In my article about Marketing Pen Portraits, I provide an example profile for the website DogWheelChairLife, but people have been asking for more examples.
Here are some key insights for my own content website niches so you can see how creating pen portraits can help you tune in to what your audience values, and help you avoid the situations I found myself in.
One confusion people often have about blog strategy is they think the work you do in the beginning is over and is only referred to later, but it is actually an iterative process.
Expertise and improvement requires prompt cause and effect feedback. Don’t be afraid to question your answers and assumptions!
First is my website for makers called MakerHacks.com.
“Makers” Pen Portrait
I did a lot of planning before I created MakerHacks, but even now I am still discovering new things about the niche (actually niches):
- Who are they? There are a few overlapping groups:
- 3D printing enthusiasts.
- Crafters with Cricut, papercraft, miniatures, or jewellery.
- Electronics hobbyists.
- Microcontroller programmers/Internet of Things developers.
- People who want to start a workshop-based business with Lasers/CNC.
- Robotics and STEM students and educators.
- Who do they want to be? A common theme amongst all kinds of maker audiences is they want to be accomplished in their making, to be able to point to a thing and say “I made that!”. They want to have made, as well as enjoy the making process. A subset would like money beyond the validation.
- What are their beliefs? A core value amongst makers is the right to repair. Another is the belief that hand-crafted or small-batch made has intrinsic value.
- Where do they learn? The majority of people in this niche learn online from YouTube, blogs, official documentation, and Facebook groups. A small percentage will pay for workshops, books, or courses.
- What are their urgent needs as a group? Urgency is almost always because there is a problem that needs to be fixed.
- How old are they? Most of the audience is middle-aged or retired, though there is a large segment of kinds and students (eg. robotics clubs) or families.
- What are their pains? Getting from where they are to where they want to be, plus time/resources (this stuff is expensive and everyone has less spare time than ideas).
- What do they love? They love the feeling of having learned or achieved something, and the satisfaction of a finished project. A lot of people love it when people say “Wow that is cool!” and will chase that high.
- What do they hate? Expensive subscriptions, hoarding of resources/information, artificial barriers, and gatekeeping. A great example is 3D printers that must be online because they are locked into the manufacturer’s official consumables as if they were inkjet printers.
Learning all of this put me on the path of creating quick and cheap solutions (for free) so that people can create cool things and feel accomplished without spending a fortune or waiting months before they see any results.
That is how I came up with the name, hacks (ie. quick solutions) for makers = Maker Hacks.
I had assumed that a lot of makers were like me, and wanted to learn all the things.
Big mistake.
What I did not realize until later was just how many people get into one of the sub-niches and never explore outside of it.
For example, they get into 3D printing and stay there. That becomes their entire hobby, even becoming sad when appliance-like 3D printers that do not need assembling, tweaking, and maintenance come on the market.
That realization leads me to believe that the way to do really well in this space is to drill down into a passionate sub-niche, where the community is much more motivated and are ready to spend money for either better or quicker solutions.
This is also why I split off two of the audiences into their own websites; Retro Games Programmers and Tabletop Gamers. Breaking these topics off was not financially motivated at the time, but gives an example of how even my sub-niche breakaway sites might still be too broad …
“Retro Gamers” Audience Profile Example
Retro Gamers do not only use original, pristine gaming hardware because a lof of those computers and consoles are 40 years old or more.
A lot of folks in this niche do not use the original hardware at all, instead using emulation and small computers such as Mini PCs and the Raspberry Pi. Those who do use the original hardware find they quickly need to learn soldering and repairing electronics.
You can understand how I thought this content would do well on my maker site. At least, initially.
- Who are they? The vast majority are middle-aged guys or just a bit younger who remember the games and systems of the 70s/80s with nostalgia.
- People who enjoy playing the games.
- Collectors, who want to own the machines and/or physical media.
- Fixers, who like to find broken or abused machines and make them like new.
- Programmers, who want to create games and demos.
- Who do they want to be? A games developer is the big dream, though many are happy to be collectors and own the systems they had or couldn’t have when they were younger.
- What are their beliefs? These games are/were awesome and need preserving, and a lot believe things were better back then.
- Where do they learn? Again, they learn online, but many seek out old books on eBay or scanned-in copies.
