,more about running a business,
and iterating, and everything,check out our book, Solopreneur
Business for Dummies. It isreleasing on 10/06/2025, and
we're so excited about that.
But for now, don't forget toleave that five star review,
(11:15):
subscribe to this podcast onyour favorite platform, and
share this episode with afriend, and we'll see you next
time on The AspiringSolopreneur. You may be going
solo in business, but thatdoesn't mean you're alone. In
fact, millions of people are inyour shoes, running a one person
business and figuring it out asthey go. So why not connect with
them and learn from each other'ssuccesses and failures? At
(11:38):
LifeStarr, we're creating a oneperson business community where
you can go to meet and getadvice from other solopreneurs.
Be sure to join in on theconversations at
community.lifestarr.com.
Ever feel like your business is for everyone, only
(00:03):
to realize that that means noone is really paying attention?
In this short episode of TheAspiring Solopreneur, Joe and I
continue our series on thesolopreneur success cycle and
break down the critical step ofpositioning your business so
that it actually gets noticed.From avoiding the generalist
trapped to zeroing in on thepeople you most want to serve,
we share why niching down is thesecret to standing out, charging
(00:25):
more, and making marketingeasier. If you've ever said, my
product is good for anybody,this one's especially for you.
You're listening to the AspiringSolopreneur, the podcast for
anyone on the solo businessjourney, whether you're just
toying with the idea, takingyour first bold step, or have
been running your own show foryears and want to keep growing,
(00:45):
refining, and thriving.
I'm Carly Ries, and along withmy cohost, Joe Rando, we're your
guides through the crazy butawesome world of being a company
of one. As part of LifeStarr, adigital hub dedicated to all
things solopreneurship, we helppeople design businesses that
align with their life'sambitions so they can work to
live, not live to work. Ifyou're looking for a get rich
(01:07):
quick scheme, this is not theplace for you. But if you want
real world insights fromindustry experts, lessons from
the successes and stumbles offellow solopreneurs, and
practical strategies forbuilding and sustaining a
business you love, you're in theright spot. Because flying solo
in business doesn't mean you'realone.
No matter where you are in yourjourney, we've got your back.
(01:28):
Joe, because of our book comingout in October 2025, or if
you're listening to this after,it is already out. We are
covering this entrepreneursuccess cycle. We're having a
series of these because that'smore or less what our book is
about. We've had this idea sincewhat?
2022 is when we came up with thesuccess cycle?
Joe Rando (01:48):
I think late twenty two or middle '22. Yeah.
Carly Ries (01:51):
Because I was out for maternity when you're this,
brainchild of yours came to be.
Joe Rando (01:55):
Both gave birth.
Carly Ries (01:57):
We did. We did. Just different ways. You didn't get
to take the time off that I did.But we've been going through, I
think, gosh, this is maybe ourseventh episode in this series.
And I think today, we're stillin the planning phase of the
success cycle. So listeners, ifyou haven't listened to the
other six episodes before this,we definitely recommend checking
those out so you can hear allthese sequentially. But this
(02:19):
will still be a good episoderegardless.
Joe Rando (02:21):
And they're short.
Carly Ries (02:22):
They're short. Yes
Joe Rando (02:23):
Yeah. They're not the long ones with the interviews.
They're like seven, eightminutes, I think, usually.
Carly Ries (02:28):
Yeah. And that's what we're gonna do here as
well. In this episode, we'lltry. We're gonna talk about
positioning your business andproduct in the market. So, Joe,
when people are thinking aboutthis, where should they start?
I feel like this might even besomething that people don't
think through that much whenthey're developing their
business. They just have a onetrack mind to get it out there.
(02:50):
But position positioning ishuge.
Joe Rando (02:53):
I mean, it's always been important, but in recent
times, it's really, really huge.It can make the difference
between failure and success. Andwhat we mean by positioning is
simply put, it's really nichingdown in certain dimensions. It's
really focusing your offer,focusing what you do and who you
(03:14):
do it for, to the point where arelatively small number of
people are going to feel likeyou made it just for them. And
the reason to do that is becauseotherwise, nobody notices you.
And it's worse now than it was.You know, I've been starting
businesses for decades, and it'snever been harder to get noticed
than it is now. I mean, just youcome out and you say, hey.
(03:38):
I do this, and nobody cares. Soyou really need to resonate with
a small group of people. Youknow, you're a solopreneur. You
don't usually need a 100,000customers. I mean, maybe
somebody has a low cost productthat they wanna sell to a
100,000 people.
Great. But you still want aniche style. You wanna be able
to go in there and focus youroffering in a way that will
resonate.
Carly Ries (03:59):
And Joe, we talk about niching down from a
marketing standpoint. How isthis different? Like, we're
actually talking aboutpositioning and, what you offer
as opposed to the messaging thatyou get out there from a niching
down standpoint.
Joe Rando (04:13):
I think they're completely related. I don't
think there's any realdifference other than what
you're doing. And it kindastarts with the business, and
that informs the marketing. But,the issue comes down to the fact
that people are afraid to limittheir offering because they feel
like they'll lose business, andit's obviously the opposite.
(04:33):
Because if you're a generalist,let's say, you're a life coach
or you're a web developer, youknow, you develop websites for
people. If you're just a lifecoach or a website developer,
you're a generalist. Right? Andbasically, it's hard to stand
out. You're not gonna getpremium rates because you're
(04:55):
just, like everybody else thatdoes websites or coaches people
in their life. you don't haveanything special, so your rates
are gonna be kinda industrystandard right down the middle.
And so if you're a specialist,if you come in with something,
unique, an offering for a smallgroup of people that's really
unique to them, you stand out.You can charge more because
(05:18):
you're solving specific problemsfor specific people that are
gonna want you versus all theother people out there being
generalists. And you don't haveto market everywhere either.
