Niche Marketing Case Study – Part 6 (22 Jan 2009)

If it’s your first time here, make sure you start from Day 1 (and follow the blueprint from there), and make sure that you register to my amazing blog’s list:

It’s crazy, as I am writing this, I am wondering why I didn’t download the Why would Seth Godin do wp plugin yet.

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

Ok, I already started with my spyware website.  I wrote the home page… and I chose to promote the noadware software (that can be found at noadware.net). From the previous lessons, you already know how to find a product that sell (just choose for those with the most gravity in your category, and then, have a deeper look. Would you – or someone you know – buy from this site?).

This noadware software is selling since 2003, and still have a strong gravity. But the factor who pushed me to choose it is that it won’t “harm” other people’s computer… I strongly believe that making money is helping people, not scamming them. Later on, I will probably have a look at other products, along with syware doctor and super anti spyware, but for now, I need to get started.

I went with the direct linking (bypass surgery) route.  I mean that I am not sending visitors to the clickbank merchant’s page.

I allow people to download the free trial directly from my site.

I’ve never done it before, but I’ve found that many competitors are doing it, so I think it’s working (the only way to be sure is to test this myself…)

This is an advanced strategy, and you need to stick to the “normal” clickbank promotion way for now.

Note: One of my subscribers asked me if I was going to show the URL in his comment. It’s a good question. I replied that I may show the site later on, or I may not show it at all (I’m not sure about this, just thinking about it).

What I will do is posting all the stats (traffic, sales, where I advertise, etc).

If you want an example, the formula I am following for this site isn’t really different than the one I am following for my affiliate marketing site:

http://www.mynetmarketingland.com.  (it’s certainly not the most beautiful website on the net, but never mind, it works pretty well like this…)

… and the blog http://mynetmarketingland.com/blog1/ (the very same blog you are reading right now)

I earned thousands upon thousands of dollars from this ONE site only, and hopefully this will continue.

See one of my rankings here (you can see that the site is in the position #3) for this pretty competitive keyword:

My Site In Google Top 3

Saying that, let’s continue …

Now we are in …

MODULE 3. Getting Content for my website

A. Adding at least 10 pages

Before you read further: Here is the software that my students use to build their sites. Believe me, I don’t know anything easier than this to buid websites: The Design Dashboard

I want to have a total of 30+ pages on my websites because I want to get traffic from Google and other search engines.

You have 3 ways to add content to your site:

1. Write it yourself (no comment)

2. Hire others to write for you (I find them on forums and elance.com)

3. Private Label Right (PLR) Content (I have tons of these, they are easy to find in the search engines)

I use these 3 ways (right now, I am using number #1, I personally write my blog posts).

As for the spyware niche, I already wrote the home page, and I will use number #2 and #3 from now, because I don’t have the time to do it (I have other projects going on), and it’s not the best way to grow my business anyway (I’ll talk about business growth later on, when I finished the case study. From now, all you need is starting with a proven system to make money).

B.  Starting Backlinks and traffic strategy

Many people are getting crazy because Google take time to index their site.

And you know what?

I don’t care! All I want from now is getting backlinks, and starting to drive traffic to my site. It will be indexed soon anyway. I’ve made tons of money from sites that weren’t even indexed in Google!

The very first thing I do whenever I start a new site is… Submitting articles. This enough will get your site indexed pretty fast!

I generally submit to ezinearticles.com first. I do not submit one article… I submit 10 or 15 in a single day for my main keyword.

Here is my traffic stats to date (3 of my own visits!)

Traffic Stats

Time to research for 10 keywords

Note: Don’t get mad with this, the more keywords you research, the better you will do. There is NO magic method to find keywords.

I use nichebot.com and the techniques I am showing you right now:

Keyword Research Step #1. Google Keyword Tool External

Now, we want to get some keywords for oue own website, and also  to submit articles to ezinearticle (EZA), all you need to do is to go to the Google External tool, and grab some keywords.

I’ll go more in depth about keyword research soon, so stay tuned.

(I just pasted what I did in B.  Google Keyword Tool External in part 3 of the case study,  while I was searching for the spyware numbers.

All you need to do is to check the numbers for other keywords (for me, those under spyware, and also the related keywords at the bottom of the screen) exactly like I did for the keyword spyware, and then, check the competition in Google.

Here is what I did:

B.  Google Keyword Tool External (Click Here)

For this, I am going to use Google Keyword Tool External.

