Importance of Specialization

Your Marketing Team Can’t Do It All Ever heard this before? “We just need one marketing person to handle everything.” Emails, SEO, social media, content, ads, analytics, branding, design… ALL of it. Sounds familiar? If you’re a marketer, you’ve probably been that one-person marketing department at some point. But here’s the truth (and why businesses get stuck): 👉 Marketing isn’t one job. It’s a collection of highly specialized skills. 👉 One person can’t be an expert at everything. 👉 Lack of expertise = lost revenue, wasted efforts, and stalled growth. What Clients Actually Expect from Marketing Teams 🎯 🔹 They want content that converts… but that takes expert copywriting. 🔹 They want better rankings… but SEO requires deep technical knowledge. 🔹 They want high-performing ads… but media buying is a science. 🔹 They want engaging social media… but trends change daily. 🔹 They want data-driven decisions… but analytics is a different skill set. One person? Handling ALL of that? It’s an impossible ask. The Opportunity: Build, Upskill & Specialize 💥 For Companies: Stop treating marketing as a “one-person show.” Instead: ✅ Invest in specialists or fractional experts for high-impact areas. ✅ Use automation to reduce workload & focus on strategic efforts. ✅ Encourage team collaboration instead of overwhelming individuals. 💥 For Marketers: If you’re that “do-it-all” person, it’s time to level up! ✅ Find your niche—SEO, Paid Ads, Growth, Content… what’s your strength? ✅ Upskill & stay ahead of trends. AI & automation are shifting the game. ✅ Position yourself as an expert, not just a generalist. Here is One of My Case Study: How Specialization 10X’ed Results. A startup I worked with struggled because their “marketing manager” handled everything. The result? ❌ Low engagement ❌ Poor ad performance ❌ SEO barely moving The Fix? ✅ We split roles into specialized areas: → A performance marketer to optimize paid campaigns → A content strategist to drive organic growth → An SEO expert to fix technical issues Result? In 6 months, they saw a 3X increase in traffic & 2.5X lead conversions. The Takeaway Marketing isn’t a one-person job anymore. It’s time to scale smartly, invest in expertise, and empower your team. 💬 What’s one skill you think every marketing team should specialize in? Drop it in the comments! ⬇️🚀

Every 2nd time founder warns me about this mistake that 1st time founders make all the time: Not niching enough. You need to niche more. Not scale faster. Not raise bigger. Niche more. When we started LedgerUp, we thought the big vision was building an AI CFO. Automate everything. Back office in a box. Sounded exciting. Raised some eyebrows. Didn’t land. Then we got honest: Where were we delivering unfair ROI? It wasn’t in accounting, but in revenue. Specifically, usage-based billing. Even more specifically, AI companies struggling with Stripe chaos. So we niched again. AI bookkeeping → Revenue clarity → Billing ops → Stripe automation → AI startups Sounds narrow, but it’s not. That last layer unlocked speed, sales, and brand clarity. You know exactly what LedgerUp is now, and so do the customers who need us. Here’s the paradox: The tighter your focus, the faster the compound returns. Every new deal looks like the last. Every insight scales. Every win sharpens your edge. If you’re early, niche until you feel uncomfortable. Then niche one more layer down. That’s where the leverage hides.

After several years on the job, I found myself on a secluded hike in the Austrian Alps, talking with my boss about an investment opportunity that had come up. What he shared with me that day stuck with me across every chapter of my life and career: "I didn’t get to where I am by being good at everything. I got here by going deep on what I am good at. I don’t hire generalists—I hire experts. I double down on my strengths, and I bring in others to cover the areas I’m not strong in." That perspective changed the way I view talent, partnerships, and the value of specialization. In both Executive Protection and Digital Executive Protection, I talk to folks daily who are frustrated—they're not getting the results they paid for. Here’s my take: You wouldn’t ask your general practitioner to perform brain surgery. So why would you… – Hire your MSP/MSSP to surgically Delete and Monitor your online PII footprint? – Let the company that provides mall security guards design and manage the Executive Protection program for your billionaire CEO? Expertise matters. Specialization matters. It’s the difference between checking a box—and actually being protected.