You usually can figure out whereyou wanna show up. So it can
help your marketing be easierand less expensive. So those
kinds of things are a reason tofocus down. But again, the
(05:39):
business positioning informs allthe communications. So to answer
your question, I think that'sthe relationship here. that's my
take on it at least.
Carly Ries (05:50):
Yeah. I mean, nothing makes me hit my head
against the table harder thanwhen people say, well, my
product and service are good foranybody.
Joe Rando (05:56):
Right. And like, they might be.
Carly Ries (05:58):
They might be. But that doesn't mean you should
create it to be.
Joe Rando (06:02):
Right. You can always expand, You niche down, and over
time, it grows. I mean, thinkabout, one of my favorite
companies, HubSpot.
When they first started, theywere just about inbound
marketing. That's all they weretalking about. Inbound
marketing, it was all aboutmarketing. It was all about
creating content, blogs, andgetting people to subscribe and,
(06:24):
collecting email addresses andlanding pages, but it was all
about inbound marketing. Well,if you look at HubSpot today,
you wouldn't even recognize it.I mean, the only inbound I hear
about most of the time is thename of the conference. Right?
They have the inboundconference, but everything's
about, service and sales andother kinds of marketing and
video and AI. And so theyexpanded over time, and I think
(06:47):
solopreneurs can do the samething. But starting with a niche
is the difference betweengetting ignored and getting
noticed.
Carly Ries (06:55):
Any other helpful tips you think for this episode?
Joe Rando (06:59):
I have a bunch. So first, I think where do I start?
Where I'm gonna niche down abit. Where do I start? Well,
start with who do you like towork with?
You know, what kind of people doyou like to work with? And then
think about, what kinds ofproblems that you can solve for
them. You know, think aboutspecific pain points. And then
(07:21):
where do you have credibility?So if you can find something
that you like to do and aproblem that you can solve
really well for people to havethat problem and that you're
credible in, it gets a loteasier. So that's one way to
think about it. It's not theonly way to niche down, but it's
really a good way to think aboutit to start at least. But, in
general terms, I mean, you canniche down in a lot of different
(07:41):
ways. You can niche down byindustry. you can say, I'm an HR
consultant, but I only work forthe hospitality industry. Right?
So now anybody in hospitalitylooking for an HR consultant
goes, oh, they get what I'mdoing. and it helps if you used
to be an HR person in ahospitality company. So those
(08:01):
kinds of things are great. Youcan focus on the audience. You
know, we talk about personas.
And that's something we'vetalked about in the show a lot
in the past. And finding, youknow, the people that you serve
and coming with a persona. So ifyou have that persona, you can
make sure that you focus whatyou're doing and what you're
offering on that persona'sneeds. And, speaking to them and
(08:25):
going back to the marketing sideof this niching down, speaking
their language, speaking tothem, talking about their
problems, and what they need,and what they want. the pain
point, I mentioned already, ifyou can focus in on a pain point
that people have, that can be areally great way. you might say,
I'm a life coach for, men over50. Well, that's good. But if
(08:48):
I'm a life coach for men over 50that have sold their business
and now don't wanna spend therest of their life golfing, you
know, looking for some next act,that's better. Right?
So somebody that sold theirbusiness and they're 57 years
old and they're like, ugh, Ijust can't think about not doing
something else. Wow. you'respeaking their language. They're
(09:09):
gonna reach out. Some peoplefocus on things like platforms
or tools or ecosystems. you canbecome a HubSpot expert, or
Kajabi or Mailch whatever. Youknow, you can focus in using
platforms, and you can helpother businesses by focusing on
the stage. You know, if you helpstartups or you help, certain
(09:31):
kinds of, businesses that arestruggling and using multiple
dimensions that I've just walkedthrough can be really powerful.
So you could say, I work forhospitality companies as an HR
consultant when those companieshave just made an acquisition.
(09:51):
So that you've got the industry,you've got the stage of
business. So combining two andthree of these are really great
ways to focus your offer suchthat whoever whenever you get
that person or company thatreally, needs what you're
talking about, they listeninstead of just clicking to the
next thing.
Carly Ries (10:11):
Yeah. Joe, you're just skimming the surface of
everything that we talk about inour book. The one thing I wanna
say is whether it's in ourpodcast, whether it's in
community, whether it's in ourbook, we talk about pain points
over and over again. And we knowwe're not inventing that idea.
Everybody, marketers, successfulbusiness owners, it's not so
(10:32):
secret that we all know thatpain points are key to a
successful business.
We have to say it over and overand over again because no matter
how many times we say it, nomatter how many times we write
it, it doesn't always stick. Soif you've heard us talk about
this before, you will hear ustalk about this again and again
and again and again to get it inyour minds as a solo business
(10:55):
owner. But yeah, Joe, this iskind of the carrot. If you
wanted to know more about this,more about running a business,
and iterating, and everything,check out our book, Solopreneur
Business for Dummies. It isreleasing on 10/06/2025, and
we're so excited about that.
But for now, don't forget toleave that five star review,
(11:15):
subscribe to this podcast onyour favorite platform, and
share this episode with afriend, and we'll see you next
time on The AspiringSolopreneur. You may be going
solo in business, but thatdoesn't mean you're alone. In
fact, millions of people are inyour shoes, running a one person
business and figuring it out asthey go. So why not connect with
them and learn from each other'ssuccesses and failures? At
(11:38):
LifeStarr, we're creating a oneperson business community where
you can go to meet and getadvice from other solopreneurs.
Be sure to join in on theconversations at
community.lifestarr.com.
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