A final way of getting a “wow” from your audience for your course is pinpoint precision.

In other words if they see your course as the absolute perfect fit for their very specific problem. The final piece in the jigsaw.

Here's the thing though. Every would-be marketing guru will repeat the standard advice that you need an ultra-specific niche. “An inch wide and a mile deep” is the mantra.

You want to be the perfect solution for someone, not the second best for everyone. But your common sense also tells you if you go too narrow you shrink your market.

In the real world you need to do both. You have to maximise the benefits of narrowing down but avoid reaching the point where you stop benefitting from it.

How do you find that point? Ask yourself 3 questions:

1. By focusing on this specific area, will customers feel the course will be better for them? Are there specific problems and challenges they face in this area that the course can focus on?
   
   For example, my guess is that lawyers would feel that because of their client relationships and legal restrictions, a marketing course for lawyers will be more useful to them than a more general one. On the other hand they probably wouldn't see any particular value in a course on Excel skills for lawyers.
   
2. By focusing on this specific area, will it reduce the amount of work you have to do creating or marketing the course?
   
   For example, a course on marketing for corporate lawyers could focus on relationship building with senior executives rather than on more general broad brush marketing and advertising – giving a major reduction in the amount of training material needed. And by marketing the course only to law firms with significant corporate law practices you can use more direct, high value approaches and avoid wasting time and money on more general marketing.
   
3. Do the increased attractiveness of the course and decreased amount of work needed to create it outweigh any reduction in market size?
   
   You have to think realistically here. If, for example, you do hybrid courses with a significant live component then you'll have limited capacity. So a decrease in potential market size from a million to half a million won't make any difference to you as both are exponentially bigger than you need. On the other hand, if you do low-cost self service courses then a big reduction in market size for a small increase in the attractiveness of the course might not be worth it.

At the end of the day, it's a judgement call and relies on your knowledge of your customers and course. But asking yourself those three questions means you'll be making an informed decision, not just picking a focus for your course because you hope everyone will buy it or just following generic advice to narrow down.

And the thought process you go through to make that decision will also help you make a better course.