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Find Your Niche: How To Find A Niche For Your New Business
By Rodney Laws | Business
Is your heart set on owning an ecommerce business, but you have no idea where to take this idea or how to get started?
Finding your niche — and choosing a successful business niche in particular — is no mean feat. You can list off all your inspirations, passions and talents, but still come up empty-handed. Why? Because finding a niche isn’t about settling on one idea — it’s about identifying countless profitable opportunities over and over again.
In this article we explore the following steps to find your niche:
Read on as we help you outline some quick but effective ways to narrow down a profitable niche and take your business in the right direction.
Image: Pexels
Niche hunting? Finding the best business niche is all about discovering what sells and why.
In this section, we discuss profitable niches and social trends to help you find your niche and discover killer opportunities to launch your business.
As a business owner, you likely want to jump on movement early so you can maximise profit and ride a niche for all its worth.
Enter trending niches — a type of product/service possessing unique popularity here and now as a result of contemporary thinking or sudden events.
For example, this past year has birthed many trending niches, given the pandemic and a looming threat of climate change has flipped many people’s lives upside-down.
Consequently, here are some trending niches rising in popularity through 2021:
With people stuck indoors, it comes as little surprise many consumers are suddenly searching for gym equipment and home office supplies.
However, it’s worth remembering that trending niches are liable to change, so you have to keep your finger on the pulse. Check the latest trending topics on social media, look at what’s hot at online marketplaces, and tap into a worldwide database by conducting research using Google Trends.
Trending niches not taking your fancy? If you’re after a more solid foundation to launch your business, some niches stand the test of time and are almost always a safe bet:
These niches aren’t riding a trend — they have weathered the storm and come up trumps for years and years. While the products inevitably change and evolve, you can safely assume these core niches will always remain profitable.
Image: Pixabay
Ecommerce is proving to be the best way to explore and find your business niche.
Ecommerce brands can reach wider audiences anywhere in the world, which is perfect for identifying profitable niches in different regions and communities.
In this section, we pin down your business niche in relation to the world of ecommerce and discuss exactly how you can operate successfully online.
Even though your hobbies won’t always transition into a strong business model, passion is a powerful force and a good place to start if you want to find your niche. If you’re planning to start up a new business, you’re going to be spending a lot of time immersed in your chosen area, so it will help a lot if you find joy in your niche.
Take some time to think about what motivates you and engages your inner ambitions. Coming to a blank? Here are some prompts to get the creative juices flowing:
Treat these questions as a rough guideline as you begin to build the framework for your business niche.
It’s good to get your answers written down — even if it feels obvious, you might be overlooking an important idea that sets your business off on the right track.
In a perfect world, you want your products and services to be one of a kind. But in such an expansive market, you’re bound to come across others who do what you do — and so will your customers.
While it’s unlikely your business niche is completely groundbreaking, you can offer a USP (unique selling point) that sets you apart from the competition.
In particular, one unique selling point sets you apart from the crowd like no other — you.
Whatever business niche you choose, it’s you who makes the biggest difference. After all, customers want to buy from personable, like-minded people with a compelling backstory — not a faceless website with no story to tell.
Take Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle theory into consideration when choosing a niche and pinpointing your USP. This story model focuses on why you set up your business rather than what it is you sell/provide. Identify your unique story by answering these questions in descending order of importance:
Stories sell and your motivation should carry through the operation far beyond ideating your niche. Your story is what makes your brand unique and stand out compared to the next business operating within your niche.
Found the right niche? By this point, you likely have a few ideas in mind that feel pretty good, but you won’t know for sure until you confirm there is a profitable market.
If there’s no market for your niche then your business won’t be able to make any money, which is a no-go even if your heart is set on an idea — you need to be flexible and rather ruthless when finding a profitable niche market.
Determine whether you’ve landed in the right place by researching global marketplaces like:
Browse through the top product categories and if you’re struggling to find searches, offers or many products within your niche, treat this as a red flag. It’s likely nobody — or at least very few people — have been able to monetise your niche.
Don’t double down and try to draw blood from a stone. Swiftly move onto a niche with more selling potential.
Having competition in your business niche is inevitable and certainly not a bad thing.
Often people avoid certain niches if the market looks oversaturated or the closest competition appears unbeatable. But this shouldn’t put you off. If you’re passionate about your niche, then go for it.
With that being said, don’t rely on passion alone — you also need to do your due diligence and research what’s front of you. By this, we mean to find out whether there is a specific way to differentiate yourself from the competition.
Unsure how to perform niche research and identify gaps in the market? Look out for these factors and gaps when researching competitors:
Found a way to differentiate your business from the competition in your niche? Now it’s time to start ranking on Google. After all, in the ecommerce world, it’s first page or bust.
Business is evolving and ecommerce — unlike its brick and mortar counterparts — is conducted with SEO in mind.
Search engine optimisation is the practice of improving the quantity and quality of site traffic through organic search engine results. And though core updates have sent this process through the wringer at times, keyword research remains an essential component of SEO, which helps your business become more visible in your chosen niche.
With this in mind, it’s important to narrow your niche down and target achievable but profitable high traffic keywords as part of your content strategy.
To do this, there are many online tools you can use. Ahrefs is our go-to research tool, but there are plenty of other paid and free options available:
Alternatively, you can manually crawl the SERPs and see for yourself what people are searching for — and locate the competition you need to beat.
Owning and running a business is an exciting prospect, but it means very little unless you successfully identify profitable niches to support it.
While the internet has made finding your niche far more accessible, ecommerce competition is more numerous and much fiercer than ever before.
Use this guide to find your business niche and start earning your stripes online.
