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Day 1 & 2 - Generating Ideas for Niche Markets
By Mike Mindel | August 3, 2007
So here we go. This is the first diary entry for this year’s entry to the Thirty Day Challenge.
I’ve started up a Google spreadsheet and made it public (see below). This means that I can open a spreadsheet from home / office and play around with my niche market ideas. Then I can show it to everyone else. You’ll see the attachment at the bottom of this post.
I’m going to follow my own advice in my last post titled ‘So What is a Niche Market Anyway?’. I’ve created three columns on the spreadsheet.
MARKETS
The first column I’ve called MARKETS. These are groups of people who share similar traits and have common needs. For example, property buyers or people who want to get and remain healthy.
NICHES
My second column is titled NICHE. These are general areas of interest and activity e.g. rock climbing, celebrity spotting.
NICHE MARKETS
My third column is called NICHE MARKET. This is where both NICHE & MARKET come together to form something unusual. E.g. if a NICHE is ‘unusual looking properties’ and a MARKET is ‘property buyers in England’ then a good example of a niche market is ‘unusual property buyers in England’.
A note on Ed’s insistence on: not choosing the mega topics. I believe Ed means don’t just choose ‘dog training’ or ‘internet marketing’ as your niche. These niches are HUGE and ultra competitive!
But there’s nothing wrong with finding a micro niche market within the health market. For example I combined the ‘health’ market with the ‘eating confectionary’ niche to get ‘healthy eaters with a sweet tooth’.
Right… less chatter & more niching.
Click on the diagram below to open up my Niche Market spreadsheet. Entries in bold are my 7 niche market selections.
-Mike
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Topics: Diary |
August 3rd, 2007 at 2:07 am
Great post Mike! Thanks for the idea on the spreadsheet. Are you verifying those ‘microniches’ in Wordtracker then?
August 3rd, 2007 at 3:38 am
Niche markets blew me away. I really hadn’t thought of niche related to markets. I look forward to your blog and future entries.
Thirty day challenge is the best thing to happen to the internet and anyone wanting to try and make a go of a home business. Thank you Mike.
August 3rd, 2007 at 9:40 am
Guys,
Also make sure you check out my previous article.
on this.
I will be verifying those ‘microniches’ in Wordtracker but I’m waiting for Ed to show how he uses it first.
August 3rd, 2007 at 11:30 am
I’m beyond impressed with the quality of content on your site here Mike!
Thanks for everything you are putting into this.
Caro
August 3rd, 2007 at 11:50 am
Thanks Caro.
I saw what a great job Chris Baker did last year on 30DC II so I thought I’d wave the flag this year.
Plus I get to try out all these cool plugins and gadgets.
:-)
Mike
August 3rd, 2007 at 11:53 am
Actually there’s one other reason.
I remember the last two challenges where people got quite disillusioned when their niche didn’t work out.
Usually because they had not put enough thought into brainstorming.
So I wanted to put extra special effort into helping people generate market niche ideas early on.
That way more people will succeed overall.
Mike
August 3rd, 2007 at 1:26 pm
Here is my little list done similar way.
spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pj2je4n29yxI2wT3PwXiOIw
What do you think Mike?
My 7 picks are in bold as well.
August 3rd, 2007 at 1:49 pm
Fantastic Milan!
That’s exactly what I’m talking about.
Some great niche markets in there.
People take note.
-Mike
August 3rd, 2007 at 1:53 pm
People.
Notice how Milan selected the market ‘dog lovers’, the niche ‘haircuts’ but found a niche market idea called ‘how to cut your dog hair at home’.
Note: This is not dog training - the mega market Ed told you to avoid. This a very narrow niche market idea inside the ‘dog lovers’ market.
Excellent.
August 3rd, 2007 at 6:28 pm
[…] Haen’t got there yet, but Mike Mindel’s Post has been really helpful. August 3, 2007 | Market Research | […]
August 4th, 2007 at 1:04 am
Hi Mike,
I was told of your site via one of my new Twitter friends, a result of the frenzied Twittering of pre-30DC.
Excellent job compiling the information and I really appreciate you sharing your niche-mining approach. That seems to be the most difficult part, at least psychologically. Seems to bring out the shadows of doubt about what is potentially a good niche, and can make all ideas seem, well, pointless.
So, again, thanks for the clarity and I will be back to read more.
August 4th, 2007 at 5:10 am
Hi Mike thank you so much for the information, I have just one word Brilliant. How much easier this makes it for us newbies.
Liz
August 4th, 2007 at 4:29 pm
Hi Mike,
Great info and love the spreadsheet! I didn’t even think about posting it in my google docs and sharing it. DOH!
Guess Dan Raine’s brain fart, that according to facebook, he’s been having since Wednesday, must be contagious.
On to the day 3 podcast which has loaded itself into itunes! Yay!
~ Annie
August 4th, 2007 at 8:09 pm
Wow!!! This is some good stuff. I like the concept of using the spreadsheet. Keep up the good work.
August 4th, 2007 at 10:13 pm
Mike,
Thank you so much for this site. The entire Thirty Day Challenge is full of material that would cost Thousands of $ from other “Gurus”. (if for no other reason than to pay for the bandwidth!) But we get ALL of this for free. The spirit of helpfulness and charity that is evident in many of the people associated with 30DC is truly a breath of fresh air. Hopefully it is also a lesson that those of us who succeed in 30DC will remember. I know I will.
Thanks again
Bob
August 5th, 2007 at 7:33 am
[…] Webventurer - This is a terrific site by Mike Mindel (Wordtracker co-founder). He has been providing excellent notes on the 30 DC so far, so definitely check out his site. If you ever have trouble generating ideas for niche markets, he has a pretty good technique of finding them at his site. […]
August 5th, 2007 at 8:06 am
Hey, who said you can’t buy Cornflakes in the US? LOL. Good post, this is really helpful. Keep them coming.
August 5th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
crikey! you’re good. you make this stuff look too easy it aint funny! kudos!
August 5th, 2007 at 9:24 pm
[…] If you’re struggling to come up with ideas, you might be interested to read my list and the methods I used to choose my topics. Mike Mindel, co-founder of Wordtracker is clearly much more experienced at this so make sure you check out his great post too. […]
August 5th, 2007 at 9:25 pm
Update: All this talk of niche & markets helped me to improve my own spreadsheet.
It’s now updated make the separation between niche & market clearer.
October 6th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
Thanks Mike
I know I started kind of late but you post has helped me with Google Docs and given me an idea of what I should be doing to start on the right foot.