Even if you don’t quite know it, you can harness the full power of niche marketing as a blogger. Having your own niche has its distinct set of advantages that you might not even be fully aware of. Of course, everyone else has carped on it to the ends of the earth and you will likely have read it all, heard it all and seen it all before. But above all else, be very careful when considering your niche and going about catering to it. Being under-prepared and/or overconfident when playing to the gallery is a dangerous Molotov cocktail that is just waiting to blow up in your face.

But what if niche marketing doesn’t particularly inspire you? What if you don’t have a niche to speak of? And just how do you make a niche work for you, instead of having to work hard for it? For starters, your niche gives you a particular target and makes you focus on it as best as you can. Think of a thoroughbred at the races; putting a pair of blinkers on it makes the steed gives it all while galloping away towards the finish line with nothing but one prime directive in mind. That’s what niche marketing does for you. It chops away all of the deadwood and makes you do only one thing, but do it exceptionally well.

Just like a leggy supermodel on the cover of a magazine or a photo of a supercar adorning a cover tells you what is in store inside, your niche purpose tells your readers what to expect from you. And what is niche marketing for blogs, but simply the effort taken to tailor your blogs to your readers needs? Use the titles of your posts, the headers of your blog, the SEO keywords and the posts itself (of course!) to tell your readers what to expect. When someone lands on your page, they are there either because they have come directly while searching expressly for something or because a search engine has directed them there. Within a few seconds, if they don’t feel that they will get what they want, they will surf away (clicks fingers) just like that. And that’s something your blog can’t afford.

Here’s a quick question then; what if you have nothing to focus on, what if your blog is all over the place? What do you do then? If that is the case, localize your content. Make your content aimed at people living somewhere. People always (yes, always) turn to the internet for information on local happenings, news or information. So why not give the people what they want and localize your content? Your blog might be a great place, but without giving someone a reason to come on over, you will forever be walking down the road to nowhere. The chances are that if someone is talking about something, they will be searching for it on Google. And that opportunity is there for you to grab. Step up to the plate and knock it out of the park, hombre. This game’s there to be won.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been to a few rock concerts where the opening was just plain god-awful. There is no other way to describe. I can’t put my finger on it, but it was just no enjoyable in the slightest. I had come there to listen to a band and I was instead made to listen to something that just didn’t have any chutzpah whatsoever. I wondered what it was and then realized it; showmanship. That’s what this band didn’t have. They just turned up and seemed almost…mechanical. And this lack of energy and showmanship doesn’t just matter for bands, it matters for brands too. The best branding strategies always have a bit of showmanship about them. Razzle dazzle or whatever you want to call it.

That’s what separates A-list bloggers and businesses from the decent ones. You can spot those that go the extra mile and use those few special branding strategies to mesmerize their audience. It’s why these showmen achieve the success they do. Don’t be the opening act for the rock star and don’t hang up those boots and guitars. You can be the best showman there is and be amongst the dominant players in your niche. What is showmanship, after all, except the expression of an idea or message in flamboyant and entertaining terms to a wide audience? All it boils down to is the development of a style that sets you apart from everyone else, something distinctive and unique.

Take Lady Gaga for instance (no, it wasn’t her concert that I went to. I don’t even like her that much). Born as Stefani Germanotta (Lady Gaga is such a wonderful name for a showman though, don’t you think?), she is a gifted songwriter, vocalist and pianist. Just search for videos of her early years on Youtube if you don’t believe me. But she knew she had to be different to get noticed and make it big, and so Lady Gaga was born. Now that’s what I’m talking about. For years, there was no one in the pop or rock industry with that kind of pull or charisma. Queen is the last band I can think of in that regards, and it’s no surprise that Lady Gaga draws a lot of  her inspiration from a band that included one of the ultimate showmen in Freddie Mercury.

