How to Choose Your Niche!
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How to become a blogger
Working out how to become blogger, or hubber, is a tricky path. To be taken seriously by search engines, you need to specialize in specific fields and to gain the most traffic, each field needs to be a niche market.
Although this may come as a surprise to you, writing about what you enjoy is still the best approach. The trick is to narrow your interest down to a specific area of your interest via some good keyword and niche research. This will involve starting with search phrases that you would search for about your interest, then looking at the suggested keyword phases for low competition markets. This will take time, but you can secure good traffic by doing this at the start. What you are looking for is instead of only writing about golf, you narrow it down to a specific place, technique, competition or equipment that is reasonably popular, but not dominated by big players.
Finding your niche is not the easiest thing to do. Hence, for myself, I like to write about things I enjoy along with the niche products or subjects that I focus on. This will also show to your readers and encourage people to follow you, as what you write about is not only to gain traffic and sales, but also interesting and about things that you clearly enjoy. You have to expose yourself to your readers (not in the illegal way!!) to get them to connect with you and hopefully like you or your style.
So, where do you start? Well, a few important and helpful points that you might want to consider are:
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What is the latest trend?
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What is a popular product/activity?
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What is a bad product/activity/food/lifestyle?
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Which problems cause people to search for answers?
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Which websites could help your followers? (once you have some)
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Could you expand the focus of a niche?
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What small things make a great difference to your life/work/travel?
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What are your specialist subjects or success stories?
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What is changing? Media, technology, techniques ....
In addition to these points, also listen to your followers. If you write about a website and your followers ask questions about how to use it, hmmmmm .... what could you do? Well, write a guide to that website of course! Your followers are clearly interested and so this also implies others will be looking for this information. Hence, it would only be polite and wise to actually meet the clear demand for this information.
If you are still stuck for ideas, you could also try a niche magazine. Although they are obviously not going to give your your exact niche, as they advertise their ideas to thousands or millions of readers, they should be able to inspire you, at least one niche section should spark some ideas that you can then expand with the above tips.
Also, once you have written your blogs/hubs, you may want to review them. Keeping your information up to date and relevant will also help you to rank better in search engines and in turn gain more readers. Hence, if you are stuck for what to write about, take the time to reread some of your old articles and update/tweak them.
So, now you have your niche ... or at least an idea for one. Now get over to the Google Keyword Tool and start writing. If you are not in too much of a rush, I'll also ask you to consider having a read of a couple of my marketing hubs that explain how to promote you hub/blog and draw in readers.
Boost your Website/Blog - Create some Backlinks Daily
Submit your Blog to Search Engines - Get More Readers!
Good luck, I hope you will be successful!
© Copyright 2012. Brett.Tesol - Full terms available on Brett.Tesol's profile page (click the blue link for profile, failure to read the Copyright Contract could be expensive. The act of copying this work means that you accept the full terms of the contract, regardless of whether or not you have read it).
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This is a very useful hub. Great advice for those who are interested in creating successful blogs. Thank you. :-)
Looking for a niche is the first and the most important step/decision you will make. Since this will judge how much work you need to do. Depends on the keyword you know how much competition you need to overcome to rank in google.
There are some good tips in here.
I like to write on health related topics.
But they are very slow to pick up.
Thanks for sharing
Area's of interest are the best choice. Especially if you plan on earning a living from the internet. Our area of expertise is one of the hardest. Search engine optimization changes about as often as I change my shirt it seems. Social media runs just a little less.
Voted up, interesting, and sharing on twitter.
I write fast news articles for my real pay, so when I get here, it's hard to settle down. I do like the science and social issues and cooking most. Thanks for the tips.
Hi Brett,
I write about many topics and have learned along the way to write in more of a niche mode...no matter what the topic is about. I also knew nothing about keyword research when I started out writing on HP. This is a continual learning process. Good advice in this hub. Up and shared!
Thank you for your replies. Although some choose to specialize in a particular niche, I personally do not. What I do do however, is to take my interest areas and write niche articles, that are highly targeted at a small interest are of a subject. If you would like to see how you can find these areas, please have a read of my Keywords guide, as it explains how to find low competition markets.
Great advise and useful, thanks for the information.
Very interesting and helpful advice. I'm curious what the generalists here have experienced about niche-ism? I've always written about diverse topics (for publications), but I can see that might confuse things from a search-engine standpoint. Any advice for those of us who have multiple topics? Guess I could develop multiple IDs here . . .
Thanks for publishing this - voted up and useful.
Because I have many interests, focusing on a niche is sometimes difficult for me. Your list of suggestions on how to start are very helpful. Writing is so much easier when it's about something you know well. Thanks for SHARING!
I like your advice ~ well written article as well.
When I first came on the net I was introduced to Ed Dale - he has excellent advice and a "pulse" (somehow, lol) on how the net changes for the niches. You might enjoy him as well. Thanks for the hub.
