By Donna Knight
In online business, it may seem like the world is your marketplace, but it is also true that the world is your competition. As a result you still have to choose your target market carefully.
One way to narrow down your potential market to maximize your profitability is to choose a business that caters to a special niche. The definition of a niche market is a smaller segment of the population that has special desires or needs. The best niche may be overlooked by the vast majority of marketers, and as a result there is much less competition. As a result of this neglect by most marketers, niche markets have the potential to be vastly more profitable than an overexploited market with too much competition.
If you choose your niche wisely, you could end up being the only source for a ravenously hungry market that makes repeat purchases. That’s the best situation for a business to be in.
With that said, you may be asking, “Okay, so how exactly do I choose a good niche?†I’m glad you asked!. Here are 8 expert keyword research tips for finding a niche to sell a product or service to:
1. Take inventory. Know what abilities you have and what products you have that may service a niche. You may not be in a good position to cater to a niche that requires a large expenditure of money or specialized knowledge that you don’t have. Write down a list of things you are good at. Your past job descriptions are a good place to start to get ideas. Even extracurricular activities such as coaching a baseball team can be included on this list. You should also write a list of products you already have resell rights to.
2. Split niches into subniches. Once you have a list of some specific niches you want to pursue, narrow them down even further by listing subniches in those niches. The more general a market is, the more likely it is to be saturated. Smaller marketers have a greater chance of having a higher demand and lower supply, which makes for greater potential profit. If you’re having difficulty finding smaller subniches, use free keyword research tools such as the Overture keyword tool at http://www.inventory.overture.com and http://www.nichebot.com . Simply do a search of a keyword relevant to your target market, and these tools will list related keywords. This is an excellent way to discover untapped niches.
3. Find a hungry audience. It’s very important to find a niche where there are enough searches to make it profitable. Using the previously mentioned tools, make a record of how many searches there are. A high number of searches (such as 100,000) indicates a strong demand. If there are fewer than 100 searches, that might be too small a niche. However, keep in mind that is only one search engine. There may be more searches on other search engines. Specifically, however many searches there are on Overture for that keyword, Google will have many more since it is a more popular search engine.
4. Check out the competition. Your next step is to get a feel for how much competition there is in that niche. Manually search multiple search engines for the keywords for your chosen niche and note how many results there are. Also try using Metasearch engines such as http://www.dogpile.com and http://www.mamma.com . Nichebot.com tells you how much competition there is on Google and Wordtracker.
5. Compare demand vs supply. Compare the number of competing websites (look at the number of search results, which is usually at the top of the page) with the number of searches made. The greater the difference between the two numbers, the less potential profit. For example, if there are 100 searches for a keyword and 10 million search results, this indicates too much competition, especially for such a small audience. If there are 100,000 searches and 10,000 results, this is more promising. If there are less results than there are searches for a keyword, you may have struck gold! For example, if there are 10,000 searches for a keyword, and only 10 results in the search engine, this could signal a potential windfall of profits.
6. Check your knowledge base. If you’re like me, you may already have a bunch of unread eBooks sitting on your computer. Check out niche marketing eBooks and special reports that provide valuable tips and tactics on finding a good niche. You’ll find a lot of repetitious material, but you could still find some valuable nuggets of information. Paid eBooks are more likely to have valuable information than free ones, so you should focus on these first.
7. Check niche lists. Although these are not as common as eBooks, there are niche lists prepared by successful marketers. Some people make a living by doing the “dirty work,†of finding potentially profitable niches. Even with one of these lists, you still want to follow the previous steps to confirm the potential profit of any niche. However, a niche list will save you time, especially you have no idea where to start.
8. Mix and match. You may be able to combine related niches as your target market because your product or service may cater to more than one related market. In your keyword research you may have found several subniches that show 100 searches. If you combine 5 of these subniches, that may be a large enough audience to make it profitable.
By now you realize, online prospects are not the easy targets some internet marketing experts might want you to think they are. But if you choose your target market carefully, because of a larger potential customer base, you can have an online business more successful than you ever could imagine in the offline world.
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Donna Knight is a Computer Trainer and Website Promotion Specialist. She has built over 200 websites and helps new site owners promote their site cheaply. For tips that will help you save money and save time when marketing online, visit her Internet Marketing Tools and Reviews blog at http://www.DonnaKnight.com
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Copyright (C) 2005 Donna Knight. All Rights Reserved. Permission granted to post this article in newsletters, free ebooks or websites as long as the article and resource box remain intact. For product reviews, you may substitute your affiliate referral link for the product URL.
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