How to find your niche as a writer

Finding your niche is a crucial step when you’re building your freelance writing business. Even if you feel that you could write about anything, I highly recommend that you zero in on a particular industry and focus your portfolio-building and client-hunting efforts on that niche.

Doing so enables you to write faster, because the more you know about a particular topic, the less research you have to do. You’ll be able to get yourself up to speed faster and produce content more efficiently.

Focusing on a particular niche can also help you build a leaner and more attractive portfolio. Think of it this way: If you’re a real estate company looking for a writer, would you go for the writer who has a few, but high-quality samples that are all about real estate? Or would you hire the one who has samples about real estate, and science, and yoga, and music? My guess is you’d go for the writer who’s more focused on your field.

Now that we’ve discussed the benefits of having a niche, here are a few ways on how you can find yours:

1. Write about what you love – That sounds trite, but it works. What subjects are you passionate about? What topics do you follow? What are your hobbies?  Find the answers to those questions, pick the one you love the most and start writing.

2. Leverage your education and work experience – You can also put your major or day job experience into good use.

For instance, let’s say you used to work for a clothing retailer and you learned a lot about how to arrange products or how to attract customers into a store. You can leverage your knowledge to produce content-such  as retail guides, blog posts etc-and submit them to companies or websites for retailers.

Or, since you know a lot about enticing people into a store, why not use your expertise to create advertising or marketing collateral for other retailers?

Also remember: You don’t have to marry one niche forever. In fact, it’s best to specialize in a handful of subjects, in case your industry slows down.

I know I go on and on about finding your specialty and all that, but don’t get me wrong here. This isn’t to say that you should focus solely on one single topic for the rest of your career. However, I am suggesting that you *start* with one. When you’ve got the covered, feel free to switch industries and expand your expertise.

Image: Mike “Dakinewavamon” Kline on Flickr