For the last 3 months, I have chatted with a different leader who is running a HubSpot solutions partner every week. I've asked them the same questions. What do you wish you did earlier? And they all say the same things: "I wish I niched faster." It's odd how it works. Constraints on a business actually "unlocks" rather than restrict. Here is why it works: 1. Expertise Development: Specializing allows a company to develop deep knowledge and skills in a specific area, enhancing the quality and effectiveness of its services. This is a double dose of goodness - because it helps train and attract new talent as well. 2. Targeted Marketing: A niche focus enables more precise marketing efforts, making it easier to connect with and attract the ideal customer base. Don't sleep on this. When you aren't everything to everybody, you get to be someone to somebody. Solve a clear pain and do it well. 3. Reduced Competition: By serving a specific segment, companies face less competition and can dominate smaller markets more effectively. Said another way, be known for 1 thing. Be the best at that 1 thing. 4. Increased Customer Loyalty: Specializing helps in understanding and meeting the unique needs of a particular group, fostering stronger customer relationships and loyalty. You can start building "systems" or "IP" around pain points in your niche. 5. Operational Efficiency: Focusing on a niche streamlines operations and resource allocation, enhancing efficiency and potentially increasing profitability. In other words, you can give more value faster. Now niching isn't just "industry" specific. You can solve function specific or combine the two. Example: 1) Best service company at HubSpot to Salesforce Sync 2) Best service company at HubSpot to Netsuite sync for industrial 3) Best service company for running outbound plays for Saas In Hubspot. 4) Best service company for HubSpot + [enter industry or function] Go all in. You won't regret it. Stay awesome -Matt

Probably one of the best papers written about the impact of AI on product development, scientific discovery, engineers and scientists to date. 🔁 The paper highlights the dual nature of AI’s impact—boosting overall innovation while introducing challenges related to skill utilization and work satisfaction. 🦾 Increased Productivity: AI-assisted researchers discovered 44% more materials, leading to a 39% increase in patent filings and a 17% rise in new product prototypes. These AI-generated materials showed enhanced novelty and contributed to significant innovations. 🧑🏫 Disparate Impacts: The tool disproportionately benefited the most skilled scientists, doubling their productivity while having minimal impact on lower-performing peers. This exacerbated performance inequality, showcasing the complementarity between AI and human expertise. 🤖 Shift in Research Tasks: AI automated 57% of idea-generation tasks, allowing scientists to focus more on evaluating and testing AI-suggested materials. Top researchers effectively leveraged their expertise to prioritize the best AI outputs, while others struggled with false positives. 😞 Impact on Job Satisfaction: Despite productivity gains, 82% of scientists reported lower job satisfaction, citing reduced creativity and underutilized skills as significant concerns. This underscores the complexity of integrating AI into scientific work. 🚀 Broader Implications: The study's findings imply that AI can significantly accelerate R&D in sectors like materials science, emphasizing the value of human judgment in the AI-assisted research process. It suggests that domain knowledge remains crucial for maximizing AI’s potential.

DeepSeek R1's performance and cost numbers have the industry's attention, but its approach to model building might be the bigger breakthrough. Yes, it's a gift to app developers who get powerful new open-source models to build on. And yes, major labs will use these efficiency innovations to build even bigger models. But there's a deeper story here: DeepSeek shows how domain expertise might matter more than raw compute in building specialized AI models. Their approach - using verifiable data and efficient reward functions - creates a new path for teams with deep domain knowledge to build their own models at a fraction of the usual cost. Consider that DeepSeek emerged from a hedge fund, where the reward function is crystal clear. This hints at how other domain experts might leverage similar techniques - whether in finance, medicine, law, or industrial operations. We're entering an era where smart training may matter more than raw compute. The future of AI may not just belong to those with the biggest GPU clusters, but to those who can most effectively combine domain expertise with clever training techniques. I explore this shift in depth here: https://lnkd.in/gKtcx6X8

