Finding a niche market is in separateable from doing keyword research.
To find a niche is a process of filtering through all the possible markets to
identify those markets:
that are profitable, and
where you can effectively compete against your competition
You will go through a series of filters when you want to identify a profitable
niche market. You should filter the following variables:
Traffic Filter… you apply a traffic filter to eliminate
niche markets that are too small to support your online
niche business.
To do this you should generate a list of keywords that are relevant to your
main area of interest. For example, your main area of interest might be
dogs, or it might be playing the guitar. You would then use a keyword
expand your list of possible keywords (potential markets) associated with
your main keyword.
Next, identify the amount of traffic that keyword receives monthly. You
want to filter through the list eliminating any keywords that don’t have
sufficient search volume to support your online niche business.
For planning purposes, we use a 1%-3% conversion factor of visitors we
get to our websites. So we want keywords that have at least 2,000
searches a month.
Competition Filter… you will apply a competition filter to eliminate those markets
where there is so much competition that it would be hard for you to compete in that
niche market.
Someone not versed in online marketing feels that the competition is the number of websites that show up on Google
when you do a keyword search. That is not the case.
The competition factor is the number of websites that contain the keywords in their title. For example, if use the
keyword ‘guitar lesson’ you would discover that 3,780,000 websites include the word ‘guitar lesson’ in their site but
only 890,000 include ‘guitar lesson’ in their title. If you set up your online marketing program properly, your real
completion is represented by the 890,000 websites.
When you are just starting out, we recommend that you eliminate the number of competitors to 30,000. If you already
have a niche business with a developed website, you can usually compete effectively with 50,000 – 100,000
competitors.
In keeping with our ‘guitar lesson’ example, you would look for keywords that are micro niche’s within your niche
market. For example, ‘online guitar lesson’ has a total of 1,110,000 websites that use those keywords but only 24,000
use them in their title. Online guitar lesson would be a micro niche where you can effectively compete.
It should be noted to conduct this level of analysis, you need a research tool like Keyword Elite 2.0. This program will
save you untold hours of time in your online marketing effort, and it is critical for finding a niche market.
Commerciality Filter… finally you want to apply a commerciality filter to your final
list of keywords (each one represents a possible niche business)
You can do this by going to Microsoft Ad Center and use their commerciality tool. This tool estimates the commercial
value of any set of keywords. You want your keyword to have a commercial value of at least 50 %.
You should now have a short list of profitable micro niche markets that you can build your niche business.
Identify Micro Niche Markets