To be practical or passionate with your niche
This question has perplexed me greatly over the past few days since joining WA. I'm wavering between three different ideas for niches. I'm trying to take Kyle's advice and not over thinking it, but obviously I am. But I think I've hit upon an important question. Should you choose a practical niche that will be a bit easier to monetize directly or follow a passion where the chances to sell stuff isn't as obvious?
For others going through this dilemma, and to help me organise my thoughts, I've outlined my niche ideas and the issues surrounding them.
Here are my 3 niche ideas:
- A site for beginners looking to buy a guitar and other accessories.
- A site dedicated to the art and craft of short stories.
- A site for people having problems snoring
Passion #1: Guitars
The guitar idea was my first. It is a good niche, and I was gung ho with it initially, but then I started thinking about creating content for it I lost my enthusiasm. I've only ever owned two guitars (one of which I inherited from my Dad) and I'm not really a gadget freak. I don't have any effect pedals. So it might be hard for me to say "this new gadget is awesome". I'm more interested in playing the guitar and song writing. The more I thought about this idea, the less excited I got. I could do it, and do a decent job, but without any passion. I could do a teaching site, but I'm not really a teacher, and there are lots of great sites done by professional instructors. In all honesty, this was me trying to be both practical and passionate. I am passionate about guitar playing, not guitars themselves.
Passion #2: Short Stories
In reality this should be listed as passion number 1. But it really was my second idea. Guitars aren't really my passion, so what is? Fiction Writing. So I took the advice of many people on WA and brainstormed something related to my true passion. That's when I came up with the a dedicated to Short Stories. I got excited about it. But then the devilish details descended on me. What would the audience want? Reviews. The problem with this one is that there are some amazing sites focusing on reviews of books and stories, and I'm not a natural critic. I'm a creator, and I'm actually intimidated by writing reviews. I'm sure I could do it, but it would be time consuming. Good critics do it full time. That's why they're good at it. The more I thought about this idea, the more I realised it might not be a good fit.
What do I want from WA?
But this was troubling. I do feel passionate about guitars and stories, so what's going on?After having a great chat with WA member Taylor, I realised that my big problem is that I'm a creator and not a natural salesperson or critic. It's hard to imagine creating a profitable blog based on my true passions because they're things I make. And this is crux of the situation. I joined WA to earn money so that I can focus on writing. My girlfriend reminded me that whatever I choose, it will be a job and you don't always feel a true passion for your job. Some people do, and they are the lucky ones. I hope one day to earn a living from writing fiction, but in the meantime I need to pay the bills. So I needed to find something that wouldn't be too absorbing, but still be something I have either a knowledge or an interest.
Practical #1: Snoring
One trend I've noticed in going through WA is that many niches focus on solving problems in the form of questions and answers. Kyle's example of belly fat is a prime example. I also read someone's post--I forgot to take note :( about going after niches concerning the really important problems people have like weight loss, job loss, money problems, relationship concerns etc... What was a big problem in my life that I solved or at least improved? Snoring and sleep. After moving in with my girlfriend, and we were past the "nothing you do is annoying stage", I started to get banished to other beds and sofas in the middle of the night. To make a long story short, it turned out that I snored! And after consulting with a sleep doctor and dentist I ended up with a mouth guard that has reduced my snoring and improved my sleeps. So I think I have my niche. Something that's not one of my passions, but something that has affected my life greatly and solved a big problem in my life.
So if you, like me are struggling to find a good niche for you, investigate your own life and think of something that has improved your life. Now I haven't completely abandoned my guitar idea, and it may be one I explore down the road. And the short story idea may appear in some form, but it may not be focused on selling stuff.