And Gaga achieved this while having near total mastery over her craft. Don’t mistake showmanship for gimmicks; showmen are the real deal and they know almost everything (or everything) there is to know about their trade. Where they excel however is in showcasing their talents where others don’t. I have no doubt there are more talented musicians than Gaga out there. But they will never be as successful as Gaga so long as they focus solely on their craft. They need to rebrand themselves, use branding strategies that set them apart. Only them will they have the audiences eating out of their hands. And the same rule applies to you as well.

You must have at some point or the other heard of viral marketing. But have you ever heard someone use the term article marketing? Think of it as content marketing done by businesses that use short articles to disseminate information about their respective industries. They achieve this by distributing and publishing this information in the marketplace so as to increase awareness of their work and what they do. And each of these articles will come complete with references and contacts for the business that has done this content marketing. It’s viral marketing in a much simpler, much more honest format if you ask me.

And if you’re not doing this, why aren’t you doing so already? Free content that is well written has great potential to increase the sales and credibility of a small business. I’m going to be brutally honest here and say that while there’s tons of free content out there on the internet, the main problem with it is that most of it is rubbish. So you can understand how quality content will stick out like a sore thumb (but in a good way of course). You might rightly feel that writing is not your strongest suite, but you don’t have to write anything at all. There are plenty of people out there that would be willing to ghost write for you for a fee.

Several forums allow you to set a budget and specify what is needed and accordingly you get responses from people that would be willing to do the job for you. And even if you don’t want to go online in search of writers, consider your hometown as a pool of talent as well. Talk to the college career department about the possibilities (an internship, a project based assignment, whatever) and you’d be surprised how students would be willing to do it for cheaper than most professional writers would. That’s because they are willing to write not just for the money it’ll pay, but because it is a requirement of their course and they get credits for doing so.

Once the article is written, your job isn’t finished yet. You must make sure that it goes viral by posting it on forums and boards that tie in with your target audience and linking it back to your blog or business website where it is located. You can even compile articles into an e-book and give it away for free (everyone loves free stuff) so long as it helps you get the hits rolling for your business. Good luck with your viral marketing ventures!

Back when I was a copywriter, I had some clients come up to and tell me what it was they wished for the brand to achieve and I listened to them patiently while they outlined things for me. Sometimes, I would have some of them come up to me and tell me that they want to improve the brand image but don’t want to resort to anything like marketing or selling. That’s because it makes them feel sleazy. And so cropped up the million dollar question; could you use some creative packaging to get our idea across without cheapening it?

I didn’t know what to say. Here were sensible folks that clearly needed to put their energies behind a marketing or branding campaign and yet they tell me instead to use “creative packaging”…what does that even mean? That I use not marketing, but something else that is equally sleazy to get the job done? Or is it that they do want marketing done without their name being attached to it? But then what’s the sense of that? It’s like a tree falling in a forest when no one can hear it. It’s an exercise in futility.

I didn’t know what to say to that, or if the question even merited a response. I had half a mind to laugh and ask the client in question if they were high or something of the sort. But suddenly within me an idea sparked and I smiled at the thought welling up inside me. I looked at the client and knew just what I had to say.

“You know what? I have just the idea for you”

“You do?”

“Indeed. Here’s what we’re going to do; instead of using a full-blown marketing campaign, which you clearly don’t want and which will cost a lot, we’ll just use creative communication and tell your customers how they stand to benefit from using your product. We’ll just talk to them, engage them, converse with them, put everything in context for them. How does that sound?”

For a few seconds, the client was asked and then simply asked whether I could do that. When I replied in the affirmative, we closed a deal pretty fast. But that right there was what creative packaging is all about. What is communicating but marketing in itself? Marketing is nothing more than the function of the message it has to place in the minds of its consumers, making them feel good about using it. And that’s what I told the client I would do for them. Sometimes, it seems to be that a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet. And you can use this creative packaging to sell almost anything to anyone.

Like this; instead of saying something is 25% off, I’ll just say you buy 3 items and get a fourth of your choice free. See what I did there? Now go have some fun and weave some magic of your own. But just don’t call it marketing, please.