Today I want to share with you some great ways to find a niche market. Sometimes finding a great niche feels like wrestling with a bear. Trust me it’s hard to win against the bear.
When it comes to making money online you need a niche and you’ll need some niche website ideas, or at least an idea of where to start looking. The problem is many people want to make money online but, they do not want to spend time finding a niche market to get into.
Below I’ll show you several ways to find one easily and beat the niche eating bear.
Magazines
Like to read magazines? Good, you can easily find a niche this way. You don’t need to buy one to figure out a niche though. Heck, you won’t even need to look past the cover either, just go to your local supermarket or drugstore and browse the headlines.
Another place? Check out the magazine section on Amazon or magazines.com. Again, there is no need to buy one there are thousands of niche markets staring you in the face on the cover.
Amazon
I just mentioned Amazon for finding a niche market above, but, this time I don’t mean by browsing the magazines. What you can do instead is simply browse the Amazon categories. From there you can simply “niche down” which means to find smaller niche markets inside the overall market category.
If you’re looking for a popular niche Amazon will flat out tell you what they are. Go to Amazon’s top seller’s page. You’re welcome.
eBay
eBay is an old classic; but it still works. They even have an affiliate program if you’d like to promote eBay products too. Back in the day we used to use an area called eBay pulse. Pulse is gone but now we have eBay Popular.
This area shows the most popular products by category and is a great way to scope out a new niche market for yourself.
Friends & Family
I love this method because it’s one of the easiest ways to find what is currently trending. One of my first niche markets was a toy niche and I scored big with it. The way I decided on that niche was one of the members of my family was playing with the toy that I decided to build the niche around.
If we listen to what people are telling us they are using within our own families we can uncover boundless niche markets.
T.V. Shows
T.V. shows themselves can be niche markets. Look at what the folks over at Buddy TV do. That site is massive now.
The best thing to do is get into the show as a fan and get in at the ground level rather than 5 years into it. It’ also best to start off small and focus on one niche in this industry rather than 50 different T.V. shows at once.
Hobbies Into Niche Markets
An easy one, but it works. Your hobbies can be easy niche markets to get involved in. You don’t generally need to research the topics in your hobby because you’re probably already extremely knowledgeable.
Being knowledgeable in a market makes it easy to write good content and come up with ideas.
Advertisements
If you absolutely must watch T.V. make it count. Watch what commercials pop up and there’s a good chance you can snag one of the ideas as a niche. But, what I suggest doing is watching what problems the commercial solves and that’s the niche you should get into, not the product itself. I.e. if you see a commercial for a product that solves allergy problems, your niche could be allergy relief. Easy enough?
Nightly News
In 2009 I jumped on a trend just by paying attention to the nightly news. I know, it’s boring and the news is usually depressing but sometimes you can get a nice niche idea.
I am not going to discuss the niche but it’s a problem that was all over the news in 2009 and I was able to take that issue and build a website out of it. The good part is that since it was a new trend, competition was minimal.
I’ll take the easy score anytime!
Social Events
These can be trendy, yearly or brand new. But, this works with events that have media coverage like The Super Bowl, The Oscars, Grammy Awards and any other type of event like that.
You can simply build a fan-site around it and even build some cool Fan pages associated with them to drive traffic. The social traffic alone is worth it.
Google Trends
Google trends is great because you can type in any keyword in the box and research how it’s trending. The more popular the trend is the more traffic that niche could generate. Of course, you’ll want to look at historical trends Google gives you as well to help you determine its long term value.
YouTube & Social Sites
Pinterest, Facebook, MySpace and anything similar fall into this category as well. You can browse these sites to see what is trending and popular. You can then build a niche around these ideas. Not a whole lot more to say for finding niche markets this way.
End Goals
One way to think of a niche is to think of an ultimate goal. I like to start by saying “I want to” and you simply fill in the blank. So you might say “I want to lose weight” or “I want to get bigger biceps.” The beauty of this type of thinking is that if you want something, there is a solution.
Solution style niches are great because if you can answer your visitor’s questions and give them what they want you can make some good money. This can work in determining nearly any niche. You can even start by stating things that you want for yourself. Face it; if you want something, other people do too.
Skill
Do you have a particular skill already? You have a great place to start your niche then! This could be an old skill that you don’t use much anymore or it could be a skill you’ve used all of your life.
Just like hobbies we can use our skill sets to our advantage because we have knowledge on the subject. It takes far less research when you already know a lot about the subject.
Work or Ex-Work
Just like a hobby and skill current or ex-work is always a good place to get niche idea from. Of course, if you hate what you do or used to do you might not want to go into that niche. I.e. I would never create a website teaching people how to be good retail managers (run for your life).
Reading Books
Readers can rejoice in the fact that all the time behind the book isn’t for nothing. You can get into a niche based on a book topic or based on the actually books themselves. Some people love to read and do book reviews as a living .
Of course, you can gather a wealth of ideas from non-fiction books as well. Just browse the titles in Amazon’s book section for ideas.
Online Communities Like Forums
Just like social sites online forum area great place to find ideas for a niche. One of the easiest ways it so simply look at the question topics that are being posted. I.e. if you’re on a cooking forum and someone asks how to make good southern fried food, you’ve just found a niche in “southern fried cooking.”
You can simply go to Bing and type in “niche idea forum” so if you were interested in finding niche ideas for cats go to Bing and type in “cat forums.”
Then search for cat questions on the forum you decide to look at and you can find hundreds of niche markets there. Just remember, if someone is asking, there is a demand.
Tools & Programs
Finally, you can use a tool that can help you. One of the easiest is Keyword Canine because it has a section called “Niches” you simply open the segment up and it comes up with a bunch of niche suggestions. It even shows you how easy or hard the competition is. Check out my review above.
This is the only tool I own that is still on the market that does this but I recommend it. It of course does a dozen other awesome things too; the niche option is just a plus. I also use that as well as Market Samurai for research.
I also offer Keyword Underground where I give my students there weekly niches. It’s a great place if you need a big boost getting off the ground. I’ll be adding more videos in there soon as well.
Finding Your Niche – Closing
In the end make niche research fun. Don’t beat yourself up to find one right this second. Put some thought into it and make it amusing for yourself.
The choice for your first niche doesn’t have to be your last; but make it something you want to be involved in. You know what I call a niche that you do not want to be in that feels like a chore?
Work! ….and work sucks.
On my final note; you are not limited to just these 17 ways to find a niche market. There are hundreds of additional ways to find one you like and this is just a small sampling.
Thoughts? Comments? Still struggling to find niche website ideas on your own?
If you have additional ways to find a niche; please share with us below, because it will help others who are struggling with this topic.