How to Choose Your Best Niche for Affiliate Marketing
Interested in starting an affiliate marketing business? Good for you! Now Step One is to choose a niche.
Affiliate marketers never seem to tire of talking about niches: I’m in this niche, I’m in that niche, the health niche, the make-money-online niche, the dating niche the blag-blah-blah niche.
“Don’t even think about starting an online business without first choosing your niche and then niching down further!” I mean, what on earth???! Well, the thing is this: if you don’t choose your own little niche in the vast expanses of cyber space, then you’re just not going to get heard or seen. It’s like trying to shout to get your friend’s attention when you’re standing next to the track at a Formula One rally. Might as well forget it.
So what is a Niche, and why are marketers so obsessed by them?
Well, I found this definition for you: Adjective: denoting products, services, or interests that appeal to a small, specialized section of the population
And I think that defines it pretty well: you need to figure out what products and services are going to appeal to your chosen target market; your ideal audience. How can you capture their attention and give them what they are looking for? And what are they looking for?
A Good Place to Start
Is a personal interest of yours: something that you know about yourself; something that you find yourself reading about online, or watching You Tube videos about. Even better if you’re already an expert in the subject, because then you’ll be able to enthuse your audience and they’ll love gobbling up all the content you produce to learn more about your subject. Plus you’ll find it easier to build that magic ingredient of online marketing which is authority. If you can establish yourself as an expert in your particular niche, then people are far more likely to buy from you, than from someone who comes across as not really knowing what they are talking about.( Winner, winner, chicken dinner, as they say. )
Yes, that’s all very well, but my area of expertise is in creating knitting patterns for mice.
Well, this is where you’ve got to get your commercial head on and do the research. You’re going to need to ask our wise friend Google how many people are searching for knitting patterns for mice, or juggling balls for frogs, or whatever obscure area of expertise you may have. The harsh fact is, is there are very few people searching for answers in your niche, then don’t waste your time, because it would be super difficult to make any real money out of it.
Some Unusual Niches to Consider
Ok, so the mouse mittens niche is way too tiny, I’m sure you appreciate that. But here are a few more unusual niches for you to contemplate which can be surprisingly profitable. Think of it this way: you don’t need zillions of visitors to your site to be profitable; it’s not so much a numbers game as a motivation game. Your ideal audience consists of people who are passionate about your niche, and happy to spend money in that niche.
Have you considered starting your business in any of these areas?
Elder care- lots of middle aged people are researching this topic as their parents are getting on in years and needing more help
Virtual assistant business- there’s a huge demand for virtual assistants as the number of people who are setting up their own home businesses has increased massively due to the pandemic
Gluten free eating- the food intolerance sector is massive
Get into college- tips on preparation for college, including advice on finance and accommodation, as well as academic courses
Haircare- there’s a huge potential for a home business here, especially if you really niche down: specialise in Afro hair, or vegan hair products, for example
Crochet- since the pandemic hit us and we all had to spend more time at home, the whole crafting industry has really expanded. Think knitting, crochet, painting, card-making….the list goes on. Here you are going to be thinking about creating videos ( how to..) selling craft supplies, patterns etc. Think about creating your own courses, or selling someone else’s.
Language learning: Arabic, Japanese, German…..the language niche is massive, and people are prepared to pay to learn them. You could create your own course and run a subscription business, including producing and selling your own course materials.
Deep sea fishing- the fishing niche has a highly-engaged audience who are willing to whip out their credit card to spend money on fancy fishing gear. If you’re passionate about fishing, this is a great niche for you, but there are already plenty of well-established fishing sites out there, and remember that, as a beginner, you’re going to be a very small fish in a very large pool. (Sorry, couldn’t resist!)
So…..think deep sea fishing, or salmon fishing, or fishing in Scottish rivers. In other words: specialise, so that your site offers something that all the others don’t.
