Monetization Playbook #44–Micro Niche aka Personal Monopoly
How do you build a personal monopoly?
You must first find a problem—a problem you can solve. And solve better than anyone else.
Creating a monopoly is a big ask.
Even the biggest of the big – Google, Facebook, et al. claim not to be monopolies.
Really! Yes.
And Netflix? Dominant–yes. But a monopoly–no. The 95 million new Disney subscribers in a little over a year confirm that.
For a new business to succeed–there must be unmet needs—ideally, unmet needs for a particular category or customer segment.
This unmet need must only be solvable by a very few. One of which is you. If only a few can reasonably solve this problem, it is fair to label them as 'experts.'
But an expert serving an unmet need does not a personal monopoly make.
Most people have an initially unmet need for coffee in the morning. Expert baristas meet this need. So these experts would more readily ascribe their artistry as a skill rather than a personal monopoly.
In addition to the expertise requirement–we need to add in another two factors–lower competition and strong demand.
Thus we now have some of the core criteria for establishing a personal monopoly:
identifiably unique skills
rationale as to why everybody else can't do what you do
a thesis on why your approach is disruptive or different
aimed at a market in demand that can afford to pay
clarity on what precisely the current problem is you solve identifiably unique approach
If you can nail all of these criteria–you'll be well on your way to a personal monopoly of your very own!