Out 6 October 2026 · Paperback, ebook and hardcoverOut now · Paperback, ebook and hardcover
The best businesses are not built for everyone.
Building has never been cheaper. Anyone with a laptop can ship a product, a brand and a plausible-looking company in a week. And yet most of them go nowhere, because when you sell to everyone you compete with everyone, and the price of reaching a customer is set by whoever will lose the most money to reach the same person.
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Why now: the argument in three parts
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The middle got crowded.
When you sell to everyone you compete with everyone, and your costs are set by whoever will lose the most money to reach the same customer.
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Building got almost free. Belonging did not.
In the first half of 2026, nearly as many new apps reached one app store as in all of 2025. Downloads grew two percent. When anyone can build anything, building is not the scarce thing.
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And concentration rewards the specific.
46% of all recorded music available last year was played ten times or fewer. If the top of every market takes almost everything, the only question is which market you are at the top of.
What is in it
The companies that last did something else. A salt maker since 1882. A curtain company in a German village that dresses the stages of the world. A maker of phono cartridges that outlived the death and rebirth of vinyl. A software firm with 1,552 customers and a $45 billion valuation. None of them tried to serve everyone. Each became the only sensible answer for one group of people, and had the discipline to stay there.
Built for Someone is a method for doing the same. Pick a buyer and a need, not a category. Screen the market before you fall for it. Earn your way into the room. Make one paid offer and let a real buyer answer. Check the economics before you believe them. Then build a position a giant cannot afford to attack, and hold it.
It is written from the inside: two small companies, their real accounts, and twelve mistakes listed with what each one cost.
- A screen you can run on an entire industry in an afternoon
- The five conditions of a niche monopoly
- Five honest routes into a trade you are not part of
- How to make one small paid offer and let a real buyer answer
- Why a narrow customer is not a narrow cost structure, and which capital fits a business with a ceiling
- Two small companies, their real accounts, and twelve things the author got wrong
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Questions
What is Built for Someone about?
It argues that for most people starting most businesses, the mainstream has become the worst place to build and the specific market has become the best. Three things happened at once: the middle got crowded and expensive, building got almost free while belonging did not, and concentration now rewards the specific. The book then gives a method for picking one group of people, screening the market, earning access, making a first paid offer, checking the economics, and building a position a larger company cannot afford to attack.
Who is the book for?
Three readers. The owner of a profitable, unglamorous business who has quietly wondered whether they are doing something wrong because nobody writes about companies like theirs. The employed operator who wants a method they can run on evenings and weekends without raising money. And the founder or investor who is tired of being told their market is too small.
What is a niche monopoly?
Not a monopoly in the legal sense. It means that for one specific group of people, doing one specific job, you are the answer and every alternative requires an explanation. The book sets out five conditions for it: the market is real, it is beneath the giants, you are the obvious answer, the economics hold, and you have the discipline to stay.
Is this a book about startups?
No. Some of the best businesses in it would be insulted to be called startups: a toolmaker founded in 1941, a theater-curtain maker in a German village, a family in Denmark making phono cartridges, a salt maker since 1882. It also says where the argument does not apply, such as marketplaces and networks where the first company to reach scale takes the whole market.
When is it out, and where can I buy it?
Built for Someone is published on October 6, 2026 in paperback, ebook and hardcover. It is sold on Amazon in every major market; the button on this page takes you to the listing.
Is there a newsletter?
Yes. Larklind writes Beyond Digital on Substack: twice a month, one narrow company, what it does, what it earns, and the one structural reason it survives. It is free, and you can unsubscribe whenever you like.
Who is Larklind Cerkezi?
Larklind Cerkezi trained as an IT apprentice and represented Liechtenstein at WorldSkills. He founded and sold a cleaning company, co-founded a digital agency and a matchmaking platform built for one community rather than for everyone, and currently leads digital transformation at a century-old dental manufacturer. He is studying at IMD and lives in Switzerland. Built for Someone is his first book.
It is niche. That is the point.
Out 6 October 2026 in paperback, ebook and hardcover. Until then, and after, one narrow company every two weeks on Substack.Available now in paperback, ebook and hardcover. And one narrow company every two weeks on Substack.
Buying for a team or an event? Bulk prices at 100, 250 and 500 copies, signed on request. Write to Larklind.