Researching a new niche
I have just completed my research for a new niche and thought that it would be useful to guide you through the process that I use.
Stage one is to come up with about ten ideas for niches. Ten may not be enough but it will do to start with. Choose topics that are not too mainstream but avoid any that are too obscure. Topics that appeal to affluent people are better too. Gardening is too general, but lawn care is probably about right. (Lawn care was one of my possible niches ideas which I later rejected; it will do to illustrate my thought process though.)
Having come up with niche ideas, stage two is to find say three or four sub-niches within each of the main niches; I do this because there will almost certainly be too much competition within the main niches. You can do this using Google or your favorite search engine. An example of a sub-niche within lawn care is organic lawn care. You will then have thirty to forty new niche ideas.
Stage three is to use Google Adwords Tools to come up with keywords for each of your niche ideas. You are looking for a niche that can provide you with 15 to 20 keyword terms that have more than 3,000 searches globally each month. Search terms with high estimated cost per clicks are best. Also, I prefer to avoid niches where the searches are too seasonal – look up lawn care and you will see very seasonal trends. You will probably eliminate about half of your ideas at this stage. ‘Organic lawn care’ was eliminated at this stage.
Stage four is to use Google search to search for each of your keyword terms in each remaining niche idea. Put the keyword terms in quotes so you search for the exact phrase. You are looking for a niche idea where you have about 10 to 15 keyword phrases that have less than 40,000 search results – less than 20,000 is better. This means that the competition that you will be facing is at an acceptable level.
Stage four will probably leave you with only two or three niche ideas meeting all the criteria.
Stage five is to ”brainstorm” ideas for suitable domain names for the remaining niche ideas, based on what names are available. Select domain names that contain keywords related to your niche ideas. Then choose the remaining niche idea that you feel most comfortable with and register the domain name straight away.
Having done all that you need to develop a website for your new niche. More on that in a future post.
