I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the concept of finding, or rather choosing, your niche.

I’m not sold.

As many times as I have tried this old standby for business success, it sets you up for a short lifespan for your business or career when you forcibly select a niche for your business.

When we’re told to choose or find our niche, we naturally avoid the work that dearly matters to us. We instead try to find the option that will pay off the soonest, the option that has the most “market potential”.

When we pursue an idea or business venture solely on the financial potential, we are doomed to fail or wallow in the misery of work that doesn’t fulfill us.

If we look beyond finding our niche, we open ourselves up to the possibility of focusing on doing work that matters. Not work that matters to someone else, work that matters to you. 

You can sell widgets for days and if you are solely motivated by money, fine. Get on with your bad self. I don’t think this lasts for many people. Eventually, we all get that itch to do something bigger, to do something that really fires us up.

The other option is letting your niche find you.

This means doing your work publicly, and letting the people that resonate with it stumble upon you and say ” oh hey, finally someone who says the things I am thinking in a way that rings true with me”.

This is not about just finding your niche or your tribe, this is about letting your people find you. There are billions of people connected out there now via the interwebs. Your people are out there. Give them a chance to get to know you by openly sharing your thoughts and ideas. Be yourself!

It’s a scary thing because as you do your work in public and open yourself to criticism and feedback, you have to face that this might not work. 

Maybe your people won’t find you, or maybe your ideas are so obscure, there isn’t enough of a market.

That’s ok.

A true entrepreneur risks testing out the ideas that might not work and leans into the things that fire them up to see what does.

You can pursue your crazy ideas in this new, crazy digital economy and your tribe will find you. We are more connected than ever and geography is not an excuse to not find the people that resonate with your ideas.

This is why you don’t choose or find your niche. You just say “this is what I do”. There ya go, you have a niche. Don’t try to be something to everyone, or something to someone you aren’t, just be you and share it. Let the freaks that wave the same flag find you. All it takes is to start waving it.

Is there something you are trying to get out into the world, but you are scared it might not work? What would it feel like to find 10, 20, or 100 people who resonate and feel the same way as you? You will never know until you start putting your work out in public and let yourself be discoverable by the people who agree that the work that matters to you, matters.