How to Brainstorm my niches and into possible sub-niches?

[dmjones23]

INTRODUCTION

Hi fellow marketers when I introduced myself about a week ago, I didn?t not know if I had a true passion but what I did and do know is that I have a burning desire to start my own online business. I have been have been studying internet marketing seriously over the past eight months, without jumping into unknown territory I set out to understand how people start business online, the message I got was to follow your passion.

Help from this forum

After one week on this forum, I came up with a list of my passion or interests but now I need some tips on refining this list to possible smaller niches before I do the KW analysis. I found many approaches to identifying your passion from my fellow marketers but here are the ones I used.

Approaches I use to identify my niche

1. I look at the magazines I usually buys and that have being around for a while and pick out a possible niche from their
2. I looked at the things I would be interested in learning about.
3. I also looked at products that I have problems in finding or buying.
4. Site I visit on a regular basis.

My Top 6 passion\interest

1. Social media Marketing
2. Male style & grooming
3. IT Support\customer service(Troubleshooting)
4. Smart Causal clothing (shopping)
5. Following Football (soccer)
6. Leaning about doing business online.

 

[fallen]

Well, I'm quite new to the game as well, but from reading your list this is what I think...

1. If your new to social marketing yourself, you can't really give advice. This would be a bad choice IMO. Plus there is already TONNES of others doing this, so it would be pretty hard to get yourself noticed.
2. This could be a good one, just narrow it to a niche. It would be great for promoting various products.
3. This is going to be a lot of work. You could try to start a community forum, like this, but that's no easy task either. There is also a lot of competition already.
4. Much like 2, this could be narrowed and would be great for promoting products.
5. There are already tonnes of news sites out there that do this. Personally, I wouldn't bother.
6. Same deal as 1.

Hope this helps. Like I say, I'm new to the game as well, but I think I have a good grasp of picking a good starting niche that I'm interested in.

 

[dmjones23]

Thanks Fallen good advised, 2 and 4 are my top two but also have a big interest in social media, I am at the brainstorming stage so I made a list base on the various approaches as listed. someone also mentioned finding a hot market and get passionate about it. I will check your blog out.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Yes I would say 1,3,6 are def out as far as too competitive.

I would take 2 and 5 and run through the niche keyword exercises I give to try to find a less competitive sub niche. http://affiliate-marketing-forums.5...-how-do-niche-keyword-research.html#post43897

 

[dmjones23]

Thanks Linda, I am starting to get the idea now with regards to the KW is it best to stick with a single word at first for eg like grooming ?

 

[Linda Buquet]

Well depends what you mean. You don't start your site around a single keyword grooming.

But yes you start your KW research there if you are working with a big keyword like Football or soccer. But the word Grooming pulls up a lot about pet grooming, so you may want to try male grooming and men's grooming and see what comes up. May even want to start with the word men's or male and see what you can find that's related to grooming. (But you have to sort through all the dicey stuff you'll find in that list!) Plus don't forget other synonyms.

The thing I just realized about Men's grooming though, is I'm not sure how many good profitable products there are that you could sell. Seems to me most of it would be just every day stuff like shaving cream that men can buy at the drug store. But I don't know that market. Research it and check the competition of the KWs and then think about what you would sell to go with it.

 

[fallen]

For mens grooming you could do reviews on electric and non-electric razors...also which shaving creams, skin creams, hair products work best. However like Linda said, most people would just go out and buy this common stuff at the local drug store, except maybe an electric razor. That they may choose to buy online.

 

[dmjones23]

Thanks Fallen that?s about it I think with regards to male grooming however this is my first couple of days in process of identifying a niche and I think I will have to learn the skill of identifying industries or products with a good ROI or evening the possibly learn something specific I can develop good content around. someone mention identifying a hot industry and get passionate about it, as newbie?s we tend to go for the obvious which often not profitable niches, however I?m determine and will keep researching. What challenges have you faced as a newbie?

 

[fallen]

My biggest challenge has been building my way up the search ladder and attracting traffic. Mind you I chose a more competitive niche. However, I'm getting there and have learned tonnes. I dove in to it as a hobby site back in Sept 09 and got busy after 2 months, but the site got a lot of attention in Dec (to bad it wasn't being maintained), and I noticed this around March so I started it up and again and it has been growing. I've always had the outlook that experience is the best way to learn, so my personal advice would be to not over think things and just get in there. Your first site may not be a huge success, but you will learn tonnes which you can put to use on newer more successful projects.

 

[HerMedia]

Instead of just grooming how about men's fashion & grooming ? Could you combine the two? Maybe present it in a way that would appeal to the every day man ?

 

[jasonhawk]

One of the best methods I've found for finding sub-niches... and by the way good work for identifying the need for going deep to start with, is to use Market Samurai, do Keyword Research and look for non-competitive terms you have a chance of ranking for.

In one of my other projects I simply started with the broad niche keyword, found a few keywords that were quite deep into the subject, started with those as the root keyword for a new project and got even deeper.

One of these keywords is now driving 200 visitors a day to my blog and it took me no time at all to rank for it since there was hardly any competition.

Market Samurai costs (at this time) $150 but you can download a free trial to get an idea of how good this is.

Good luck, and definitely the male grooming niche... since I'm a male and need grooming, but you could break this down to shaving, waxing, hair care, then hot shaves, best electric shavers, single blade shavers, which shaving cream to use for sensitive skin, is it worth getting a schick or gillette razor? Etc.. etc..