Learn Wordpress, Python or Java. Sites which involve teaching a specialist skill have great potential for profitability. If you can teach someone a skill that they really want to learn, then they are prepared to pay for it; especially if that skill is going to be something that your students are going to be able to recoup their spend from later down the line. If you can teach someone the skills required to be a mortgage adviser, for example, then they will know that they won’t need to find too many clients to easily pay back the course fees that they originally paid to you.
Is This Niche Really a Viable Business Proposition?
Ok, so now perhaps you have a good idea about which niche you’d like to start your business in- but is it really a viable business proposition? Let’s look now at the factors you need to consider before you launch.
High Search Volume, but Low Competition
The golden rule is to find a niche which has high search volume, but low competition. What that means is that there are plenty of people interested in the niche- researching it and asking questions- but low competition. That means that there aren’t so many people producing content about the niche- especially established big players- that you can’t compete with them as a fledgling business without a million pound advertising budget.
How To Research
There are lots of paid tools for doing this research, but you can do it for free by opening up an account in Google Ads and then use the Keyword Planner tool. In order to do this, you’ll have to set up an advert, but don’t worry, because you won’t have to run it. Just fill in the boxes within Google Ads but don’t publish the campaign.
Once you’ve done those steps, then type in some words which describe your niche, and then go to ‘search volume and forecast.’ This will show you the numbers of searches for your niche topics and give them a score, as to whether they are high, medium or low competition keywords. It’s not an exact science, but it will give you a good idea.
Avoid Keywords With High Search Volume
Strangely enough, although high volume words are those which are being searched for most, these are the ones you want to avoid as a beginner. This is because they are search terms which are the most competitive, and as you are starting off as a very small fish in a massive pond, you simply don’t have a chance of achieving so much as a nibble. Those words are dominated by the huge companies which have been around for years and have mahoosive amounts of cash to spend on advertising.
No, you’re looking for the words with high search volume ( lots of interest) but low competition.
What Next?
Let’s take the next step. Following your keyword research, let’s imagine that you have managed to find a niche you’re interested in that has a high volume of people searching it out, but low competition. Sounds promising….but can you actually make money from it? This is your next topic for research: what are you actually going to be able to sell to generate a good income?
Courses: these can be extremely profitable, as your ideal audience will be prepared to spend to learn the skill you’re offering when you have convinced them that you know what you’re talking about. The knack to this is to publish plenty of free content on your chosen platform ( your website, Facebook page etc) to build your authority and gain the trust of your audience, but then to ask for payment if they want to know more. In other words, if they really want to know how to do it, they need to buy your course.
If you have worked hard on building your authority and gaining the trust of your audience, then you won’t meet with too much resistance when you ask them to get their credit card out and pay to learn more.
Creating a Digital Asset
Creating your course involves a fair amount of effort and time on your part, but once it’s done, then you can sell it time and time again; tweaking it where required. Therefore your course will pay you back many times over. If the idea of designing and writing your course scares the pants off you, then you might wish to engage the help of the free artificial intelligence tool, chat.openai.com and choose the ‘One click course creator.’
You will need to enter your prompts for what you want your course to look like, but the result will at least be a great starting point for you, and avoid the dreaded blank page of terror.
Speaking of digital assets: these can be a real money generator for you. Think about what downloadable assets you can create in your niche: e-books, how-to guides, quick-start guides, recipes, instructions….the list goes on. You can create these and offer them for free as lead magnets to entice prospects to sign up to your email list, and then offer them your paid downloads when you have won over their trust. Again, once you have gone to the trouble of creating these, they are going to be able to create income for you for years to come.
Create a digital asset business: you could create a very profitable business purely by creating and selling digital assets. Have a look at Etsy.com and see the massive potential that exists there: huge traffic and a huge variety of products you could create and sell.
Stressing about how to create digital assets? Go to Copyai and get them created for free!
Selling Services: there is a great demand for freelance services. You may wish to read this article: https://wearecityliving.com/blog/top-5-most-in-demand-freelance-jobs-for-2023
This discusses the top 5 freelance skills which are currently in the highest demand:
Social media management
Web app development
Translating
Videography and photography
Admin tasks
I Can’t do any of Those!