I have just received another response from an investor: "I'm not an expert in this area, but it looks like competition is huge." This feedback isn't new, and as an early-stage founder, it highlights a critical challenge we all face: clearly defining our market and initial ICP (Ideal Customer Profile). If you don't articulate the problem you are solving and why it is unmet, investors will naturally lump you in with the broader competition. 🔎 Here is the thing: competition only seems "HUGE" when your niche is not clearly VISIBLE. Your job as a founder is to show that you are not just "another player in the GAME" but the only solution tailored for a specific, underserved niche. Think of it this way: if the market is "eggs," you don't want to just blend into the "scrambled" mix. You need to demonstrate that you are a perfectly cooked sunny side up, with your own unique flavor and presentation. That means: 1. Define Your Niche Clearly: Who exactly are you solving a problem for? What makes them different from the broader market? 2. Demonstrate the Problem: Show this segment has a pain point no one else is addressing effectively. 3. Position Your Solution: Articulate why your product is the only solution that meets their needs in a way others don’t. 💡For example, for Smart Grant Solutions and its Mission Granted, the niche is small-midsize nonprofits and local governments struggling with the burden of financial compliance in grant management. These are grant recipients, not grantmakers, and existing solutions don't serve their needs. They are clearly not a generic "yet another one grant management tool" -- they are the only financial compliance solution for this niche. >> Investors don't need to be experts in your field to see your value. They must see you have worked hard to carve out your space and prove your uniqueness. So, founders, ask yourselves: are you "scrambled," or are you ready to shine like a "sunny side up"? 🍳✨ #competition #niche #investor #scrambled #sunnysideup

The deeper I delve into AI, the more clearly I see that the relative values of different skillsets are being rebalanced. This shift has particularly large implications for career transitioners and students entering the data field... Recently, I posted about how the ability to build emotional ties and trust with stakeholders will be the most critical skill of the AI-era: https://lnkd.in/efMV6tdi Similarly, I believe the value of #domainexpertise (DE) will continue to grow, as the value of "technical stack" skills declines (as #AI increasingly assumes those duties). THE COMPONENTS OF DOMAIN EXPERTISE 🔸Factual Knowledge - the terminology, definitions, and data relevant to a domain 🔸Conceptual Knowledge - the theories, models, and structures that explain how things work within the domain 🔸Procedural Knowledge - how to perform domain-specific tasks, techniques and processes 🔸Strategic (aka Metacognitive) Knowledge - how to apply these components to solve problems and make decisions 🔸Tacit Knowledge - the implicit understanding, skills, insights, intuition, etc necessary for expert performance 🔸Contextual Knowledge - the industry-specific factors, regulatory environment, market dynamics, and cultural factors that define the full context in which the domain operates 🔸 Domain-Specific Data - the data sources and metrics essential for analysis and decision-making 🔸Problem Framing - the questions and factors to consider when tackling domain-specific challenges 🔸Interpretation - the ability to translate domain analyses into actionable insights 🔸 Continuous Learning - the discipline and adaptability to keep pace w/ new domain developments, trends, and best practices WHY IS DOMAIN EXPERTISE SO CRITICAL TO AI? There are two primary ways to improve AI models - improve the underlying models themselves or train them on better data. It is DE that generates this higher quality training data. I've been working since GPT4O was released on a custom Power BI GPT that is vastly outperforming both the base 4O model, and every GPT in the GPT store that I've tested it against. This is because mine captures IMO the top 15 books related to Power BI (6,000+ total pages), as well as datasets and data models, courses, articles/blogs, video and audio transcripts, images, thousands of code solutions, etc. - fully leveraging years of experience as a CCO and trainer in this domain. In the ultra-competive business world, where every org will have access to the same base models, the advantages afforded by a superior model trained on better data will be enormous, and those who have the DE to provide that edge - in health care, finance, law, construction, logistics, IT security, public policy, etc. will be in extraordinary demand. This is why IMO #career transitioners with DE from a different sector are entering at a perfect time, and why students should orient their studies to obtaning data skills in the context of building DE in a second area.