Recent Comments
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Hi,
I am in that same boat right now struggling with a niche. It's the 'passion' versus 'I want to make $10k a month' situation. And why couldn't you do all 3 ideas? I go on all these CPA gateways and see tons of offers, some that pay $24 per lead etc, but they are on topics I may know nothing about. However I could just jump on EzineArticles, grab an article regarding the subject, (they allow 25 per year to my understanding) make that my 'blog' or go to 'iWriter' and have someone write me an article for $3 to post on the subject and promote via ad gateways or Google, Bing, Yahoo, Facebook, Youtube, etc. I am personally disconnected from the actual offer or content, with the intent on making money, but I could always fall back on the passion as well and heck, I might even learn something. The way I'm thinking here is in order to make the serious money, you would have to have as many websites and offers running as possible rather than picking one thing and hoping it will make you money. I am new at this so maybe this is the wrong attitude, but I have some pretty ridiculously high expectations in terms of how much money I want to earn doing this.
Hi just my opinion, but Kyle dose touch on it too, concentrate on one website and make it work. You can do it if you follow the lessons, do the tasks and stay focused. Otherwise you are stretching your time and attention in too many different directions.. just a thought to okeep in mind as you go through the training. :-)
Good point Digger, 'go deep, not wide' makes sense, I've heard that one before in affiliate training. Get something to make money before you worry about doing something else.
HI, great questioin, and you did a good job breaking it down. In my opinion go with your passion/ and your first gut instinct. You will have a lot to write so I think having a passion for it will help. If its something your passionate about that will stoke your interest to learning more and that will give you more ideas. I think you can do a lot with guitars, and later maybe you can somehow incorporate writing into it. A lot of people play guitars/ a lot write songs / a lot do both :-) Maybe you could somehow add your writing into the site later, there are differences, but writing stories and writing songs could go hand in hand. I think you could monetize the guitar site in a lot of different ways. You can always rinse / repeat doing another niche later. Anyway just my 1/2 cent lol, good luck to you, i'm sure you will find your way and make a great one :-)
Thanks for your comment. I'm going with the snoring for now. It might be my learn from my mistakes blog. Then I can come back to the guitar one more experienced! haha.
Best of luck on your quest. I struggled for six weeks on picking a niche, you did good with only a few weeks. ;))
haha. I know Kyle said not to over think it, but for first timers like us I think it doesn't hurt to think about it. You want to choose something you're comfortable with.
OK, do your passion. You don't have to be a critic. You can tell people where to find good illustrations or sell their own. You can give them a list of what makes a good illustration or illustrator. Explain how to start a career as an illustrator.
Monetizing, will be more with books on the art of illustration, art supplies, any online courses you might come across. Are there magazines you could recommend?
You can also sell your art and services if you like. WA is about teaching people affiliate marketing, but it's also about how to set up your own website and business. In this case you become your own product.
You can monetize any niche, some have very obvious connections, but with a little thinking you can come up with things that will interest your readers. I wrote a blog post about there. https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/michelle12/blog/how-will-i-make-money-what-will-i-sell
I know. I just want to find something I can monetize more directly. With guitars, I haven't tried too many gadgets and accessories, so I'd feel uncomfortable recommending them. With the snoring niche I've tried many different things, so I have that first-hand experience to share.
Thanks for sharing. I think we all deal with this. I certainly did and do. I honestly don't know how much traffic or affiliate money I can make with the whole privacy thing but I am passionate about it. At this point I'm not worried about the money or traffic I'm just doing it to exercise the learning and get good at it. Later I can pick a very good niche that maybe I won't be passionate about but will have a higher ROI.
This is definitely a great question.
Personally I followed a passion as I felt that it would help me with content generation, especially while I was still learning how to do everything. After about 6 weeks in I started a second more practical site and now run the both of them. This method worked for me and I would definitely recommend it.
I'm glad that worked for you. I started the guitar site, and I probably will go back to it.
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The problem finding the "right niche" is simply that is not easy to profit from it.You can be as passionate as you want about your niche but if it doesn't sell ...what's the point? (unless you have lots of $$$ and you are in Wealthy Affiliate only to do it as a hobby which I doubt)
For example I like a lot the niche of electronics.Especifically tablets and laptops.However I chose WA as my niche because I HAVE NO CLUE on how to profit from the "Tablets and Laptops" niche..What do I do ?...do I sign with amazon or bestbuy as affiliates?,do I dropship?
So that's why I chose to start with WA as a niche (much easier)
Well it looks like WA pays out pretty good for premium member conversions, so not a bad choice, heck I even considered it.