How to Make It Work

According to many internet marketing “gurus,” finding and choosing a niche market is the first, critical step in any internet marketing campaign.  Gurus are those self-made, or self-proclaimed ‘experts’ you’ll eventually run into if you dabble in the dizzying field of internet marketing.  Yes, some are very clever and have made a lot of money, thanks to their savvyness.  But most are just rehashing, repackaging, and hawking old get rich quick schemes to unsuspecting newbies.

Anyways, the concept goes like this:  Find a profitable niche and monetize the heck out of it with information products, membership sites, and/or continuity programs.  A niche is a narrowly-defined market; for example:

• halitosis (bad breath) sufferers
• people who have obsessive compulsive disorder
• model train collectors
• German cuckoo clock collectors
• Civil War buffs
• Halo gamers

In a profitable niche, people buy things related to the niche, making it monetizeable.   Now, the reason why niche marketing is so talked about is that, being a narrow topic, it: (1) is easier to market to because it is so narrow (think easier Google rankings); and (2) isn’t that crowded; i.e., not as many people selling to it.  Therefore, according to overzealous gurus, finding a profitable niche market is the key to a successful internet marketing campaign.

But hold on.  Let’s put our thinking cap on for awhile.  Can an outsider actually pass himself off as an expert in a particular niche?  Can some regular Joe, not knowing a thing about, let’s say, model trains really write and sell an ebook on How to Make Model Trains to people who have actually been doing it most of their lives, in some cases?  There is only so much you can teach yourself about a niche you’re not familiar with.  The rest of it comes from years of experience.  Only those who are true members of the niche market will be familiar with the terminology, the slang, the history, the leaders/authority figures, and other fine details.  An outsider posing as an expert is probably going to stand out as an outsider 8 times out of 10; whether it be revealed in his product, his email autoresponder messages, his forum postings, or website.  They will reflect either incorrect information, or shallow/ generalized / useless comments.

I’m not saying it can’t be done; I’m just suggesting that it’s not as simple as the gurus make it out to be.  You can’t just pick a niche as an outsider and expect to teach and sell to real members of the niche by slapping together some cheap ebook or making a generic mini-course.  You are better off entering a market that you are active in yourself, primarily through your career (job) expertise, or one of your hobbies or interests you participate in.  If you try to pick a topic you are not at all familiar with, you won’t be convincing, and you won’t be as motivated.

Something to think about before jumping on the “niche craze.”