Introduction

 

What is a niche?

Simply put, niche means a defined subject or area of interest.  Examples of niches are weddings, parenting, pets, health, crafts, Christmas, real estate, and so on.  Each of these niches needs written materials to sustain them.

I’ve been ‘working’ the internet for a few years now, and have discovered that most writers are leaving money on the table – simply because they don’t understand, or even know about, niches.

This is an area that can bring you expert status, or can help fill your wallet, depending on your goal.  Usually it will do both.

As you are probably aware, I am the author of several ebooks for writers – all of which I self-published.  Each of these was written because of a distinct need in the writing niche.  In every case, I did research before I began, and asked myself several questions:

v  Who is my target audience?

v  Are there any books of this type already available? If so, how many? (With at least two, I had no competition whatsoever!)

v  Will my book address anything that isn’t currently addressed? (Different angle?)

v  What makes this book stand out against the others? (What can I bring to this book that will make it unique?)

v  Why would people pay money for this book when other books on this subject exist already?

v  What value can be placed on this book – both monetary and usefulness?

v  Would a publisher pick this book up for its commercial value? (Commercial value = saleability)

v  Will the resultant sales cover the cost of the time involved in producing this book/product?

I’ve found that the commercial value of a book is the last thing on a writer’s mind.  And that was true for me also until I took an online course called “Thinking Like Your Editor”. The course emphasised that a book needs to be a commercially viable product for a publisher to pick it up.  In the niche marketing/writing arena, you are the publisher.

The bottom line is this:  if a publisher contracts a book and cannot sell it, they’ve wasted not only their time, but heaps of money as well. (Time is money.)

So before they decide to contract the book, they’ll look at its feasibility, just like I’ve done above.  Just because you’re going to self-publish an ebook doesn’t mean you can fast-track the research or disregard the feasibility factors.  In the end, you’re doing it for more than the satisfaction of a job well-done.  You’re doing it for the potential earnings, and if that book makes little or no money, then you’ve wasted a lot of time and effort.  Hence the reason for research and feasibility studies.

Before I continue onto the meat of the information, let me point out that this report is a brief overview.  It doesn’t go into great depth on each subject, but will give you an idea of the sort of effort involved.

When I wrote my first ebook, there was very little information around.  I struggled for months trying to put it all together.  The help simply wasn’t there.

I don’t want you to struggle, I want you to learn some of the ‘tricks of the trade’ and make your writing career the best and most profitable it can be. 

Let’s begin.....

What is a niche?

Ø  Think about the ‘topic’ or ‘area’ you want to write about.  You might even call it a genre, although in reality it isn’t.

In Australia we pronounce it neesh, which is the original French pronunciation.  In the US they tend to pronounce it nitch.  I guess it’s a bit like the Chinese Whispers game – it changed as it was passed along.

As mentioned briefly in the last section, a niche is basically a well-defined topic (or topics) that you will write about.  One example of a good niche is ‘writing’.  If you look around, you’ll find several large websites on writing.  Some of those (in no particular order), are www.writer2writer.com (my website), www.fictionfactor.com, www.writesuccess.com and www.absolutewrite.com.

Spend some time at these sites and you’ll see they only have products, courses, articles, and resources related to writing.  Fiction Factor goes a step further and has broken the site into several tight niches – for example, Horror Factor, Short-Fiction Factor, and Freelance Factor. 

I’ve broken Writer2Writer into two sites – a general site, and also one for romance writers www.romancewriter2writer.com

Keeping niches fairly tight does two things:

1. Almost guarantees you’ll have a targeted audience. That is, the people who visit your site will be looking for the type of products you sell;
2. The search engines will like your content, and will ‘index’ your site appropriately.

Another good example of niches is the Christmas niche.  It happens that I own a Christmas site (☺) which brings a small seasonal income.

www.bestchristmasrecipes.com was originally set up to sell Christmas recipes – as the name suggests.  But I decided to change it into a site that has mostly free stuff. 

In October this year (2007), I totally revamped the site, gave it a clean fresh look, and made it much more Christmassy. 

(When I first began the site, I put together a Christmas Cookbook; this is a good example of a niche product.)

I’ve added links to other Christmas sites, and also a ‘Santa Script’ which allows people to fill in the blanks, giving them a letter from Santa for their child.  This is also free.

The latter is a big drawcard, and gets people to the site. 

Because I wanted to ‘crank up’ interest in the Christmas site, I decided to buy a whole heap more resources to add – free whenever the license allowed.  To my dismay, I discovered there is a distinct lack of products available in this area. 

So… guess what I’ll be doing – in time for the 2008 Christmas season? You guessed it; I’ll be creating niche products which I’ll sell from another of my sites, one I haven’t done much with yet.

www.originalresaleproducts.com will host (and sell) a range of ‘original’ products that marketers can purchase to resell as they see fit. What I’ve found is that loads of products currently available are simply revamped PLR products.

(PLR means Private Label Rights – a details explanation can be found further into the book.)

The resale rights business can be tough, but I’ve been studying another marketer who is doing exceptionally well in this area.  I’ve found that by watching successful marketers and modeling their business concepts, I’ve been able to generate a moderate online income.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not rolling in money; far from it.  But it does allow me to buy luxury items I wouldn’t otherwise have.

I love creating websites, and I love writing. Combining the two brings me joy, while also bringing a passive (or residual) income.

When I started in the niche/online income area, I did have to retrain my thinking.  Instead of thinking like a writer, I absolutely had to start thinking like both an internet marketer and a business person.  This has helped the bottom line of my business immensely.

You’re probably wondering where the income from the Christmas site is derived.  Certainly not from sales of products; I keep the prices as low as possible, and don’t have a huge range. And I rarely sell anything.

The income from that site mainly comes from Google Adsense.  People click on the links, and I get paid for each click. 

Again, it’s not a huge income, but it all adds up.  I have Adsense on only three sites, and do nothing except put the code up.  I’m earning extra income through them, and I’ve done nothing extra.  (Click here for an example of Google Adsense)

Okay, I’ve digressed again. ☺

Internet Marketing is another niche, believe it or not.  And many people working in this area are making a killing.  Everyone wants to become an IM, so the internet is flooded with products for that niche.  The problem is (again) that a lot of the products are very low quality. 

One IM site is called The Unselfish Marketer.  I am a member of this paid membership site, and this is where I get the majority of resale rights products that I offer for sale on my various sites, and also the products I supply inside Resources4Writers.com

The charges for membership sites are typically not low, but provided you can earn the costs back, it’s usually not a drama.

I believe anyone who can produce high quality products in the IM niche – or any niche for that matter – will be able to earn a good online income.

Here’s another site that is a very good example of niche marketing: 

I’ve been on Denise Hall’s list for a very long time, and have watched as she produced appropriate and timely ebooks for her subscribers. (And purchased some of them.)

At the time of writing this report, I’ve just purchased her latest offering as it is appropriate to my Christmas website, and indeed anyone who wants to make some additional income during the holiday season. 

You can check it out here.  You’ll see that Denise knows her audience, and what their buying triggers are.  This is something that produces a consistent income for her, and has done for several years.

Read the Table of Contents for this book