This post was most recently updated on February 23rd, 2014
FINDING YOUR NICHE – PART ONE
When we speak about finding your niche, it is not as complicated as you might think. It basically gets down to looking inside of yourself to see where your passions truly lie.
Once you’ve done that, you can be a bit more scientific about it by doing keyword searches, checking out the social media and reviewing ads on Google to see what the general online interest is in your niche.
For instance, if your passion is dogs, you might put various keywords into Google to see what sort of people are out there in your niche already, how much activity they seem to be generating, and what the Google ads on the search page are selling.
YOU might find that dog training is where the bulk of the interest is, or dog breeding. You could discover that there are a lot of e-books being promoted, or blog sites featuring dog nutrition. The advertisers may be mostly large companies selling dog food, or they may include small vendors and other bloggers featuring “how to” information products like dog training.
To take it a step further, you could start searching the social sites like FaceBook, YouTube and Twitter to see what groups are out there in this niche, what are they talking about, what are they selling or looking to buy into. A simple search on YouTube, for instance, may introduce you to a great many people buzzing about dog care, dog training and the like. You’ll get to see who they are, visit their blogs and fan pages, and read articles they’ve written on eZine. This will give you a good idea of what sort of social buzz is related to your chosen niche.
There may be several things you want to sell or be a part of, not just dogs. That’s O.K. for starters, but you’ll want to do comparative searches of the various niches you’re considering to see which one has the best fit for you. Ultimately, of course, you are looking to find just ONE niche to develop. At least for now. If you offer too much diverse expertise to too broad of a group of followers, your message may get lost in the vast sea of online information.
Take your time. Sometimes we are in such a rush we get all confused. Your niche has to be built for people that will be attracted to YOU for specific reasons. These reasons will be engineered by you, and the way you choose to develop your niche.
For instance, using the dog example again, you may develop a blog that features you as an expert on dog nutrition. Your articles, videos and social media chat will focus on what are good ways to make your dog healthy. Or, you may decide instead to be an entertainer. You might write funny stories about dogs, do zany videos or craft a cartoon series. You could just be a good resource for dog related products. One day you could introduce your readers to a product for making your dog less aggressive. They next day you might feature a new kind of collar that keeps ticks and fleas off them. You could feature, analyze, critique and even sell these products right on your blog either as a direct seller or as an affiliate.
These are just some brief examples to get your mind turning in the right direction, and to show you how important it is to choose a niche that you are really passionate about. You’ll be doing a lot of work and research in your niche, so you’d better enjoy it… No, you’d better LOVE it! It’s going to be your home base on the internet. All of your activities… socializing, selling, product development… will revolve around it.
This is a two part series…stay tuned for part two!
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