Entrepreneurs often blame slow growth on market saturation. The reality is they lack the marketing skills to reach the 99% of the market that isn't already solution-aware. It's an ego-preserving way to avoid admitting a skill deficit.
The common view of competitors carving up a fixed market pie is false. In reality, you and your competitors are likely fighting over a tiny sliver of one platform. The true market is a vast ocean of untapped channels and attention.
Saying "the market is crowded" or "there are no good salespeople" renders you powerless. By reframing these as "I lack the skill to get more leads" or "I lack the skill to hire well," you become the source of the solution and regain agency to change the outcome.
The allure of a "better" opportunity is deceptive. By switching, you abandon years of accumulated experience and momentum. Growth is easier when you're established, meaning a new venture, even if growing faster initially, will likely never catch up to your existing trajectory.
Entrepreneurs quit when they hit a predictable rough patch, mistaking it for a flaw. SaaS is slow to start, e-commerce has cash flow issues, services are people-heavy. Success requires pushing through your chosen model's inherent difficulty, not switching to another.
Niching down allows you to dominate a small pond with less competition, enabling higher prices and faster learning. Once you're the "biggest guy in a puddle," you use your acquired skills and resources to graduate to a pond, then a lake, and finally the ocean.
Growth isn't random; it can be planned along five vectors. From your current market, you can target higher-paying clients (upmarket), a larger volume of smaller clients (downmarket), different industries (adjacent), a wider category (broader), or a more focused sub-niche (narrower).