Perhaps one of these ideas sounds like a great business prospect to you but you don’t currently have the required skilset. Don’t worry! You’ll be surprised how quickly and cheaply you can learn to perform many tasks, so don’t let that put you off. Let me suggest popping over to Udemy.com and browse the recommended courses: they’re amazingly cheap and high quality. Then get to work learning the skills you need.Depending on your commitment to acquiring the skills and knowledge required, you could have learned everything you need to start your own business within the space of a few months.
Getting Started as a Service Provider
You may wish to start off your freelance career by setting up your profile on the freelancing websites such as Fiverr, Upwork or Freelancer. There are pros and cons to be considered here, including the fact that all of these sites take a slice of your profits as their fee. However, they do have massive traffic and will give you the chance to get started with working with clients and learning the skills you’ll need to get your business off the ground.
Research whether your chosen niche has any high ticket affiliate programmes for you to promote. You’ll find that, surprisingly, it isn’t actually any harder to sell products with a high price tag and those with a low one, and it’s those high ticket items which are going to get the money rolling in for you.
Low ticket or free items are handy for getting people to sign up onto your email list, but they’re not going to pay your bills. However, once you have those interested people on your list, that’s when you can promote your high ticket offerings to them through your email sequences.
Value Ladder
You may have heard of the term ‘value ladder.’ This is the process whereby a lower priced product brings someone into your sales funnel easily, and subsequently offers them other items at increasingly higher prices. You may get someone to download your free ‘how-to’ list in exchange for their e-mail address, and then make them further offers, until finally you’re inviting them to your one:one coaching programme, for example.
Recurring commissions: these are the programmes which earn you a monthly recurring commission, such as email auto-responders, web hosting etc. Supplements also often are pretty good at paying out monthly, as want to renew their supplies regularly. See whether there are any such programmes within your chosen niche, as these can build up to bring in a healthy monthly income for you over time.
Evergreen Products
Be cautious about setting up a business purely based on a current fad as it may have a very short lifespan. Think fidget spinners: at one point, not so very long ago, all the kids wanted one and businesses were selling them left, right and centre. Yes, I am sure that at the height of the craze there were savvy businesses coining it in selling them, but when the craze was over then there were also plenty of businesses left with a shedload of unsold stock that nobody wanted any more.
Google Trends is a useful research tool here, as it will show you what search terms are trending at any one time, and which are fading out. It’s easy to feel that a product is still very much in demand when in reality it’s actually beginning to die out, and is therefore not a great idea for an evergreen business.
When considering signing up for affiliate programmes, make sure that you research the commission rates they offer and do some maths: ask yourself just how many sales you’d need to make in order to generate the income you desire. You don’t want to be busting a gut to make just a few measly pounds: that’s not the lifestyle of financial freedom you’re aiming for!
Looking for programmes which offer a great affiliate commission?
Consider selling luxury items- the luxury watch market pays out great commissions, for example. There are also affiliate programmes for companies that offer private jet flights and luxury yacht sales and cruises. Look for where the money is and do your research.
Private Boat Charter Programmes
You may wish to include this article in your research: https://highpayingaffiliateprograms.com/yacht-affiliate-programs/
As the author of the article writes:
“Boat affiliate programs may be an opportunity you’ve never thought of before as an affiliate marketer.
The boat sale and rental business is doing very well and it’s not just for the ultra-affluent.”
Bill Burnice
Now, there’s an interesting niche, that most people wouldn’t have thought of.
Conclusion
Well, that’s it from me for now on the subject of choosing a profitable niche for your online business venture. I really hope that I’ve given you some useful guidance on finding the one that suits you the best, and will grow into the business you dream of. I certainly wish you all the very best, and I’m off to knit some socks for mice now- let me know if you want the pattern, won’t you?!
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