What is a niche market?
A niche market is the smaller segment of the larger market on which a blogger should be focusing.
Niche markets are often used by retailers to define product features, prices, quality, and demographics to satisfy specific needs. It aims to help companies to survive the competition by differentiating the niche.
The same applies to blogging. To stand out from the crowd, one needs to find a distinct niche and position a website or blog to be different from the competition.
Let’s look at the steps you can take to identify profitable niche market for your blog.
Five steps to discovering a perfect niche
1. Identify your interests and passions
The first step is to know the things you are passionate about. It might sound like a logical step for some people, but it’s important that you go through that process.
Write down the list of things that are interesting to you. It could be personal or professional ideas. Here is how you can get the most out of it:
- List the things you enjoy doing. For example, you like to take pictures; you like to cook; you like to play guitar; etc.
- List the things you enjoy learning. For example, you like learning how to take professional portrait photos; you like to know how to cook different cuisine; you like learning how to play new musical instruments; etc.
- List the things you already do. For example, you take a bunch of pictures when you go vacation; you cook every day for your family; you play in the local band; etc.
Once you have all these items together, you can select and identify what resonates with you the most.
Pen them down. I recommend choosing one item from that list and explore that topic further.
If you have more than one item don’t worry, below I’ll show you how to check what niche would be the most valuable to go after.
For example, you can have these points on your list:
- I like to play guitar, and I like to teach people how to play it
- I like to cook, and I like to share my recipes with people
Next, I’ll show you how to narrow down your interests and pick a niche for your blog.
Note. I highly recommend going after your passion, that would help you to enjoy the journey and make the process of starting a popular blog stress-free.
2. Research keywords and search volumes
Once you have the list of things you like to do, now it’s time to start digging and researching the size of that niche.
The second step is to identify the core keywords people use to find information about your topic in search engines. And analyze how attractive or competitive these phrases are.
Based on the item you selected in step one, write down core keywords that you think people would use to search for that information. You don’t need a huge list. It could be 2-3 leading phrases, and I will show you how to pull out all the keywords based on the seed keywords.
Here is an example of seed keywords:
- How to play guitar
- Guitar lessons
- Guitar for beginners
I will show you how you can do keyword research using free Google keyword tool. Login or create a new account to enter Google Keyword Planner tool.
You will see three different options under “Find new keywords and get search volume data.” Select the “Search for new keywords using a phrase, website, or category” tab.
When you open the tool, you will see the list fields. Most of these options are pre-selected, you will need to enter your seed keyword in the field highlighted below and hit “Get ideas” button.
You will see results for the selected keyword and get relevant keywords ideas. You can download the list of keywords.
This list will help you further identify which keywords you are going to target within your niche and understand the volume of searches.
3. Research your competition
It’s important to recognize and check who your competitors are. And I want you to know that competition is not a bad thing. It’s opposite, the presence of competition shows that niche is live and that people are interested in this type of content.
The easiest way to check for the competition is to do a Google search using core keywords that you’ve identified in step two. Perform a Google search and list down website’s you like. You don’t have to have a huge list, 3 – 5 sites would be enough.
Further, you can research these competitors on the subject of content or keywords ideas, and traffic sources. Check free tools like SimilarWeb, FirstSiteGuide, and Semrush.
Additional reading: 25 Sneaky Online Tools and Gadgets to Help You Spy on Your Competitors
4. Determine if the niche is profitable
If one of your goals is to make money from your blog website, you will need to check if the niche of your choice monetizable. Money can be made online in almost any topic area. But it’s always good to double check and see how big is the potential.
Here are things you can check:
- Review what products and services your competitors are offering.
- Examine what products are sold on Amazon related to your niche.
- Check if there are any products offered through affiliate networks, such as Clickbank or CJ.
These points will help you better understand how you can monetize your blog down the road.
5. Positioning your blog (Start with why and Law of category)
The last, but not least step is to position and differentiate your blog from the competition.
Sometimes you will have to niche down to focus on more specific topics. For example, you could be writing only about vegan food instead of writing about broad food topic in general.
I would like to share two powerful exercises you can use that would help you to stand out from the rest of the blog in your niche:
a. Start with why
The process introduced by Simon Sinek, who believes that every great idea learned should start with “Why” and explains how good leaders inspire everyone to take action.
b. Law of category
This idea comes from the book, “The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing.”
Here is the main point of the law:
It’s hard to gain leadership in a category with a lot of competition.
It’s better to create a product in the new category.
The category doesn’t have to be radically different, e.g., if there’s dominant player in the imported beer you can become the first to import light beer. If you can’t be the first to fly over Atlantic, you can still be the first woman to fly over Atlantic.
Conclusion
This article should help you understand how you can find and check a niche for your blog. And hopefully, you will become an authority blogger in that niche.
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions and leave your comments below.
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