Identifying Your Niche

The first step is simply to identify a hungry market and in within the market, identify or expand to as many sub-niches within that market. Usually, this is a market that you have acquired some knowledge of, have some personal experience in it or perhaps it is your hobby or a special interest. To make it easier for you to understand, I will show you some examples.

Let’s say you want to work with this market: Dog Market

Why do you choose this market?
You own a dog and you enjoy everything about dogs. Okay, fine.

So you would start by brainstorming and expanding your niche and see what other sub-niches or micro-niches are there:

• dog training: dog training with a leash
• dog sitting: dog sitting in an apartment
• dog grooming tips: dog grooming tips at home for goldies
• dog bathing: reviews of dog shampoos
• dog breeding farms: legal and illegal dog breeders in singapore
• dog breeds: maltese, mini-schnauzer, golden retriever, etc.

Another example: Travel & Vacation

Reason: You just enjoy travelling every now and then. Okay.

What comes to your mind?

• budget travel in europe
• cheap flights to bangkok
• travel adventures in kenya
• beautiful islands of the world
• backpacking in asia
• best beaches in thailand for honeymoon
• destination guides for getaway couples in australia

Please note: Dog market or dog training is not a niche at all. Travel or vacation is also not a niche either. A niche has to be a mile deep and an inch wide. Keep drilling down to very specific topics. Look for a micro-niche.

So use some creativity in order to indentify as many possible micro-niches within that huge market. After getting some reasonable sub-niches you think you can work with, you want to spend much more time doing…

Research, Research, Research

This is what most people miss out and also where all the fun is. Start researching and learning about your market or micro-niches are about. Go to forums, hobby websites, competitors websites, magazines, social networking groups, special interest groups, wherever your niche is go there and find out more in detail about your niche. Listen to what your market is asking for and discussing about. This is how you are going to find out whether you can make this niche work for you.

Also find out what your competitors are doing. You would want to do some long tail keyword and trend research, understand the traffic volume, demand, market size and future growth. You may also want to check if there are any affiliate programs around, because you are looking for a niche that is also easy to monetize.

Now, ask yourself this question: How can I master and dominate this niche?

Watch out for your competitors. If this is a competitive market, you may need to work extra hard to beat your competitors and stand strong among them.

So, What will my strategy be to beat the competition or at least standout among the average competitors? Have that in mind.

Also ask yourself this: If I’m not an expert in this niche yet, do I have the passion, energy, determination, perseverence, resources and time to master this niche?

Imagine this situation, if your audience is smarter than you in this market, do you think you will be able to convince them to buy your idea?

Once you have answered those questions, you will understand why some people are making money from their choosen niche and some not. So often we hear, one’s passion on a subject can make a huge difference towards their success. For me, I always have an absolute belief that my passion will lead me towards my goals in life.

Finally, if you’re lucky, you may come across a niche where there are no competitors. Why are there none or very little competitors? It’s either the niche has very little potential or you found yourself a gold mine! I’m sure you’ll be able to figure that out.

So by now, depending on how confident you are on that niche after weighing every aspect of the niche, you are now able to decide whether that is a niche you want to go ahead with. Always go for a niche that works for you and not one that works against you. I hope you find this helpful in your internet marketing journey. Share with me your thoughts if any and whatever you’re doing in life, live your dreams!

Anyway, increase PageRank you must…

In case you are trying to find out how, here are the 2 easy ways to improve your PageRank:

1. Get more one-way quality backlinks to your site.
2. Use the rel="nofollow" tag in outgoing links.

If you are a rocket-scientist, you can read this to improve your PageRank.

By the way, as some of you may know, my PageRank is still zero as I haven’t been blogging much at all until recently. As I’ll be spending more time here, my PageRank is definitely going to improve in the next 6 months.

Sha Money Maker’s Online Earnings in December 2007

Can Adsense really make money?

5xmom reveals her Adsense income…

What about Affiliate Marketing?

An Interview with Paul Bourque

So, how much money DO YOU want to make online?

What’s The Difference Between Those Who Do And Those Who Don’t?

All I did was try.

All I did was give it a go.

I went in with the right attitude, not knowing whether it would work or not. I believed it would, and I was more pleased with myself for having done the site as it was good practice for my next one.

What’s The Difference Between Those Who Do And Those Who Don’t?

