The first time I tried to niche down, I felt like I was being peer-pressured into lopping off my own limbs just to fit inside a box labelled “Easier to Market”.
And the first time I filled out a customer persona worksheet?
I felt like a deranged marketing necromancer trying to summon a dream client from the depths using nothing but Pinterest boards, LinkedIn polls, and a splash of trauma baiting.
“She’s 36. Owns a wax melt side hustle. Cries during voice notes. Has a trauma and a podcast.”
Sure, she sounds lovely. Possibly someone’s dream client (if that’s your thing, who am I to judge?)
But me? Well, I’m all for raising an undead army—but imaginary clients? They’re not going to help fight off the giant spiders in Skyrim, are they?
I had to give her a name. A backstory. A morning routine.
Excuse me?
I don’t even have a morning routine beyond rolling out of bed and mainlining Yorkshire’s finest.
I’ll be damned if I’m inventing a fictional girlboss who has her life more together than I do.
It was like The Sims: Freelance Edition.
Except instead of building a cute tiny house and trapping my Sim in a doorless room (RIP), I was cobbling together a Frankenstein’s monster made of assumptions, marketing clichés, and recycled Facebook group drama.
(She’s still in there, by the way—just her, a houseplant, and the crushing weight of brand strategy.)
And then I was told to build my entire business around her.
Not my skills.
Not my joy.
Not the real people I’ve worked with and adored.
Nope. Glow-Up Gloria™ had her Pinterest vision board and a vague but aggressive sense of ‘empowerment’, and I was expected to shape my entire business to suit her fictional midlife glow-up?
Why Customer Personas Are Overrated (and Possibly Cursed)
Customer persona culture teaches us to:
- Invent fictional people based on surface-level trends and vibes.
- Anticipate their pain, shame, and buying triggers.
- Treat them like Rubik’s cubes with wallets.
- Build entire offers around imaginary baggage.
- Predict what they might object to (trick question its usually price)
- Drip-feed content until they’re too emotionally exhausted to resist.
It’s like writing a love letter to someone you’ve never met… then being confused when the people who actually read it feel a bit ghosted.
Here’s the truth:
I’ve never landed a dream client by guessing their Enneagram type or nailing their trauma in a funnel.
I’ve booked them because they read my site and went:
“Oh shit. This person gets me.”
That doesn’t come from avatars.
It comes from truth.
It comes from being so wildly, unmistakably yourself that your content starts screaming across the internet like a feral bat signal—and the right weirdos howl back.
I’m Not Building Funnels—I’m Broadcasting a Feral Bat Signal
Because weirdos don’t need coaxing. They just need to know you exist.
I’m not here to outwit the algorithm.
I’m not drip-feeding “value” until you break down and book a call.
I’m not battling objections like it’s some marketing Mortal Kombat showdown.
I’m saying the shit I want to say.
I’m designing what lights me up.
And I’m attracting the kind of people who see it and go, “Finally. My people.”
Not because I guessed their Starbucks order.
But because I showed up—real, honest, and just a little bit feral.
TL;DR?
I don’t niche because my people aren’t confined to a single box.
I don’t do personas because my clients aren’t build-a-Glorias with bullet points.
And I’d rather flop dramatically being fully myself than go viral for nailing the brunch preferences of a fictional mum-of-three slowly questioning all her life choices on a mindfulness retreat.
So if you’re tired of reverse-engineering strangers into sales…
🎨 Make something only you could make.
🦊 And trust that the right weirdos will recognise it when they see it.