I want to know how much money people are willing to pay to be on Google paid results.

Generally, the more they pay per click, the better the market!

Advertisers are willing to pay money because they know that they will earn more in return, otherwise, they don’t spend.

1. Type the word “spyware” in the search box, like I did on Day 2.

Once I got the results, I will do the following:

2. Click on the drop box menu in the elipse (Choose Colums to display), and then, select: “Show Estimated Avg. CPC”

Important Note: You are going to do something different here, so pay attention. Click on the picture to enlarge it, and you will notice a drop down meny box (under the red elipse) with the word broad match. Click on it and just select phrase match.

Drop Box Menu

Now, you have the same screenshot,

BUT,

As you can see, there is a new column (in the red elipse): the costs per click (see below).

Cost Per Click New Column

Important: You need to get the cost per click in dollars. If you are not in the US, make sure that you:

a. Use the drop box menu (above the arrow on the picture above), and then,

b. Choose US Dollars.

c. Once you’ve done this, click “Recalculate” and you will get the CPC in dollars.

3. Then, write down (or save in excel) the cost per click (CPC)

So for me, I will write: Spyware $3.30

Step #2: Research Organic Competition

Now, I need to find out how many competing sites are there (the sites in the black rectangle from the picture above):

1. I go to Google.com

2. I type spyware in the search box

3. I write the number (in the red ellipse)

Google Organic Results Number

Example with my spyware niche:

If I was doing this manually, I would check for these keywords (under spyware):

Nb of Searches (Demand)      -      Competing Sites in Google (Supply)

1. Spyware adware                22,200                                     7,150,000
2. spyware removal              201,000                                    3,900,000
3. spyware remover              90,500                                      2,880,000
4. etc, …

Make sure that you write down the results in Excell or (like me), in a simple notepad file.

Those keywords are pretty competitive. When you are starting, it’s better to choose keywords with less than 300,000 competitors on Google, like this one:

Nb of Searches (Demand)      -      Competing Sites in Google (Supply)

1. Spyware cleaner                8100                                     749,000
2. Spyware removal software 12,100                        513,000
   

Try to choose what is called “buy keywords” because those keywords like the two above will make you more money although they have less searches than the first set of keywords.

Keyword Research Step #2. Researching your competitors keyword

I like this one because it’s easy.

Obviously, your competitors already made some keyword research. All you need to do is have a look at the keyword they chose, and make your research to find out if they are profitable.

Keyword Research Step #3. Ezine Articles (ezinearticles.com)

All these bum marketers (hmm, almost all of them) carry out basic keyword research before writing articles to promote affiliate products.

All you need to do is to search for articles in your category and get the keywords they use

Keyword Research Step #3. Authority sites like About.com

I like having a look at the keywords, they don’t choose them slightly…

Keyword Research Step #4. Forums in your niche

You can find some gems there, “hot buttons” keywords.

As you can see, there are tons of ways to search for keywords, and I only gave you a few of them…

But it’s enough for now. All you need is to find 10 of them with at least 1000 searches per month, and less than 300,000 competitors.

All the best,

Franck

PS. Your Homework:

Write your home page

1. If you don’t know how to build a website, download The Design Dashboard
2. Get some “buy” keywords (i.e spyware removal software is better than spyware removal)
3. Write (or outsource) 10 Pages for your website
4. Write an article and submit it to ezinearticles.com with 2 backlinks to your website in your resource box

Let me know if you have any question about these points!

Update: I’ve added all the links to the case study below (links open in a new window):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Ckecking Niche Profitablity

5. Choosing My Money Making Niche

6. Learning More About The Spyware Niche

7. Domain Name Registration

8. Getting Website Content And Backlink Strategy Starts

Note: I didn’t add screenshots for this part because Screenprint32 doesn’t want to work on my new laptop. It may be because it’s not for vista. I’ll find out, and if I can’t, I will have to start with a new screenshot software…

If it’s your first time here, make sure you start from Day 1 (and follow the blueprint from there):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

Now we are in …

MODULE 2. Preparation

A. Domain Name Registration

In the previous lesson, you learned about your niche, and today, it’s the time to get a domain name.

Yes, I know that you can start with free blogs or even a squidoo lens, but it’s much better to have your own domain name that you control.

For those who can’t buy a domain name, I recommend to start with a free blogger blog or a weebly site. Squidoo is also good (I’ll show you how to use it later on), but there are two many distraction, and this will lower your conversion rates.

