This is a guest post by Mark Wagner, who writes about creative leadership strategy and connectivity for icebluebanana.com.

So you started a blog or a niche site and now you want to sit back and watch the money roll in. Well, that is probably not going to happen. At least, not unless you did some planning first.

Honestly, there are no businesses that I know of that does not require the proprietor (you) to really work on their (your) product. This is true whether the (your) product is a toaster, a sales page, a blog, or a bottle of beer.

Unfortunately, there is no magical niche finder and no niche product that can successfully be sold by everyone.

What you will read below is the way that I recently determined what my blog is about. Funny, I know, since most people seem to believe that you MUST determine your niche prior to starting a blog. What can I say, I am a rebel.

Whether you are choosing a blogging niche or a product niche, there are several questions you must ask yourself and several tools that can be used to ease your efforts in finding your ideal niche business.

The process is really quite simple, but the level of competition makes it quite difficult.

Ask Yourself

What are your biggest interests, or the things you know very well?
If you choose something you have a great interest in, it will likely reduce the need for you to put great effort into some of the tasks associated with gaining and audience and/or a high search engine raking. Remember that you will need to carry this with you a while, so pick something you like! Now break that subject down into categories the best you can. Each of these is a potential niche that you can adopt as your subject.

What keywords or phrases really describe what I want to write about?
These are going to be the true basis for the content and search engine optimization that you do. This is where you need to really focus and put in some effort.

Who would buy this product or read this blog?
When I think of the right group of people, I think that they would be the people who like certain things connected to my subject. This might sound wrong, but it is likely that, if you are trying to earn money through your niche site or blog, you will want to target a certain group of people. That’s right. The group of people who have money. Now, I know many people who have money and trying to figure out who they are based upon how they look or their marriage status is not likely to get you anywhere. You may guess right or wrong here, but there is no sense trying to sell something to someone who is either not interested, or not able to purchase it.

Tools That Can Help

In the second question above, you determined what you believed to be your keywords. Having done that, you should you should now determine if there are any other keywords that you should be using to optimize your website. You can do about 800 Google searches with the Google keyword tool or you can use a purchased tool like Keyword Research Pro. You can use these tools to check on your competition as well, which it seems the experts really believe you should do.

Your Turn:

What have you done to find new niches or to determine that one ideal niche for you?

If you enjoyed this article, please visit Mark’s website at icebluebanana.com where you can find creative leadership strategy and connectivity tips.

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