Membership Niche Selection Tips
In order to make sure your membership business is profitable, you have to select the right market. Here’s how.
First – Look for Fanatics
The first step in developing a profitable membership business is to find a market with fanatics in it. Simply put, a fanatic is someone who’s willing to spend time and more importantly money on a topic they are interested in. OK, so we know what a fanatic is, but how do we find them?
- One simple idea that’s easily forgotten is to scan the magazine racks when you’re out and about. It’s becoming increasingly difficult to run a print magazine. So if you see one on the shelves you know they are making money, which means that there are enough people interested in what they’re saying to make it profitable. That doesn’t mean definitely that it will make a good membership business, but it’s a good starting point.
- Watch and listen for fanatics in your daily life. Pay attention to conversations, social events, TV, restaurants, public places to see what people are talking about. If people are talking about it, they are interested in it. And this means there may be a market for information about it.
- Conventions, clubs, and organizations. Once again, if there are enough people interested in a topic to create a club or organization, then there are enough people to build a membership business around it. Conventions are expensive to hold and attend, so if one if going on that’s another strong indication of a good niche to go into with your membership website.
- What about your interests and hobbies? Chances are that if you like a certain topic or hobby, other people do, too. Making money is fun and it’s even more fun if you can do it in a niche you’re excited about.
- One simple and easy way to find out what’s hot is Google Trends. Google Trends tells you the most popular current search terms. These are the things people are actively searching for in Google. They’re searching because they want information. Building a membership business around things people are actively searching for is a great way to ensure your success.
Next – Figure out if there’s money in it
After selecting a possible niche to build your membership site around, the next step is to find out if it’s a profitable niche to be in. An easy way to determine this is to figure out if anyone else is making money in this niche.
Here’s how to determine if you can make money in your chosen niche
- Find out if there are blogs or forums related to it. Just search Google for “YourNiche blog” & “YourNiche forum” and see what comes up. This lets you know there is a market (a group of people actively interested in the niche.)
- Check Amazon, eBay and Google Shopping to find out if others are making and selling products in your niche. If other people are creating and selling products in this niche, it means there is money to be made.
- Monitor Google Adwords to determine if people are running the same ads for weeks in a row. If they are, this means they’re making money on these ads – otherwise, they’d stop running them. Which means there is money to be made in your niche.
Finally – Figure out your barrier to entry
After figuring out a good niche and determining that other people are making money in it, the last thing to do is decide if you will be able to enter the market. How do you gauge the ease of entry?
- Figure out what kinds of products people are interested in. If it’s mostly physical products, coaching and live seminars, then it will be harder to break into this niche. The easiest membership website to create and maintain are information membership sites.
- The next thing to look at is the competition. You don’t want to try to break into a saturated marketing, so figure out how many people are already selling in this niche.
- Compare the size of the market versus the number of competitors. Some competition is a good sign – just make sure the market is big enough for you to join in.
- Market readiness. Are people ready to buy? Are the receptive to marketing messages? Every market is different. Sometimes people are looking for information and are ready to pay for it right now. And sometimes it takes weeks, months or even years for them to make the decision to purchase.
Putting it all together
So far, we’ve talked about exactly what it takes to pick a great niche: One with a hungry crowd of fanatics, who are ready to spend money on information about their topic. And you’ve determined your barrier to entry is small enough to give it a go. If you’ve followed along with these steps you’re success in practically guaranteed. The only thing left to cover is exactly how to run your membership business…
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