Strategies that Help You Build Profitable Niche Websites
As you begin building and selling websites, you might be wondering how fellow web builders come up with ideas for their niches in the first place. The key to finding profitable niche websites is a combination of creativity and timing. If you can leverage both successfully, you can be on your way to building a website that provides you with a legitimate passive income stream. Once you can prove a website is profitable, you can justify a higher premium at the time of sale.
Buy a Notebook and Become a Master at Identifying Trends
A couple years ago, 3D printing was all the rage. While the niche is still within its infancy, many entrepreneurs jumped aboard the 3D printing train as soon the topic became popular. It is important to notice trends the first time they pop up on your radar. It may be helpful keep a notepad handy or utilize an app such as EverNote or OneNote in efforts to record your thoughts.
The last thing you would want to do is mistakenly forget all about your potential million dollar idea. Or in the case of the 3D printer, you wouldn’t want to jump into already saturated market even though experts suggest that they market is still growing rapidly. You want to look for opportunities in their absolute infancy in order to gain a maximum edge.
Finding Trends – Where do you start?
Think about the things you know a lot about. It could be technology, it could be a sport or it could even be a minor inconvenience you experienced which required you to do online research in order to solve the problem. These places are a good starting point for formulating a niche. Once you begin getting deeper into a broad subject, niche items will begin to stick out like a sore thumb and you will likely be able capitalize on these opportunities.
Take a Keen Interest in Startup Companies
Many startup companies are looking for ways to make their very first sales. Startups often announce to the world via press releases that they are officially open for business. On the press releases, the startups often talk about what it is that they sell and what it is that they think their product can accomplish. This information is like gold to those who have invested in to the website entrepreneur mindset. Websites such as PRnewswire and Bloomberg routinely publish press releases from startup companies. Startups are often receptive to inquiries they get so if they product does not already have an affiliate program, you could email the founders and suggest it. If they like the idea, you could be their first member which could be advantageous to your long term plans.
Startups often provide unique solutions to quirky problems. Perhaps you find a startup that has identified a problem that you strongly agree with. You see the market in its infancy. The web entreprenuer inside of you says, “You know, maybe I should make a note of this niche and do some research to see if an authority website or an affiliate based directory exists.” You get home and there’s little to nothing to found and you realize a sweet domain name is available for registration. You plop down the $10 and you start loading up WordPress and begin building.
Pro-tip: If you happen to know something about the startup’s specific market, you could be responsible for connecting this startup to its first few customers via your new website. Your website could become the defacto authority for this newly discovered niche and this could parlay itself into a serious revenue stream for your enterprise.
You should always keep an eye on the popular news aggregation websites such as Google News, Reddit and even the most popular trending items on Twitter. These resources can help you formulate ideas that can help you get an idea off the ground that no one else has already capitalized upon. Knowing about up and coming items that starting to get a lot buzz online can become your ticket to passive income rewards.
Keyword Research is Necessary
Before you start registering domains and writing content, it is important to come up with a report that identifies all of the specifics about the keywords you want to target. This bit of intelligence can likely give you the metrics you need in order to determine whether or not your website can become a profitable entity.
Google’s keyword tool helps website entrepreneurs gauge how much a search engine exposure a specific term gets. If the term is not being searched for at all, you must use your better judgment in order to tell if the product or service will even pick up steam at all. If you believe you can penetrate the top 10 spots for certain keywords within your niche, go ahead and begin building content and see if you can get any of your traffic to convert into sales or Google AdSense revenue.
Note: If you do not think you will be able crack the top 10 search engine results for a specific combination of long tail keywords that you have verified receive search engine results, it may be wise for you to look into an easier niche. Otherwise, you may be required to make a significant investment in terms of time and capital which will enable you to get the traffic and profits you desire.
Capitalizing on a Niche: It’s a Science
It is important to begin capitalizing on your niche as soon as you discover it. If you discover a niche because you were the person wanting to buy the product initially, it’s entirely plausible and probable that someone else on earth has experienced the same problem and they would also like to buy said product. You must ask yourself, “Would an authority website help me purchase this product directly from a merchant that I link to on my authority website?” If the answer is yes, you’ve likely found a product that others would buy online. If you can build a website that presents a solution while providing yourself an avenue to profit, why wouldn’t you jump on that opportunity? You may want to get your notebook back out and begin writing any and all ideas down that pertain to your discovered niche.
Validate Your Profitability of Your Newly Discovered Niche
How can you be sure you aren’t wasting time building a website for a topic no one but you wants to read? Ultimately, that is the biggest concern for many website entrepreneurs who want to begin building niche websites for profit but the truth is that you must approach the opportunity with a different mindset. It’s always better to build a website around a topic you are passionate about so you do not lose interest. Otherwise, you may be required to become an expert at the niche topic you discover because you may be the sole source for new content; especially if you are bootstrapping your operation.
Content will be the Say All, Be All for your Website
You should want to provide the most amount of content on your particular subject as humanly possible through out the presentation of your website. Some veterans in website entrepreneurship will recommend a 50 page minimum for a content authority website. It should be noted that it is entirely possible that you will need to go above and beyond that number given your specific topic. If your niche is a robust topic, you may want to consider hiring contractors to help write content for your website.
Hiring contractors gives you flexibility as you can astutely navigate your writers in the direction you wish. You can have your writers focus on certain keywords and adhere to deadlines that you yourself may not be able keep. Websites such as Elance and Freelancer are available for entrepreneurs to have the ability to contract out small jobs should they need assistance in generating content for their websites. Once you discover profitable website niches, acting upon the idea and generating content as quickly as possible is often the correct strategy because someone else can always beat you to market if you hesitate or procrastinate on a particular idea.
