Ask HN: How did you discover your niche?

[wlfsbrg]

How did you arrive at your target audience for your product/service/idea? Did you stumble across them or was it carefully planned out and executed?

I'm in the research/discovery phase of finding a market to create a service for and I was curious about how you found your customers. Thanks!

[WillyF]

I was a recent college grad who was struggling with the job search process. I wasn't finding many companies that I was excited about working for, so I started thinking about how I could make the process better for people like me. A failed job search evolved into my now somewhat successful (paying all my living expenses and growing) startup.

[mapster]

I stopped trying to 'come up with ideas' and put on a pair of opportunity glasses. So now I look for opportunities, whereby I measure them, re-measure, talk with people in the field, re-measure and am now building a service I am pretty confidant I can turn profitable. My four steps for a start-up:

1. Measure a Demand a. Ask people b. Do a Poll 2. Build the Product or Service a. Do you have the right vision to do the work or coordinate it in the best way? 3. Market and Sell 4. Provide great customer service

Each step is incredibly difficult and requires a lot of luck and work. But I am in this for the long-term.

[cme]

I found my niche by solving my own pains. Think about something thats a pain in your life, then think about if it could be solved with a simple app, would you pay for the solution you are thinking about? would others? chances are people out there also have that issue and might pay.

do a little research, build something and get feedback, you'll pry find your niche going through that simple process

[tjmaxal]

Tell us a little bit more about where you are starting from. This is a pretty vague question and a lot of the answer depends on what you are aiming for. Are you trying to start a company or are you just trying to find an application for a new technology?

[revorad]

I launched with a fairly broad product and a number of target user types in mind. Over time, I've refined my product to match the most responsive user types and their needs.