2 builders who never spoke to each other

Pick a niche small enough to list completely

Narrow until you could name every player by searching and following links, then work that list to exhaustion. Tight positioning makes most visitors disqualify themselves quickly, which is the point, and when the niche is used up you step sideways rather than jumping at the mainstream.

The method

1. 01

   Narrow the target niche until you could actually enumerate every player in it with searches and link-following.

2. 02

   Start from a niche where you already have one to three customers and list everyone like them: who those customers follow on social is a good seed list.

3. 03

   After you dominate a tiny niche, step sideways into the adjacent one rather than jumping straight at the mainstream market.

4. 04

   Do not abandon a market when it starts working: assume almost nobody in it has heard of you yet.

5. 05

   Treat fast self-disqualification as the point of narrow positioning, not a cost of it, because it removes the discovery calls that were never going to close.

What it returned

• 1

  1-3 existing customers as the starting point

• 5%

  He estimates only 5% of professional bloggers know ConvertKit exists

• Not bloggers, not recipe blogs, but paleo recipe blogs run by women

• The ladder ran from interval training blogs to running, then powerlifting, then across to diet and recipe blogs; Ryan Delk built Gumroad's traction in the music industry until introductions came to him

Sources

• Being vague is costing you moneyJustin Welsh · justinwelsh.me · The Power of Specificity · 2025-01-11
• How the "Rule of One" led to a $4,985 monthJustin Welsh · justinwelsh.me · How to Implement This for Yourself · 2024-11-09
• Direct Sales for Bootstrapped SaaS Startups: from $1,300 to $725,000 MRRNathan Barry · nathanbarry.com · Prospecting · 2017-07-06