I recommend the blogger platform over Squidoo.

Now,

I will register my spyware domain name, and for that, I use namecheap.com

Step 1. Brainstorm (with all the information you gathered from the last lesson, just think about a name you will choose).

For example, I will choose something like: spywaredefender.com or spywarecrusher.com

Question: Should I use keywords in my domain?

My answer: it’s not an obligation (my website mynetmarketingland.com is on google first page for ‘affiliate marketing’, and as you can see, the keyword affiliate is not in the domain).

However, I’ve found that it can help to have the keyword(s) you are targeting in your domain, for several reasons. Here are some of them:

• People will click more when they find your website’s url (whether it’s in the organic or paid traffic results)
• If you decide to go for PPC later on, you will get better quality score

Let’s do it now:

IMPORTANT NOTE: Before you start with step 2, you need to have a web hosting. The UMC is the one I use and recommend. You can read my review here: Ultimate Marketing Center Review

Step 2. Go to namecheap.com

Step 3. Choose a .com extension (I always choose .com, but if it’s not available for the word you chose, you can also choose .net)

Step 4. Type the name you chose in step 1 into the box on the top left (under: “Enter the domain name you want “)

Step 5. Click search (if it’s not available, search again, and think about variations, you can add a letter, or a small word).

Example: at my first attempt, I tried ’spywareremovalpro.com’ and ’spywareremovalnow.com, but they were already taken. All I did was to choose another word instead of ‘pro’ and ‘now’.

Step 6. Once you found a domain name you like, click: add to cart, and then, all you need to do is to follow the instructions on the screen. (The price for a domain name is currently $9.69 with a free whois guard)

B. Changing the name server info

When you are buying your new domain, you will be prompted to add your name servers info. You should receive them in your welcome email when you sign up with the Ultimate Marketing Center Web Hosting.

All you need to do is to add the two name servers into the boxes at name cheap.

Ok,

I finally chose my domain and changed the name servers. It’s ready to make sales… I need to add some pages to this site.

What’s the next step?

Starting my website and getting indexed… I’ll give you a secret weapon to build a site in hours, even if you never did that before.

Franck

PS.  Your homeworks.

1. Get a hosting account at the amazing Ultimate Marketing Center
2. Buy your own domain name at name cheap

Update: I’ve added all the links to the case study below (links open in a new window):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Ckecking Niche Profitablity

5. Choosing My Money Making Niche

6. Learning More About The Spyware Niche

7. Domain Name Registration

8. Getting Website Content And Backlink Strategy Starts

What is really funny is that my FIRST concern with my new laptop was to protect it against Internet threats!  I mean virus, spywares and other problems. I downloaded Avast antivirus software right away. It already have a spyware protection integrated. I don’t know if it’s enough though.

Ok, let’s start now …

Niche Marketing Case Study (15 Jan 2009)

MODULE 1. Finding a money making niche. —-> We Completed this Step!

Here are all the previous lessons (make sure that you read these before you continue):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find  A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Choosing my Profitable Niche

Now we are in …

MODULE 2. Preparation

Step 1: Learning More About the Spyware Niche

A.  Browsing various spyware websites, blogs and forums

I spent about 3 hours researching about my competition and reading a couple of spyware related forums and other sites to understand this niche a little bit more.

I wanted to know what are the problems that people are facing in this niche.

I found that there are many spyware removal softwares that can damage people’s computer, and I need to make sure that the product I will promote is legitimate…  I don’t want to be the cause of people’s problem… I want to help them, and I need to find a good product for them, and earn money as well.

Happily, I found some good products. Some of them are not in clickbank, but it doesn’t matter.

How to find other affiliate websites?

1. Go to Google.com
2. Type: YourKeyword Comparison, or YourKeyword Reviews
3. Visit the sites in the sponsored search (Google Adwords) Ads section. (you also need to visit the sites in the free results, but you will spend more time analysing the sites in the paid advertising ads because they work like mad to improve their ROI, and you will learn a lot from those.)

I found that these affiliate marketers use 4 types of websites:

1. Review type
2. Scam type
3. Bypass type (they don’t send visitors to the merchant site, but they allow them to download DIRECTLY from their OWN site)
4. “Regular” content affiliate site

I also found that there are not that many spyware software for mac users.

