How To Find Your Niche Market

Finding a niche market that is large enough to be profitable, but is specialist enough that it is not saturated with too many competitors, is often a critical success factor for a business.

This post covers a few areas to steer clear of, some tips on identifying your existing niche, and how to find a new niche to break into.

If you are starting from scratch it is often a good idea to directly target a specific subset of a market (a niche), and if you decide to enter a wider market, in order to compete you will need something that will differentiate you from the competition (and this differentiation effectively creates your niche).

Niches to steer clear of

Put simply, any niche that is too small or where the population of the niche has little or no money, is one to steer clear of.

The following are some broad demographic groups that are generally not worth going for. There are always exceptions to the rule, but it's generally easier to just avoid:

1. The unemployed, homeless and/or bankrupt. There's just simply no money in this niche.
2. Children. Again, children generally do not have any money - so if this niche is chosen it either needs to be aimed at (a) getting the children to get their parents to buy things for them or (b) aimed at the parents themselves, not the children.
3. Students. Unless you're selling essentials, this market generally does not have any money either. There are more exceptions in this case than others, as there are some things students will spend money on, and targeting them via universities can be effective, but it is generally not as lucrative a market as most. As with children, it can be worth targeting parents.

It's also possible to put people trying to save money in this list, although money-saving schemes can actually be very profitable.

Finding your niche

We all have a niche of our own and every time we buy a product or service, whoever we buy it from is quite likely to be targeting the niche that we belong to within their market. As a result, a great starting point when looking for new business opportunities is to look at the niche market(s) we are already part of.

To work out your own niche, ask yourself some simple questions:

1. What do you want / desire? (There will be others out there who want the same things)
2. What are your constraints / what is holding you back? (Helps if the marketing messages empathise with these things, and breaking through them could also be a selling point)
3. What are your interests / hobbies? (If you're interested in something then others will be, and (a) will be easier to empathise with them Asand (b) you already have knowledge to build on)
4. What are your skills? (At work or at home, your existing skills and knowledge may help finding a product to sell or could lead to specific services you could sell)

Finding another niche

So, answering these questions will help identify your niche, but what if it's not quite what you are looking for and you want to break into a new area? Maybe there's just not enough money in the areas you've identified?

In that case you need to find a different niche to target. Whatever you choose, remember that you will need to be able to learn enough about it to enter it effectively, so it needs to be an area that interests you.

To find a new niche, a good starting point is to think about what people spend money on, for example:

• Hobbies and sports: sports, movies, games, music, art, electronics, equipment...
• Money: money-making programmes, getting better paid jobs, investment, budgeting and money management...
• Health and beauty: fashion, cosmetics, dieting, weight loss & gain, body building, vitamins, healthy living...
• Love and sex: finding a partner, dating, relationships, flowers, chocolates, jewelery, greetings cards, gifts...
• Children, pets and family: toys, presents, gardening and diy tools...

Also think about current concerns and market trends. What are people's hopes and fears? What can you do to help with them? Is there something already out there that you can provide your own unique spin on?

Remember that a niche is a subset of another wider market, so if there is a particular area you are already interested in there will almost always be demand for some new product or service, or a more targeted version of an existing one, for a smaller part of the overall market.

Have you found your niche?