Niching isn't restricting you, it's making you stand out and saving your sanity…
Whilst narrowing your business to focus on designing for a very specific group of clients seems scary, it’s the solution to gaining confidence and avoiding burnout in your freelance fashion and surface pattern business. After consulting with 30+ brands, working with 100+ buyers and managing over 40+ freelance designers, you could say I have been around the freelance block. I used to think all I needed was a great portfolio of high calibre clients and a beautiful website. I spent years as a stressed out freelance designer relying on referrals until I discovered how to build a future proof niche, craft a unique marketing message and attract the clients I desired.
Why should you niche your freelance fashion design business?
When there’s only one of you in your business you are constantly swapping and changing from one type of creative work to another, often taking on briefs that you really don’t want to work on. Simply put, if you have a niche you are well known for something in your industry. You know exactly who your target client is, you are able to find them easily and communicate your brand as an industry leader. You know what you help your client with and how you help them.
When you have a niche you have clarity in your freelance fashion and surface pattern business; instead of spending days pouring over every catwalk trend, you now know specifically which handful of inspiration serves you and when you go inspirational shopping you whizz round feeling wonderfully smug that you have exactly what your clients need.
Everyone knows exactly where your expertise lies, referrals are easy and clients look to you as the expert. You feel confident, happy and wonder why the hell you didn’t do this years ago!
Here are 3 ways to look at niching.
If you are a baby print designer, focus on unisex design in one specific age group for modern brands. Use your unique viewpoint and show how unisex print and colour is the future of sustainability and cost effective range building. Be the go to print designer for not only best selling prints but unique trend resources.
Niche by your unique style, for example ‘feminine vintage geometric patterns’ and become the absolute expert in the industry; talk about which pantone shade of vintage pink works best for baby layette, teen girls and ladieswear and which vintage era is always the out and out winner for women’s nightwear.
Maybe you are the only designer that supports founders to manufacture complex multi-functioning products. You have left designing behind, yet use your knowledge to help visionary sportsmen and women bring concepts to life using artificial intelligence, sustainable factory sourcing and a proven development process you have honed over your 30 year experience in lifestyle clothing design.
How do you niche your freelance design business?
The first step is to understand what your niche needs to give you financially; are you the breadwinner or is your business a part-time secondary income? The more specific the niche and the bigger problem you solve, the more you can charge for your services and the less clients you will need to find each year.
Future proofing your niche is also important. For example, fashion footwear is impacted by the economy more than casual schoolwear styles and babies grow out of clothes fast, so this part of the industry is more recession proof than say toddler fashion.
When you know this information, begin to unpick your experience and understand what reoccurring problems you see and how the industry tries to solve those problems. In your experience what works, and what doesn’t? Why? How does your expertise, point of view and design process solve these problems?
Now you have the components so that you can begin marketing your freelance fashion and surface pattern business. You know the problems and you have a unique way to address these problems. You are the only person that can solve the problems of a specific area in your industry and an expert that clients will want to work with.
What if your mind is still telling you not to niche?
It’s understandable to feel doubtful. You have been working this ‘jack of all trades’ way for so long it’s likely you can’t see how narrowing down can help you get more clients. Scientifically speaking, your mind has been building neural pathways that are so strong you just can’t think of any other way. A niche feels counterintuitive; you are insanely talented you can design anything, so why would you focus on a tiny area for your freelance fashion and surface pattern business?
Niching is a proven marketing tool and makes you an expert in your field. It means you are the go-to person, and I have experienced this myself when booking freelance designers worldwide. The “good at everything” designers were great, and there were a lot for me to choose from. Yet the specialist always got the work in that chosen niche, and was paid up to 50% higher than the rest.
Try looking at a niche business in a different service industry. For example, imagine choosing a dog trainer. You can go to a generalist charging £45 per hour and there’s quite a few of them. Your labradoodle is driving you nuts, and has been for ages, you’ve tried everything to get him to recall promptly and it’s stressing you out. Then one day you find a dog trainer that specialises in recall training for labradoodles. They charge £90 an hour and have a proven system; they have great testimonials specifically solving the exact problem you have. That trainer needs 50% of the clients to earn the same money as the generalist dog trainer. Who do you choose?
