EVALUATING YOUR NICHE FOR PROFITABILITY

So at this point we have a selection of niche ideas and we know they have
potential.

Now we need to really open a google doc and start to gather this info.

CHECK GOOGLE SEARCH VOLUME

Using the Google keyword planner tool you’ll look at how many people
are searching for your niche idea every month.

At this point you’re not looking to find low competition keywords simply
how many people are searching for your core niche keyword every
month.

Personally I’d like to see at LEAST 3,000 local  EXACT MATCH
searches per month for the main keyword.

However I’d prefer it to be much higher, 10,000 + as this shows a huge
market with lots of potential and these in my experience are easier to
make money in.

Summary of what you want to see on
the Google Keyword Planner
■ Use Google Keyword planner to find how many people are
searching Google every month for your niche.
■ Look for big markets with over 10,000 searches because these
show big demand.
■ Use Google Suggest to get related keyword ideas to see what
else people are searching for..

CHECK GOOGLE TRENDS 

A quick check on Google Trends to make sure it’s not a dying off trend
is a good idea.

It’s better to focus on evergreen niches than trends that come and go.
Just enter your keyword or niche idea in the search bar at:

http://www.google.com/trends

You’re looking for niches that are growing or stable and not on a
downwards decline.

ARE THERE PRODUCTS ON SALE?

The best niches are ones with both physical and digital products
available on sale and lots of them.
 
Though many niches will only be one or the other and that isn’t a problem
as long as there’s a good selection of products and a demand for them.
 
Check Amazon and Ebay first are these are the 2 biggest online retailers
online and if anywhere sells products in the niches these will.
 
Check the Kindle market place for ebooks too.
 
For digital products check Clickbank.
 
To find out if there are retailers other than Amazon and Ebay stocking
products check CJ.com and ShareASale
 
These are affiliate networks who run the affiliate programs for many
retailers big and small.
 
Look for niche specific ecommerce stores – this is a sign of a very
prosperous market,
 
You can also use Google to find other products on sale.
 
Googling the niche name and checking out websites in the rankings to
see what they are selling.
 
Or searching for “niche + affiliate program” (change ‘niche’ to your
niche of choice) may bring up some products not on any of the big
marketplaces.

Sites like www.offervault.com also allow you to search for affiliate
programs within your niche.

Check the following sites for
products
■ Amazon
■ Kindle Marketplace
■ Ebay
■ Clickbank.com (digital products)
■ ShareASale.com (ecommerce affiliate network for many major
brands)
■ CJ.com (same as ShareASale)
■ OfferVault.com (Finds affiliate offers and CPA)
■ Odigger.com (Affiliate offers and CPA)

LOOK FOR BLOGS & WEBSITES

If there’s a lot of authority sites, blogs, forums and social media pages
on your niche topic it’s a good sign.

Competition is healthy and if others are going to the effort to provide
people in the niche with information you’re on the right track.

You can use these sites to drive traffic back to your own, network with
them, spy on them to see what they do well and so on.

To find blogs you can use http://technorati.com/ which is a blog
aggregator by entering your niche topic into the search box and choosing
‘blogs’ and hitting enter.

Or go to https://www.google.com/blogsearch and type in your niche
ideas and hit enter.

Please note Google keeps changing how their blog search feature works
so apologies if this has changed by the time you try it.

You can choose to show posts or homepages and how recent they are,
if you use ‘past 24 hours’ it will show the most recent posts.

Check what these blogs are promoting and selling, what they are
advertising and sign up to their email lists and social media pages to
see what they are doing and how well they do it.

LOOK AT FORUMS & MESSAGE BOARDS

Sizeable forums with active members mean people are passionate
about the topic and willing to discuss it and ask questions in the niche.

Use FindAForum.net and Boardreader to find forums or simple Google
searches such as “niche + forum” or “niche + message board”.

CHECK FOR SOCIAL MEDIA HUBS 

If there’s lots of fan pages on Facebook and groups on Twitter then
you’ve got an interactive niche who like to connect.

Simply searching on either platform will bring up groups and fanpages
based on the niche keyword.

You can also check for groups and pages on Reddit, Pinterest, Tumblr,
Squidoo, Google Plus, Scoop It, Youtube and Hub Pages.

These blogs, forums and social media groups can also play a vital role
in driving traffic to your niche project once live.

ARE PEOPLE ADVERTISING ON GOOGLE 

When you search for your niche on Google are there ads displaying at
the top and side of the search results?