Hi peoplepower73,
So long as you don't change the URL, it shouldn't be too bad. What will make a difference though is changing your keywords (especially in titles), as this can cause you to change rapidly in search results. This can be good, but can be bad too, so do your research first.
Great hub - as always Brett. I know the subjects I enjoy writing about and also my niche which is my working background. Researching keywords is so important for ranking, as is checking for popular topics or questions.
Loads of great advice too - thank you so much. Voting up.
Brett, Great advice as always. If I tweak my hubs, say the title or the summary, coes that mess up my ranking in search engines?
Hi Cclitgirl.
I don't think that it hurts to write about a few different topics. Finding a niche is more about finding a market that isn't overly competitive, so that you can grab a large chunk of that traffic by writing frequestly about it. I write about what interests me, but also include a lot of niche articles on those subjects (just researched more and focused on a specific area of that subject).
Yes. I agree looking for a niche is very hard. Thanks you for the tips this just make the task a little bit easier.
Great information I needed. Thank you for sharing.
Golden tips for new bloggers. Thanks and voted up!
Brett - great hub, as usual. :) Okay...let's say you're someone like me and you've studied LOTS of things. My interests lie in the social sciences, but I was essentially a triple major with two minors. That's why you see me writing about grammar (because I'm a Spanish teacher) all the way to the "green" movement (because of my travels learning and speaking Spanish and seeing how other people live on less than the typical American). Does this hurt a person? Or would you recommend creating separate accounts? I've seen this before and just decided to write about things I know and enjoy. Thanks!!
Another useful hub from you, I'll always choose to write about something I feel knowledgeable about and even then do my research. Some good advice, Brett..Keep up the good hubs.
Thanks for sharing..
Great Title and Info.
Thank you for all your comments. The trick is to write about what you enjoy, but to then also focus that subject to draw in search engine traffic. Having lots about the field in general will also go in your favor in the long run.
I am retired, so I tend to chase whatever interests me. I've been chasing interests all of my life, and I can't say I'm dying of boredom. Strangely enough, out of the Hubs I have on love and war, writing, crafts, and gardening, people like my Hub about putting dividers in a dresser drawer. It has a constant draw. I am now motivated to refinish an old pine toy chest that has been sitting in my garage since 2002 and provide step-by-step information. Bookmarked, voted up, and everything else.
I have to say, I have never really put myself in a Niche unless you consider jumping all over the place a niche. I will say there are some things I tend to write about more often than others, but I like to write about whatever comes to mind. But if I had to choose a niche that I am in... it sticks mostly to Health and Fitness. These are two things I am very big on and because I like to learn about them myself... I like sharing the information as well. Thanks for SHARING!
Interesting Hub with some great advice. Plus, very helpful in getting the creative juices flowing. Voted Up. GClark
This is good information. When you write about what you know, your readers can't help but notice your comfort level with the topic which I think leads to trust in your information.
I can't find a niche. I am just all over the place. Maybe it will all come together for me someday. Anyway, thanks for SHARING.
An interesting read and it makes me feel better about writing for such a specific market.
Thanks for SHARING!
Hi Cr00059n,
Market trends eh, could work well if there isn't too much competition in the market. But, how do you find what people are actually being successful with? And how do you tell if it is a continuing trend? Sounds like an interesting approach.
Hi Molometer,
Thanks for the votes. Also found your 50th hub, congrats!
I'm impressed that you continued to earn over the quiet spell, as most on there don't. However, when you restart, remember Jan/Feb can be quiet months for online earnings.
This seems like a good idea. When I start thinking about a a subject, I always look for market trends. Meaning, how other people have seen success with. Thanks for sharing this. I appreciate your nice information.
Hi mackyi,
Thanks for the additional tips. That is a good point about the availability of materials, as if you don't know the subject well, it will make things easier to research.
Hey Alocsin,
Thanks for the votes mate, had a read of your hub about 3000 views, very interesting!
Very useful advice Brett, good pointers to help hubbers focus on their strengths. And to use the tools that we have access too.
Voted up useful and interesting.
PS. BTW I made £8.40 last month at webanswers and I have not been active there for 5 weeks. I wanted to see what would happen if I did not work on the site for a month.
I am now going to answer 2000+ questions. Cheers buddy for your great advice and support.
Your personal experiences,or field of expertise is also a good starting point. If you so decide to go any other route you have to make sure there is enough good information out there on your category of choice. Unavailability of good materials will cause you to struggle to produce great blogs. These are just a few additional points. This hub is nicely laid out and very informative. Thanks brett.
Good advice, Brett. Voting this Up and Useful.
Hi businesstrader,
I agree, anything that you know about or are interested in are great foundations for finding your niche market! Thanks for commenting.
An industry you have prior knowledge in is always a good start.
emilybee Level 5 Commenter 5 weeks ago
I love the keyword tool. Besides how helpful it is, it's fun to laugh at what people are spending time searching for on the net :) Great tips to help people choose their niche to write about. Voted up.