Reverse Strategy For Niche Site Building

bynathaniell

100.6K followers

4 years ago

Here's an interesting idea. What if you built an affiliate website back to front? Instead of thinking of a niche idea you want build, then finding affiliate programs, what if you found the affiliate programs first, then built a website promoting that company.

There are pros and cons to doing it this way, but it can work IMO.

I haven't built an entire website like this, but I do publish content like this sometimes, and it's worked out pretty well. What I means is that I'll find some affiliate programs related to my niche, then brainstorm keywords I could use to promote their product.

Reverse Enginnering Your Niche Audience

Of course, a review is obvious. But what other keywords might someone search, for which the solution would be this product.

For example, let's say I wanted to promote cell phones with walkie talkie functionality. Maybe I found a great affiliate program that pays well, and it's a cool product I want to promote. On top of doing a standard product review, I'd also think about WHO would want to buy this and WHY.

• are they in a rurual area?
• are they a prepper?
• do they have kids but can't afford a cell phone for each one?
• do they go hiking in areas without cell coverage?

Then I think about how those people might search for a solution to their issue. Here are some example questions I think someone might type into Google (based on the ideas above).

• how to get cell coverage when out of range
• how to avoid roaming charges
• how to make a phone call after EMP attack
• cheap family phone plan
• best walkie talkies for hiking

So when someone searches, "best walkie talkies for hiking", I can list a couple of good walkie talkie brands, but also introduce them to this cool cell phone which doubles as a walkie talkie, and tell them how it's a better solution that buying and carrying both devices with you.

You could potentially do this with an entire website if you find a good enough affiliate program or affiliate product to promote.

For example, maybe you really want to promote a Trager grill. You could build an entire website for barbecue recipes, smoking techniques, and outdoor cooking.

If you wanted to promote a high paying affiliate program for a miracle mattress that fixed your sore back, then you could do whole website about natural ways to cure back pain.

The downside is that you are reliant on that single affiliate program, and it may take time to get traction.

A Real Bummer of a Story (-$1000)

I actually tried to do this with my beer site and the result wasn't very good. Though my beer site isn't tailored to specifically promote a single product, I had an idea this year to pivot in that direction.

There was a really cool device called a Picobrew that could brew beer via bluetooth and it was small enough to sit on your countertop. The cost was $800+, and they ran their affiliate program through Shareasale.

I planned to do a bunch of cool beer recipes and promote the Picobrew as a way people could reciplicate my recipes.

After investing over $1000 to buy the machine and brew their kits, their affiliate program went offline, and it turns out they were in financial trouble. The machines are hit and miss whether you can buy them or not now, and they certainly aren't looking for new affiliates.

Bummer. I have a cool new brewing machine, and could still do the recipes, but there goes my prize product to promote.

If you are building a website to promote a specific product, and it's a brand new website, you may have to wait to get accepted into their affiliate program, and who knows what will happen in the meantime.

I'm not saying this to scare you away from trying this tactic, I'm just saying that there are some things to consider before doing it.

Lucky for me, I only invested money into the project and it wasn't a year down the road after I invested hundreds of hours (and more money). So I lost about a thousand dollars trying this out, but it wasn't as bad as it might have been.

Final Thoughts

Even if you don't build an entire site this way, the process of reverse enginnering your niche audience and what they search for is still interesting for promoting individual products. I often find keyword sets this way because it changes my thought process and sends me down a different road.

Try it out and let me know what you think!