If people are paying to advertise there it’s likely they are doing so
because there’s money to be made.

You don’t use paid advertising if you can’t make any money back.

ARE THEIR AFFILIATES IN THE MARKET

Wherever there is a profitable niche there are affiliates promoting the
products. To find them you can use the affiliate target tool:

http://affiliate-target.com/

Or manually do the following

■ Go to Clickbank.com and choose ‘market place’
■ Select your niche from the menu on the side.
■ Choose to sort products by ‘gravity’ to show the most promoted
products.
■ Copy and paste the top product name.
■ Go to Google.com and type in “product name + review”
■ It will bring up results showing people who are reviewing these
products
■ Most will be affiliates.
■ If there’s plenty of people affiliated with the product then it’s
likely profitable.
■ You can repeat this process on Facebook, Twitter, and Google
Plus to find more.
If you see plenty evidence of affiliates promoting it’s likely a profitable
niche.

CAN YOU GET TRAFFIC?

There are endless ways to get traffic to sites as I’m sure you know.

Including SEO, paid traffic, social media, forum marketing, content
marketing (guest posting & content syndication), blog commenting and
more.

You have to work out what your method will be and whether it’s
achievable.

I recommend that you should pick niches that allow you to drive traffic
from a number of different sources and not limited to search engines as
this is unpredictable and not guaranteed.

Earlier in the guide I showed you how to find a list of blogs, forums,
social media hubs and so on - these are potential traffic sources.

Presently I like to focus on this type of traffic for most of my sites as I
find it gives the best return on investment and converts well.

It also builds a relationship with my audience.

Examine the following to see if you
can get traffic

■ Do blogs in your niche allow guest posts?
■ Do they enable comments and let people link to their content
when done in an intelligent manner?
■ Do the forums allow signatures with clickable links or to post
your content?
■ Is there a Reddit sub-reddit on your topic of choice?
■ Are there lots of active social media groups where you can share
your content?
■ Are other blogs putting out good content, if not you can easily
better it but if yes can you still?
■ Are your SEO skills strong enough to outrank your competition?
■ Can you afford to pay for paid advertising and outbid your
competitor?

WHAT’S THE MARKET WORTH

It’s a good idea to know how much money is being spent in a market
and what it’s worth.

■ Go to http://www.statisticbrain.com/ and enter your niche idea
into the search box.
■ This site has an impressive amount of statistics on a wide range
of topics
■ You can usually find out how much money is being spent on a
niche or what it’s worth here.
■ There’s no set number I look for but you’ll want it to be in the
millions.
■ Alternatively if Stastics Brain has no information you can usually
find through a manual search in Google, try “niche + market size”
and “niche + money spent.
■ You can also find a lot of good info on the demographics of your
niche so you better understand your target audience.

ARE THEIR INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE IN THE NICHE

You want to see niches with influencers who share content on social
media.Some niches content just doesn’t get shared much making it
harder for your content to go viral.

■ Go to Topsy.com
■ Click on “influencers”
■ Enter your niche keyword and see if there are influential people
sharing content.

ARE THERE MAGAZINES ON THE SUBJECT

If there are magazines for sale on the subject this is definitely a profitable
niche. People don’t spend money on creating Magazines on topics no
one spends money on.

■ Go to Magazines.com
■ Enter your topic and hit enter
■ If you find magazines on the subject you’ve picked a good niche
■ If there’s no magazines it doesn’t mean it’s NOT profitable but
it’s always a good sign.

HAVE WEBSITES ON THE TOPIC ALREADY SOLD?

What better way to know if your niche is profitable than if there are
already profitable websites on the topic.

■ Go to Flippa.com
■ Click “advanced search”
■ From “auction status” click “all”
■ Choose “websites” from “property type”
■ Click “search listings”
■ Then on the left hand side there’s a “refine your search” option
■ Choose “Revenue (USD/Month)” as $100 to $20,000
■ Record the top 10 results.
If you find websites that have already sold it’s a great sign.

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Remember you should see the following:

■ Over 10,000 Google searches per month for main niche and lots
more for related keywords.
■ Growing or stable on Google Trends showing an evergreen niche.
■ Thousands of products on sale across a variety of retailers and
stores.
■ Lots of blogs and websites on the subject.
■ Lots of discussion forums and message boards.
■ Tons of social media hubs where people in the niche are hanging
out.
■ People advertising on Google.
■ Affiliates promoting products in the niche.
■ Can you easily get traffic.
If all those are present you’ve got a gold mine of a niche.