It’s called “Audio Video in Wordpress, New Media Marketing” by Armand Morin and Mike Stewart …

The prerecorded webinar features a short video on History of Info Publishing - you’ll get to see how publishing began 500 years ago and how it has evolved into publishing on Wordpress on the Internet today… something every blogger should know!

It also covers the basics of blogging, why we use RSS, knowing the difference between Conversation Marketing (new media) vs Interrupted Marketing (old media) and some blog case studies…

They also go into very detail on How to Setup a Podcast in Wordpress from recording the podcast audio and uploading into Wordpress… and also a special tool for Video Podcasting, you might wanna check that out if you wanna try video podcasting…

If you’re buliding a relationship with your blog audience or even a list, you’ll be able to pick up some good tips from this webinar…

So grab yourself a drink and click on below to enjoy the free webinar:
http://bloggingav.com/webinar/

Thanks Armand !

The Right Brain vs Left Brain Test … Do you see the dancer turning clockwise or anti-clockwise?

If you are seeing clockwise, then you use more of the right side of the brain and vice versa.

Most of us would see the dancer turning anti-clockwise though you can try to focus and change the direction… see if you can do it. I can make it turn both ways.

LEFT BRAIN FUNCTIONS uses logic detail oriented facts rule words and language present and past math and science can comprehend knowing acknowledges order/pattern perception knows object name reality based forms strategies practical safe RIGHT BRAIN FUNCTIONS uses feeling “big picture” oriented imagination rules symbols and images present and future philosophy & religion can “get it” (i.e. meaning) believes appreciates spatial perception knows object function fantasy based presents possibilities impetuous risk taking

Still thinking whether it is possible to be a millionaire online?

Here’s how a teenager turned an $8 website into a million-dollar empire….

Meet Ashley Qualls, 17 years old and CEO of the website called Whateverlife.com which gets more than 70,000 visitors and 60 million page views a month.

With only $8 borrowed from her mother, she started Whateverlife.com at the age of 14 and today her website has made her more than $1 million !

How it all started :
Ashley became interested in graphic design just as the online social networking craze began to catch fire.

When she saw her friends personalizing their MySpace pages, she began creating and giving away MySpace background designs through Whateverlife.com.

The designs are cheery, colourful and whimsical, with lots of hearts, Ashley’s favorites. She also pulled quotes from popular songs and built backgrounds around those themes.

Ashley’s first cheque was for $2,700. The next was for $5,000, the third for $10,000. She now hires her friends as designers and her own mom to help manage the business.

Although her website makes more than $70,000++ every month, she only pays herself a modest salary of $3000.

Hope this motivates all of you, that nothing is impossible out there… If you have a dream and real passion for something, start taking action today and you will reach your goals…

You may check out the full story at:
http://potw.news.yahoo.com/s/potw/52250/teen-millionaire

Attention Squidoo Lensmasters!

Recently, my high ranking Squidoo lenses and account got terminated for violating Squidoo’s Terms of Service.

It says here:

11. SQUIDOO CAN TERMINATE YOUR USE OF THE SERVICE

Oooo, scary. But true. Squidoo, in its sole discretion, may terminate your password, account or use of or access to the Service (including CO-OP Services), and remove and discard any Lens, for any reason. Some of the more likely reasons for termination are inaccurate information in the registration form, harassment of other Lensmasters (this is a BIG no no), Citizen Squids, SquidooStaff, bloggers and other individuals online. More reasons include hacking Lenses or the Service, automatically redirecting lens traffic to another site, spamming people on and off the site, illegal transactions via Squidoo, and otherwise acting in violation of the terms or the spirit of these Terms of Service or other policies making a Lensmaster a fine, upstanding member of the Squidoo community. If Squidoo terminates your use of the Service, then your Lens may be immediately taken down, and your Squidoo Earnings Account may be closed (and donated to charity). In this event, Squidoo will not be responsible to you or any third party for any termination of your access to the Service. (So, if you sell your lens, make sure the buyer knows this stuff).

Obviously, I was over Squidooing, Squidwhoing and Squidvidding….. I had spent so many hours on my niche lenses, getting a lot of attention but Squidoo just terminate it. I emailed them to ask for it back, but they said I was in violation and they said I can open a new account but they couldn’t give me back any of my lenses (even the ones which was not in violation).

Well, sad and lesson learned… so be careful of what you write, what you put and how you use your Squidoo lens…………