Market Research
Step One - Research, Research and... Yes, more Research
The first step and the key to a profitable online business starts with your market research. Your research efforts will determine your success or failure in online marketing…
Too few people who start out online take this step seriously and end up wasting their time, money and effort. Market research is one of the key ingredients to your success. If you are unsure where to go to get started, start with a topic that is popular or research areas which you are passionate about, these may include your interests, your hobbies and anything else you are particularly knowledgeable about. Once you have a broad topic area you should start at the source of information, you could try local bookshops, newspapers, magazines or even Amazon.com.
Select a broad topic first before narrowing it down into targeted niches. That way it gives you more choices. Try typing in keywords or key phrases to find out their popularity on the internet. At the end of the day, you will need to determine the kind of information that your market is searching for. Once you have determined your subject area, take a few key phrases and then move to the next step where you should check on its competitiveness and profitability.
For the next step, you will need to open up your internet browser and go to Wordtracker (http://www.wordtracker.com) which is one of the most popular keyword research tools. To confirm whether you are on the right path, you will need to go to Google and type in the few keywords or phrases that you have focused in on. Take note of the natural listings, which are on the left and the sponsored listings on the right. Questions to ask, who is your competition in this market? Are there enough listings on both sides to justify your venture into this particular market? If there are too few listings on either side, perhaps you might want to reconsider entering this market. This should only a general rule of thumb as you may stumble into a hot untapped market, but just honing in on the wrong keywords or phrases… This being the case you need to do more research on the chosen target market or niche.
Niche marketing is all about focusing in on a small section of a market that is not being readily served by the mainstream product or service marketers. Niche marketing is a common path to online business success. No retailer can be all things to all people, and there are always going to be segments of the population whose needs for particular products or services are going unmet. Niche marketing is not about trying to be everything to everybody. Instead, the goal is to satisfy the wants and needs of a specific group of consumers better than your competition. Niche marketing is finding a small, unused area of the market that has a special area of demand… a small corner of the world that larger online businesses and retailers have no interest in.
