How to Innovate in a Saturated Niche?

Many people who want to create or sell online courses have lots of questions when it’s time to choose a topic because they’re afraid of investing in a saturated niche, in which it’s harder to innovate.

It’s true that, at a first glance, most areas seem to have already been explored. However, you need to know, once and for all, that there are some voids that still need to be filled.

And that’s why we’ve written this post. Here, we’ll give you 9 tips that will show you how to innovate and find good opportunities to be an entrepreneur in your market and in your area of expertise!

In this post, you’ll read how to:

Good reading!

1. Understand your role in your area of expertise

Before you can even think if your niche is saturated or not, the first step you need to take is choosing your niche. And, to help you do this, we’ve written a post with 7 tips to choose a market niche for your business.

After you have a clear view of your area of expertise, you need to understand your role in that market.

Who are you in your market?

Are you the person who gives tips and recommend products/services like a friend? Or are you the one who can teach and is always willing to educate your audience to find the solutions?

Regardless of what your profile is, it’s important that you know exactly who you are and the image you want to convey to your audience. So, even if the niche looks saturated, you’ll be able to stand out by innovating in what you do best.

2. How to innovate and do something different

It doesn’t matter the market you’re thinking to tackle, it’s always good to keep in mind that even a saturated niche can hide business opportunities that are passing by unnoticed.

A good example of this is private transportation services in big cities. For a long time, one of the only options people had to go from one place to another without using public transportation were taxis. With it, the prices charged by drivers were extremely high. However, in 2009, an American app called Uber was created aiming to make private transportation services available.

Uber got to know how to innovate in a saturated niche because it was different. The idea of the app, to have more people working on their own and making a cheaper transportation available, innovated the private transportation market.

After Uber, many people believed that there was no way to innovate in this market. However, what we see today is that it was possible to create new ways to use private transportation by being different. Currently, there are other apps providing the same service, such as Lyft and Curb.

What these companies have been doing is finding ways to supply demands that their competitors have failed to meet. Each of them, in different ways, can hold themselves in a niche that seemed to be saturated.

And have taxis ceased to exist when faced with these innovations? You already noticed that the answer is no. What they’ve been doing, like we’ve said before, is to provide a differentiated service to charm the audience.

So, don’t be afraid to think “outside the box”. Remember to charm your niche with innovation and always show them what makes you different.

3. Look for micro niches

Do you know what micro niches are?

In a determined area of expertise, there are specifications called micro niches. (To understand more about this topic, take advantage to read our post “What is a micro niche and how can you find yours?”)

Basically, what you need to do is find a segment within your saturated niche that hasn’t been very explored yet.

For example:

You understand a lot about the makeup market, but you also know that, nowadays, this is a market that has been very explored. Before you give up creating a product/service for this niche, why don’t you try being more specific?

You can start by searching on search engine mechanisms (like Google) and type “makeup for” on the search bar. You’ll notice that as soon as you type it, the search engine will give you options to complete your search, such as “makeup for you”, “makeup forever”, “makeup for hooded eyes”, and “makeup for work”.

These are some ideas of more specific niches. But, in order for your product/service to reach a more assertive audience, you can think of micro niches such as “romantic makeup for dark skin”.

The more specific you are, the smaller your audience will be, but it is likely that they engage better and really make purchases, once you’ll be solving your buyer persona’s pain spot on. (If you don’t know what a buyer persona is yet, we have this text that will explain the concept and help you create yours).

VIDEO: How to choose your market niche? | Hotmart Tips

4. Keep yourself updated

Getting into a well-explored market with well-known brands is a challenge for anyone, but cheer up! The sole fact of your business not being well-known does not mean that you’re not an expert on the topic. And the best way to establish your authority in a topic is by studying and keeping yourself updated.

Every time new opportunities or different topics in your area of expertise come up, be interested in learning more. If you are updated and know everything there is to know about your niche, it is likely that you’ll stand out among your competitors for being the best in what you do.

