Figure out who you want to work with and the niche you want to be part of. That is the very first thing you need to do if you want to make money as an affiliate marketer whether you’re going to make money selling other people’s products or your own (best to do both).
Who Do You Want to Work With? One way to figure out the type of people you’d like to work with or help is to look inside yourself to find your interests and passions. If you really enjoy being around certain people and you know about their hopes, desires, and needs due to being part of that audience yourself, that’s one way to do it as you will already have insight. However, don’t let this give you an excuse not to do your research. Your experiences, even as part of your niche audience, are subjective and real results may be very different than you imagine. Try describing your ideal customer in one or two sentences to help you move forward.
Who Serves That Audience Now? Once you have identified a potential niche audience, it always helps to look at the competition. After all, if this niche has no competition, is it really a profitable niche? Some people will say that you should go for the low competition niches, but it’s better to go for the niche that offers enough potential customers for you to reach your income goals if your conversion rate matches industry standards. For example, if there are 1000 potential customers, and according to your research there is a 4 to 7 percent conversion rate, and you know that you can get your materials and information in front of those 1000 customers, you may get at most 70 customers from a campaign. Is your price point high enough for those 70 customers to make you profitable?
What Skills and Solutions Can You Offer This Niche? Do you have specialized education, experience, or knowledge that makes you particularly suited for this niche? You don’t have to be part of the audience to do well in a niche. For example, if you have identified a niche that needs someone to advise them on products to use for their love of camping which are different from what’s out there, you can still learn about it and serve the audience even if you have no camping experience or appreciation of camping. Maybe instead of direct experience, you have resources that enable you to pay people with subject matter expertise to create your business.
What Makes You Different? Always look at yourself too. What makes you different from your competition? What skills can you offer to this niche that others can’t? How can you stand out from the crowd? Are you going to approach the niche in a different way than the others? For example, if you’re a business coach, are you buttoned up or a free spirit? Whatever you are, you’re going to attract an entirely different segment of your audience base than someone who is different from you.
Check an Affiliate Network for Products That Serve That Audience The other thing you want to do is ensure that any niche you choose is profitable. Asking yourself if it’s profitable is an important question. Just because you have internet and passion doesn’t make it a profitable niche. What makes it profitable is that the target audience exists in enough quantity and has enough money to buy the solutions you create and offer. Once you narrow down some options, the primary considerations are whether your niche idea is profitable or not, and whether you have the skills to proceed or not – either skills you learn or skills you buy from others. Choose a niche that you like, that can provide enough profit, and that you know how to serve.