- What are their urgent needs as a group? Urgency mostly comes from faults in old equipment, either an eBay purchase or something starts smoking that shouldn’t.
- How old are they? Most of the audience is middle-aged, or are the generation that grew up with Playstations or high-end gaming PCs and are curious what the old guys keep telling stories about.
- What are their pains? Old equipment is difficult to keep working, and parts are either non-existent or getting very expensive. Programming is difficult enough, achieving what you want to when a machine has less total memory than this article weighs in at is another level of difficulty.
- What do they love? They love the machines, and the games, especially when they are the ones who take someone’s trash and restore it to being a treasure. For the coders, they love when people play and praise their creations, or get the dopamine hit of a learning breakthrough.
- What do they hate? Companies who attack the community as pirates when they see emulation and archival as conservation. They also hate scammers and scalpers on eBay or Facebook Marketplace taking advantage of people.
Originally, I had this content on MakerHacks because of the electronics overlap, computer programming, and aspects involving creating home arcade emulation systems. While the content did ok on that site, the people looking for the latest 3D printer or laser cutter review were not keen.
So you can see that even though the skills and tools overlap, and even a lot of the people, the goals and fascinations are very different.
In my research, a lot of the content creators focus on the games and restoring machines, but less on programming. My pull towards the hobby was creating and sharing games, a goal I had as a kid and that grew to me wanting to create a game for every system I collect.
That became a site mainly for people who like programming for these retro gaming systems, AKA RetroGameCoders, and aiming at a community allows me to report on things that interest them, touching on the whole subject area, including electronics projects and retro stuff for modern systems.
“Tabletop Gamers” Pen Portrait Example
Tabletop games, such as Warhammer and Dungeons & Dragons, involve a lot of crafting. Painting miniatures, creating terrain environments, and added to that there are a lot of cosplayers (people who dress up in outfits and makeup to match their favorite characters).
For years I was trying to get influencers and other people in the tabletop gaming community to try 3D printing, laser cutting, and electronics and I kept getting told “too expensive” and objections around the learning curve. Totally understandable, but frustrating when I could see they could create better things in half the time.
Then all of a sudden the YouTubers started reviewing 3D printers and lasers, promoting 3D models on Patreon subscriptions, and doing terrain Kickstarters.
Again, I started with this content on MakerHacks, but split it off to a new domain. Actually, it is now on the second domain I bought for the site, after finding the first not quite right.
- Who are they? In the roleplaying community you get everyone, it is extremely diverse. Wargamers can include guys who are much more offensively “dudes only“, with flame wars breaking out any time Games Workshop tries to be more inclusive.
- First-generation Roleplayers (AKA Grognards) who started playing in the 1970s and early 80s. (I started playing in the early 1980s but I am not one of these guys)
- Serious Gamers ™ and casual/social players.
- Vendors, creators, developers, and store owners.
- Streamers and live-play.
- Competitive gamers (including pro or aspiring pro).
- Crafters, cosplay-makers, builders, and painters.
- Lore lovers and universe fans.
- Storytellers and worldbuilders.
- Who do they want to be? These games are meant to be played in person with other people so there is a huge social aspect (people wanting to be popular and respected), but also there are many aspects of competitiveness (tournaments, painting competitions, etc).
A few years ago actual play streaming became popular, and a whole new ambition was formed where people aspired to be one of the stars of such shows.
Even more surprising, as well as shows getting TV show deals, Hollywood stars started going in the other direction, featuring on and in these shows.
These streamers and TV shows like Stranger Things have introduced a fresher, and wider audience.
- What are their beliefs? Back in my day, there was a belief about these games called the Satanic Panic. Everyone within the game community knew how ridiculous that was (there were many teachers who would have been turned into frogs if we really were casting spells!). Some people make individual games their whole personality, and others make hating on certain games their whole personality. The one belief I think that combines the most is that we shouldn’t give too much power to certain greedy corporations. There have been several large-scale revolts that have made companies perform groveling apologies for unpopular business decisions.
- Where do they learn? As well as online, and official sources, the highstreet stores and their local game clubs.
- What are their urgent needs as a group? Urgency usually comes from getting ready for the next tournament, competition or event, or a new rules release. Big product launches from the top games, for example a brand new box set, also cause urgency due to them almost always selling out. The scalpers then sell their additional boxes at a huge markup.
