Christopher Van Buren

This article explains how to select a profitable niche for your membership business.

Step 1 – Find a Fanatical Market

The first step in developing a profitable membership business is to find a market with fanatics in it. Fanatic is defined as someone with an irrational enthusiasm. These are the people you’re looking for because they are so enthusiastic they’re willing to spend money on their topic of fanaticism. Now that we know what we’re looking for, let’s talk about how to 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. This is a very good indication that it’s a good niche for you to go into.
• 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. People generally talk about things they are interested in. And that may also mean they’re willing to pay money to learn more about it.
• Don’t forget about clubs and organizations. If there are enough people to to build a club, there are certainly enough people to start a membership site on the same topic. By the same token, if enough people are interested to hold a convention on a certain topic, you can definitely find enough people to build a membership business around that same topic.
• And of course there are all the things you have an interest in, too! There’s a good chance that others are interested in these things, as well. And, as an added bonus, it’s much more fun to build a business around things you’re interested in.
• 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 topics are the hottest topics because lots and lots of people want information about them. Hot topics that people are excited about make great niches for your membership website.

Second – Analyze the “commerciality”

OK, so you’ve got a great idea for your niche membership business with lots of fanatics. But will they actually spend money? The quickest way to find out is to determine if others are profiting in your potential niche.

Here’s a punch list for figuring out if anyone’s making money in your 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 means there is a large group of people already assembled for you to market to.
• Check Amazon, eBay and Google Shopping to find out if others are making and selling products in your niche. What you’re trying to figure out is if anyone is making money in this niche, and if people are selling products it means they are making money.
• 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.

Last, but not least… How hard will it be to break into this niche?

OK, so you found a hot topic and you know other people are making money on it. Will you be able to get involved and do the same? Here are some things to look at to figure this out:

• Product types. What kind of products are being sold in the niche? You’re looking for a niche that sells info products. That’s because it’s much easier to build a membership business around information vs. any other kind of product.
• 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.
• Unless the market is just so big that it doesn’t matter how many competitors there are, you want to limit the competition. So evaluate the size vs. the competition.
• How ready is the market for marketing messages, and how willing are the fanatics to buy. Depending on the market it can be anywhere from a couple minutes to a many months between when someone starts the investigation process to when they actually make a 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. Now that you’ve prepared properly, you’re success is 99% guaranteed. How to actually run your membership website is the only thing left to talk about…

Through the use of the internet you can spread your message around the world 24/7.  Here are 6 cost effective tools you should be using to maximize your online marketing.

Tool #1 Email

Email is the workhorse of the modern economy.  Think about it, you are more likely on email more than you watch TV or talk to your family.  And it doesn’t matter if you work for a major corporation or a home base business you need to be using email to help build relationships with your customers.

Tool #2 Email Newsletters

Bet you didn’t know that email newsletters are inexpensive to produce and cost almost nothing to distribute.  In fact even a simple quarterly newsletter offering a friendly hello and a short, informative article or product review can help you attract more sales.

Tool #3 Auto Responders

With the use of autoresponders you can automatically follow up with customers via email.  This is a “set it and forget it!”  way to grow sales with virtually no work, by reminding clients to keep purchasing from you.

Tool #4 Blogs

You can create a blog for free using vendors such as WordPress or Blogger.com.  But I recommend purchasing and hosting your WordPress blogs, since it is both inexpensive and you are able to control what content or advertisements appear on your blogs.  But the main reason blogs are so effective is first, they pull web traffic like a magnet.  Google, Yahoo and other search engines love blogs, because blogs include information that is far more up to date and relevant that the typical website, and the majority of blogs are topic specific.  Secondly, blogs can help you position yourself as an expert in your field.  I blog about real estate and home financing.  So people who are searching for information on these topics can easily find my blogs.  Lastly, you can start a conversation about a topic and allow people to comment on your blog.  Warning don’t forget to moderate your comments, which means approve all comments before they appear on your blog.  This will prevent spam comments.

Tool #5 Social Networks

Social networking is one of the very best ways to brand yourself.  Three of the most popular and largest social networking sites are FaceBook, Linkedin, and my personal favorite Twitter.  The key to social networking is all about building groups, friends, followers, or connections, and then carrying on conversations with them and building a relationship long before your start to promoting.

On site like Facebook and Twitter, your conversations should be about both your personal and buisness life.  Sharing information about things like your pets, hobbies and interest will endear you to those who are following you.  So by the time you start to discuss your product or service, your followers will be more receptive because they’ll feel they already know and like you.

Tool # 6 BizPack

BizPack an incredible new tool for small and home based business owners.  This is the first complete marketing and tracking system for business success. Features include are Contact Manager, Web Meeting, Personal Development, Marketing System, Udeduct, & Residual Income Opportunity.

With the power of these 6 tools you have the ability to spread your message around the world 24/7 like a wildfire.  If your business can benefit from word of mouth promotion, then all the new friends you make doing online marketing can help you spread your marketing message.