There is no such thing as too much studying. On the contrary, the more knowledge you have, the more opportunities and ideas will appear in your path to innovate in a saturated niche.

5. How to innovate and be yourself

A great problem most people who enter an already very explored market face is that they try to “mimic” what the experts in these niches are doing. Of course, you can look to great brands and people in the market to get inspired and to understand what they do. However, the problem arises when you try to copy them.

It is not interesting that you talk about something that is constantly advertised. It’s important to research about your competitors so you can notice what has already been done and think of ways to approach that subject differently.

As we’ve said in the second topic, being different is essential to innovate in a saturated niche. So, doing more of the same is not how you reach a big audience.

You need to be authentic, be true to yourself. Create content that looks just like you while solving the problems your audience faces.

Every time you show your audience that what you do has your touch, people empathize with you. By recognizing your product/service is authentic, people become more trustworthy regarding your brand.

6. Extend the concept of “innovation”

When we think of the word “innovation” and “how to innovate“, the first that comes to our minds is “create something new from scratch”. If you also think like we do, you should know that’s not exactly what you need to do.

Of course, it would be wonderful to have a completely original idea, something that nobody has ever thought before. But innovating isn’t just that.

There are many ways to be different in a saturated niche. For example, you can change the payment method of your product/service, improve customer support, offer a bonus to consumers, extend your business model, and many other options.

You need to understand that innovation isn’t only having a brilliant idea, then you can see your business in a different light. This can be what sets you apart in a saturated niche.

7. Come up with short, medium, and long-term plans

Many times, we believe the changes that need to be made in a saturated niche will only be successful if they are major and take a long time to complete. However, small adjustments can make all the difference in a saturated niche, especially in the digital market, that is always being updated.

Don’t underestimate innovation that can be completed in days, weeks, or even a few months. Regardless of the time it takes to complete what you believe is an innovation, it’s always important to test.

Start thinking about how you can solve some small troubles that would improve your business now and stop focusing only on possible trends that may or may not come up in 5 or 10 years.

8. Notice the flaws in your niche

Nowadays, people get information faster and in practical ways. That’s why they’re growing more demanding. Currently, customers usually do a lot of research. And, if you’re an entrepreneur in the digital market, this is even more noticeable.

Most people want to be educated about the possible solutions for their problems, and this makes them understand better about the advances in the market. So, always think about the quality you offer your customers.

When someone decides to make a purchase, it is very likely that this person already has enough knowledge about what they are buying. And this is the moment when they realize the flaws in the products/services she desires.

In a saturated niche, this is a great way to innovate. Because in the flaws and needs we can find other sources to set us apart in our market.

9. Focus on your persona

The last tip we have to help you on how to innovate in a saturated niche concerns your buyer persona.

As you’ve seen in tip 3, buyer personas are essential to choose a micro niche and create specific products/services for a smaller but more engaged audience who looks for a determined solution. That’s why to be innovative, you always need to focus on your buyer persona.

When you know the right profile of your client, you can think of strategies on how to innovate that suit their needs. This happens because you understand who your audience is, you know their values and pains, and you also understand their consumer pattern, and what they are looking for.

Tip 9 complements 8: knowing your buyer persona very well makes you think of innovative solutions for small problems that haven’t been solved yet in a saturated niche

VIDEO: How to create a buyer persona for your business | Hotmart Tips

Finally: see beyond your reach

If you got this far, you’ve noticed that even if your niche is saturated, finding ways to innovate and get ahead of your competitors is possible.

Like we’ve said, you don’t need to have an extraordinary idea and do something never seen before. Start little by little, with small changes and actions that add value to the customer’s experience with your brand. Try to reinvent a format that is very used in your niche, test new sales models, improve the interface among your business and possible buyers.

When we think of innovation there is no right or wrong. The important is to try something different from what’s being done and test to see how people respond.

What you need now is to identify new opportunities in your niche and go above and beyond, shake things up and see beyond what you already see.

Do you have any suggestions about how to innovate in a saturated niche? Leave your tips in the comments and take advantage to share this post on your social media.