Affiliate Marketing: Day Two

You are welcome to the second day of your affiliate marketing training.

Day 2 Objective: Researching And How to Choose Your First Niche

Choosing your First Affiliate Niche:

One of the most important decisions you make is which niche or market to go into first. For your very first niche I suggest a topic that you’re very knowledgeable in.
But having knowledge or interest regarding something doesn’t necessarily make it a lucrative market to go into online.
For example, your topic might be too narrow and doesn’t have a large enough audience which is not a good one to enter. Also, choosing a niche that’s too broad, such as the money making niche, will be met with large competition that you’ll have a real hard time gaining ground there either.

So What Niche Should You Choose?

For starters, these are the three best evergreen markets to enter online. They are as follows:

1. Health
2. Relationships
3. Money

I know those topics are very broad but it's OK, please stay with me, because we’re not done yet.
You can never go wrong if you pick a market related to either of these three topics. If you really think about it, we all deal with these topic one way or the other in our daily lives. And they also seem to cause people the most problems as well (which is why they’re so damn good for us!).
People spend a lot of time, money and energy trying to improve and iron out anything related to these three topics. Which will always be the case so if you need some ideas just think about problems people face and are looking to find solution to. People are happy spending money to make life easier in these three key areas.
There are tons of competitions in these three areas but also tons of money to be made as well. Competition in your niche signals that money is already being made in that niche. And you’re not going to be competing with all of them but rather only a segment.

Would You Rather Be A Big Fish In A Little Pond? Or A Little Fish In A Big Pond?

It’s your choice. Here are the two different schools of thought on niche selection.

Big Pond, Little Fish:
Many marketers prefer to get into a huge online market and cut just a little piece of the pie. Examples of these markets include the making money niche or solutions to mental health market.

Little Pond, Big Fish:
Other marketers like the idea of being the top dog of a small segment in a large market. Examples of these markets would be smart money management for seniors niche or the social anxiety in children market
See the difference?
Neither strategy is wrong. You just have to pick the one that favors you. I happen to prefer the little pond, big fish strategy since I always enter a new market with the intent of being in it for the long haul. And I know that if I start small I can always add other elements of that niche as I expand my reach and influence.

My Methodology For Niche Selection

After choosing a market, you should look for untapped opportunities within the niche you’re exploring. Explore sub-niches of your target market to find aspects of it that are yet to be accessed. Think specialization and focus on becoming an expert on a particular field or Issue. Your goal should be to become the go-to marketer in a particular segment within that niche.
That’s what I did with the site you’re on now. While researching on the affiliate marketing niche I noticed that nobody was really into it, so, that’s where I made my start. I researched as much as I could regarding this particular segment of the market until I could comfortably write and enlighten people about it. Before I knew it I was ranking high in the search engines on my keywords and had people seeking advice from me on high end affiliate programs and selling to the affluent.
Drill down into your chosen topic like this example:

mental health > anxiety disorders > social anxiety > panic attacks > panic attacks in children

If your chosen niche is really competitive you may need to drill down so far that the market segment may be too small for you to make decent money. But it's OK since you can start springing upward again once you start making your mark in your niche. Eventually through expansion you’ll have the market share you need.

Tips For Finding Lucrative Niches:

-As I stated earlier, you start with your passions, interests or any area you are an expert in. It’s smart to make a short list in order to analyze and determine the one with the most potential.
-Search for competitors. competition signals that others are already making money in that niche.
-The three most successful niche categories fall into health, money and relationships. They are things on everyone’s mind thereby people will spend money on improving each of them. These outstanding categories will always provide good money-making opportunities for you.
-Pay attention to other people. Have you ever spoken to someone at your place of work or in a social atmosphere and been blown away by their passion for a particular topic? Genuine passion is unmistakable and it is often a great indicator of a potential niche market for you to explore.
-Search for the nearest magazine rack or stand. If you really think about it, magazines exist to cater to specific niche markets. If that niche market isn’t lucrative enough to pull in profitable advertising dollars, it will fail. So your research has been done on it! If there is a magazine for sale regarding a topic, there is money being made in it.
-Make use of search engine(google, bing, etc). Are people paying for ads for keywords on your topic or niche? If so, there is money being made in that space.
-Check Google Keyword Planner to see how many searches per month are occurring for keywords in your niche. This is a valuable free tool that will help you in understanding actual search terms and market size.
-Make sure to visit the bookstores to get Barnes and Noble before they’re all gone. Take a look at the number of books on a specific topic. Also take note of the labels on the shelves and the categorization of broad topics. There are a tons of data looking right back at you.
-If you’re targeting the affluent market look for exclusive, unique and hard-to-find products and services.
-If you’re probing the low end of the market, search for solutions to problems instead of vanity products. The key is to look for things that people need to buy rather than want to buy. Look for a topic that gets people emotionally charged.
-Pay attention to TV commercials and advertisements. Television adverts deals with tread. Pay attention not only to what they’re selling but also the angle they are taking to get your attention and act on your impulses. There is a lot to be learnt because companies spend a lot of money on television ads just to get it right .
-Dive down into your market for sub-niches. Go a mile deep. Are there opportunities to expand your market once you pick a topic? Are there multiple products and services for sale in this niche?
-Go to ebay.com and amazon.com to see things that are trending. Amazon has simple tools that allow you to browse by subject, popularity, sales, and even analyze trends with their “Movers and Shakers” feature.
-Focus on one niche to begin with and become an expert in that niche or topic. Don’t be a “jack of all trades – master of none”. If your first niche doesn’t work out quickly find a new one. If you’re going to fail then try, fail,and keep moving forward.
-Go to clickbank.com which is the holy grail of digital information products. I say that because they really are the largest and most profitable digital retailer in the world. Their marketplace is loaded with tens of thousands of products that you can sort by in lots of categories. If you haven't started making money on clickbank, you need to get started… now.
-Follow the money. Do a little research on Google for what people are spending money on right now. Go where the money is flowing and set up shop.
-Plan for the future. For example, I know for a fact that driverless cars are the next HUGE market. So you can jumped on it and purchase several domains in that space for future sites. Likewise the drone market.
-Is the market sustainable? Following trends is good for some quick cash but will that money flow long term? Think about what happened to Beanie Babies. People that invested thousands of dollars in them were left with boxes without worth.
-Visit magazines.com. This website is a wonderful resource for finding tons of niche markets. The magazines are even broken down into categories and ranked by popularity. This is a goldmine folks!
-Listen to what people are complaining about. It’s annoying yes, but it can also clue you in to what problems people are looking to solve to help simplify their lives. If one person has a problem, it’s likely that many other people also have the same problem. Think of it this way, wherever there is a problem lies an opportunity. Solve it for them and make money.
-Think! Make use of your intuition, brainpower, and powers of observation to solve problems. Some of the best ideas ever thought of resulted from initial mistakes or applications of other ideas applied way outside the box.

So start digging into the possibilities and choose your first niche.