I also found that many people are like me (anti-viruses,spywares and trojans dummies), and don’t have a clue.

That’s all for today.

Make sure you read this before you start your homeworks:

Read: A blog reader asked me the following question. Since I know that it’s something that many people ask, I thought I would add it here:

Question from Gavin: What a great idea and I will be following through your steps to see how you go – can’t wait.

I see you have picked some pretty competitive niches which have loads of products offering the same thing on clickbank, why those and why not a niche somewhat less comeptitive?

My Answer: Hi Gavin,

From my experience, it always pay MORE to go after competitive niche. I made my first affiliate commission ($250) in the forex market… I was a complete newbie!

And the Forex market IS pretty competitive.

The good thing about these niches is that buyers will buy MANY products… I do not say that non competitive niches are not worth going after, it’s just how I do it. Take an example at the Internet marketing niche (I see that like me, you are in this niche). You can earn thousands of dollars in ONE day… and it’s competitive.

All you need is the RIGHT plan, the REAL information.

Without a plan, people fail even if the niche isn’t competitive.

Fact: Anyone, I say ANYONE can come today and earn thousands of dollars in ANY competitive niche.

But …

You need either one of these two:

1. Be an expert (People will find you one day, but it may take a while, and you need to learn a little bit of marketing or partner with someone)

2. Be a GOOD marketer (even if you don’t have a clue about the niche, you know what you need to do)

Without one of these two qualities it will be difficult in any niche, whether it’s competitive or not.

In this case, number three:

Get a coach to jumpstart the process. It’s how I started.

Fact: If a niche don’t have competition, it’s often for a common reason.

Franck

PS.  Your homeworks.

1. Catch up on the previous lessons.
2. Find what are the problems that people have in your niche, and think about the solution (the product). For this, you will need to use the search engines to find: blogs, forums and websites (affiliates and normal sites)

Stay tuned, I will show you how to register a domain name in my next post

Update: I’ve added all the links to the case study below (links open in a new window):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Ckecking Niche Profitablity

5. Choosing My Money Making Niche

6. Learning More About The Spyware Niche

7. Domain Name Registration

8. Getting Website Content And Backlink Strategy Starts

I hope this course will help you to find yours as well…

Niche Marketing Case Study (10 Jan 2009)

MODULE 1. Finding a money making niche.

D. Choosing a winner

Goal: Choosing my niche (the winner)

Step #1: Results For My Niches

If you remember, you had to choose 3 niches, and pick a winner.

We did the HARDEST part of our campaign.

I will enter the niche with confidence because I know that there is a lot of money to be made.

Here are the results for some of the niches I chose…

1. Spyware:

Search (Seo Book Count): 119K / Month

Cost Per Click:                    : $3.07

Paid Advertisers in Google:  544

Organic Sites:                       121,000,000

Clickbank Gravity:                 88 & 81

Nb of clickbank products:     10+

Magazines:                            4+

2. Registry Cleaner:

Search (Seo Book Count):      34K / Month

Cost Per Click:                    : $2

Paid Advertisers in Google:  498

Organic Sites:                       5,000,000

Clickbank Gravity:                 159/144/56

Nb of clickbank products:     20+

Magazines:                            4+

3. Government Records:

Search (Seo Book Count):      2430 / Month

Cost Per Click:                    : $1.31

Paid Advertisers in Google:   51

Organic Sites:                       10,000,000

Clickbank Gravity:                210/137/100

Nb of clickbank products:     10+

Magazines:                            N/A

While I was searching for the Government record niche, I found another niche: “criminal records”

4. Criminal Records:

Search (Seo Book Count):      27K / Month

Cost Per Click:                    : $1.31

Paid Advertisers in Google:   183

Organic Sites:                       4,000,000

Clickbank Gravity:                 44/55

Nb of clickbank products:     10+

Magazines:                            4+

5. Reverse Phone Lookup:

Search (Seo Book Count):      314K / Month

Cost Per Click:                    : $0.57

Paid Advertisers in Google:   159

Organic Sites:                       3,000,000

Clickbank Gravity:                 520/82

Nb of clickbank products:     4+

Magazines:                             N/A

As you can see, I decided to compare between 5 niches (I had 7 when we started).

Right now, I think I will start with the spyware or the registry niche.

Why?