Reality → The insurance and financial services industries are filled with generalists—firms that try to cater to everyone. But here’s the problem: when you try to serve everyone, you serve no one well...👇 My conversation with Tim Chaves is proving this with the success of his software company Jump - Advisor AI serving the Financial Services industry niche. In this short clip from our latest podcast episode, we dove into the undeniable benefits of industry niche specialization and why it’s a game changer for firms that want to grow, scale, and stand out. Here's the truth... Being a generalist might give you a wide net, but it also leaves you struggling to differentiate yourself, master any one industry, or solve problems better than your competition. In contrast, specializing in a niche allows you to: → Master the specific needs of your market—whether that’s RIAs, cannabis operators, or artisan contractors—by offering tailored solutions that no generalist can compete with. → Build deeper client trust by becoming the go-to expert in their specific industry, positioning your firm as the authority that truly understands their pain points. → Create a competitive advantage by offering world-class, niche-specific services that your generalist competitors simply can’t match. Tim agrees, just like the future of the software industry and SaaS, specialization is your competitive advantage—and the firms that embrace it will dominate their markets. 📍Key Takeaways: ✅ Choose a niche and commit→Become the go-to authority in that space. ✅ Focus on solving specific problems→Tailored solutions always win over generic offerings. ✅ Integrate deeply→Build systems and solutions that are uniquely valuable to your niche clients. The generalist model? It's not the future—it’s a dead end. The firms that specialize will win because they know their market better, solve problems faster, and provide more value than anyone else. Which side are you on? ********* ♻️ If you found value in this, please repost and pay it forward to others! 🔔 Follow me @ Rob Jacomen for more industry niche specialization tips, strategies and playbooks that will help you discover the perfect industry niche, and get your Producers to dominate their competitors (incumbents)! Chad Ramberg Box Professional Insurance The Advisors Edge Podcast #insurance #ria #financialservices #riskmanagement #nichebuilderbootcamp

🎯 Finding the Right Fit About eight years ago, I remember a colleague who was recruited into a project simply because he had a specific programming skill that no one else in the organization possessed. However, the project ignored their domain expertise, reducing his role to just technical execution. Instead of accepting that narrow function, they followed the connection between their domain knowledge and ML, eventually building a unique program that fully leveraged their interdisciplinary strengths. Today, that program stands out as one of a kind. This story came to mind during a recent mentoring conversation. One of my mentees asked why they were struggling to hear back from industry roles despite strong technical skills. Through our discussion, I arrived at three key insights: 1️⃣ The value is in the combination – It is possible to market oneself purely based on programming or ML skills, but much like a gold diadem, you are worth far more than just the material itself. A diadem can be melted down and sold as raw gold, but its full value comes from its craftsmanship. Similarly, your strength lies in the integration of ML, programming, and domain expertise—not just in any single skill. Finding a role that recognizes this unique combination requires a more strategic approach but ultimately leads to greater impact and fulfillment. 2️⃣ Focus on vision, not just past experience – Too often, we define ourselves only by what we have done, rather than what have we done in pursuance of the certain North Star. The key is framing your experience in the context of your future vision—showing how each skill, project, and challenge has prepared you for what comes next. Employers are not just looking for a list of past accomplishments; they want to see how you think about the future and how your expertise will contribute to it. 3️⃣ Yes, it takes longer to find the right fit—but it’s worth it – If you bring an integrated skill set, it is naturally more difficult to find a role that fully values all of your strengths. Many hiring processes are optimized for specialists rather than interdisciplinary thinkers. But when you do find the right match, it will be a far more fulfilling role—one that allows you to make a unique impact. It may take longer, but the result is a position where your full expertise is not just utilized but essential. Curious to hear others' thoughts—have you ever faced a similar challenge in aligning your interdisciplinary skill set with career opportunities? 🚀