- How old are they? New people are joining the community all the time, especially those who over the last decade or more arrived via collectible card games or superhero-themed fanbase.
- What are their pains? Everything in these games involves learning, such as rules, painting techniques, etc. Another big pain is getting a game, especially a group of people, together on a schedule. This, unfortunately, means people stick to the most popular games because then you are more likely to find other people who know the rules or are motivated enough, versus the independent and quirkier games.
- What do they love? They love using their imaginations, being creative, impressing their peers, winning, collecting, the art, and the stories (“Lore“).
- What do they hate? Losing, and looking like a loser. Abusive company decisions, unfair rule changes, cheats.
Even though I was seeing a shift towards “digital fabrication tools” in the space, the vast, vast majority of the community was only just becoming barely aware.
My initial idea was to call the site “Geeky Gamesmaster”, so people running their games could learn how to make things that blew the other players away.
This was ok, but there is a problem with Gamesmaster. People didn’t know if it was Games Master, Game Master, so I needed variations and mainly used GeekyGM for short. Another issue is the most popular roleplaying game calls it a DM (Dungeon Master) rather than GM, and the wargaming community, which turned out to be much more receptive, doesn’t even use the term at all.
I hung on to the name, even creating an electronics circuit board with the logo, but decided to go with a more wargame-oriented site, with roleplaying games as a subset rather than in the title.
Even now, with my new domain D6Combat, I am not always making friends because a lot of RPG players believe their games are better with zero fighting. I see their point but I like shooting fireballs, you can argue with that all you like!
Monetization AKA Where they Spend Money
When it comes to making a business around serving these audiences, we need to know what they highly value that you can provide them, and are willing to spend money on.
Those criteria are not always conveniently the same thing!
Sonia used to provide the example of people who collect vintage writing pens. They spend a fortune on the actual pens, but are unwilling to pay for anything that is not a pen.
Monetizing Makers
Makers buy new tools and machines, and they go through consumables as they make stuff. This is why, therefore, my affiliate commissions can range from one dollar to hundreds of dollars.
Due in part to the upper range of those commissions, there is a lot of competition, plus you are up against the brand owners in search too.
I have been fortunate to rank highly for some sought-after machines. There is a challenge, though, as new machines are coming out all the time, and while I have been lucky to get some amazing equipment, I am not always going to be on the list to be sent one for review.
To a lesser extent, makers will pay for software licenses, though in most cases the open source alternatives are better and free.
Take, for example, 3D CAD software where everyone either uses the free Blender software or we use the free versions of the expensive commercial software such as Fusion until we are no longer allowed.
Some education products, such as books, plans and courses do sell, though in general the field as a whole is more oriented toward free education from YouTube, and a percentage of those viewers support their favourite YouTubers via Patreon.
The makers who do best financially either sell what they make, or have huge YouTube channels.
Retro Revenue
Most of the money in the retro gaming niche is spent in the second hand markets, such as eBay and Facebook Markeplace.
Again some YouTubers do well enough to go full-time with viewers supporting their efforts via Patreon to suppliment their ad-revenue.
David Murray, 8 Bit Guy, has self-published a series of games, though I don’t think even his very successful games would be worth it to him on finances alone.
Tabletop RPG and Wargames
People in the tabletop space are continually buying consumables, such as paint, and new releases of games and miniatures from the top companies do very well.
Kickstarters have in the past been huge, though the excitement around them seems to have waned after the reputation of crowdfunding veered towards taking a long time to deliver, or not delivering at all.
There are also large cohorts of people who are willing to buy third party digital books from the established online bookstores, such as DriveThruRPG.
3D models for 3D printing are getting increasingly popular, and sales are either one-off via the marketplaces, or on subscription via Patreon.
Crafters and makers can find customers on Etsy for their cosplay props, gaming terrain, or other makes, also.
Conclusion
I hope these examples give you some ideas about how to approach creating your audience profiles, and also how you can evolve your thinking as you get feedback and experience from within the niche.
Did you notice myself and the YouTuber thumbnails are like we were birthed from the same cloning factory? Talk about affinity with your chosen community!
But seriously, one of the things I try to do as part of my efforts is to help more than old white guys enjoy these hobbies, because otherwise the community will fade away as we do.
This brings me to a closing point – you have to have a motivation beyond writing content and making money. What is your extra why for the niches you are looking at?