1.  Because advertisers are willing to pay a lot of money per click

2.  There are more advertisers in these niche, and obviously, millions of dollars. I want to get my share of that.

3.  I wanted to start in the spyware niche for a while!

4. I’m interested in knowing more about spyware

5. I make money with my laptop, and I know almost nothing about spyware, trojans, viruses, etc… Good to know a little bit about these.

6. I will be able to create an information product for YOU marketers with what I learned in this niche. This will add a new product to my IM product line. I will be able to add it as a bonus to my other products, or use it as a bonus or just a gift for YOU my subscribers.

These are some of the reasons I may choose to start with the spyware niche.

Note: Once I finished my site in the spyware niche, nothing prevent me to start a site in the registry niche.

Step #2: Checking The Trends (Google Trends)

I’ll use the Google Trends Tool to decide whether I will go for the spyware or registry market.

I typed spyware removal and registry cleaner in the search box:

Note: You an choose the length of time you want to check the trends (see the drop down menu in the red ellipse) …

Google Trends for Spyware and Registry

You’ll notice that there are more searches for the registry cleaner on the graph, but registry and spyware seems to have the same amount of interest overtime.

NOTE: Please keep in mind that unlike the spyware niche, the broad keyword registry has many “unrelated” searches (like Government registry, and all other registry stuff you can think about), that’s why I said that the trends are similar. With keywords, you always need to think because tools are just … tools!

Now …

Google Trends just released a brand new tool, it’s good to play around with it as well. In fact, I recommend that you check it because it’s more advanced than Google Trends:

Google Insights

A. I just want to see the trends on these keywords: spyware, malware, adware and registry.

Note: you can also select the lenghts (since 2004). I went for the last 12 months, and I also selected USA (you can do this several times for different regions).

Google Insights

B. I click on the search button, and here is what I get:

a.  A graph (not really what I want)

b.  I scroll down and get Data for spyware (This is what I want)

Google Insights For Spyware

As you can see in the graph above, I have the “top searches” and the “rising searches”. This is good for what’s coming next, and I am going to save this.

In just two minutes, I learned many things:

1. That people want for free scan/download
2. They use the word removal a lot (remover as well)
3. Avg spyware is pretty popular (I’ll make sure I have a page about avg on my site)
4. Super spyware, spyware doctor and spyware guard are popular

c.  No, I will just click on the drop down menu and select malware to see what’s going on:

I learned that:

1. Malware is associated with virus
2. Malwarebytes is popluare (I don’t have a clue about this, but it’s ok)

d.  I do the same for adware:

I learned that:

1. Adware is associated with lavasoft
2. Many people want to know what is adware
3. People who search for adware also search for spyware

e.  Finally, I check for registry.

I learned that:

windows registry is an important tearm in the niche.

As I said above, there are many unrelated registry terms like those: baby, wedding, gifts, etc

f.  I will type now registry cleaner instead of registry

I learned that:

1. Regcure is pretty popular
2. Ccleaner is popular as well
3. People want to know what is the best registry cleaner for windows and vista
4. Eusing is pretty popular

Here is the niche I decided to build a website around:

And the winner is … Spyware! And… nothing prevent me to promote the registry softwares later on.

What I will do now?

Now that I have a niche (Spyware), I will spend one hour or two digging into this market to:

1. Learn more about spywares and find out what people need
2. Digg for a sub niche
3. Get a domain name

Stay Tuned for my next lesson…

Franck

PS. Hey, Don’t forget your homeworks!

Here is what you need to do (not too much):

1. “Play” with the Google trends & Google Insights tools
2. Note what you learned about emerging trends in your niche
3. Select a niche from your own list (or mine if you want)
4. Be ready for choosing your domain name

Update: I’ve added all the links to the case study below (links open in a new window):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Ckecking Niche Profitablity

5. Choosing My Money Making Niche

6. Learning More About The Spyware Niche

7. Domain Name Registration

8. Getting Website Content And Backlink Strategy Starts

If you are New here and you didn’t read lesson 1 & 2, Do it before reading this page (Make sure that you get the course in the RIGHT order. Many people fail because they don’t know how to follow simple steps):

Update: I’ve added all the links to the case study below (links open in a new window):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Ckecking Niche Profitablity

5. Choosing My Money Making Niche

6. Learning More About The Spyware Niche

7. Domain Name Registration

8. Getting Website Content And Backlink Strategy Starts

Before we start, I want to make a Recap because this will keep you on track.

What’s my goal?

We are in the MODULE 1. Finding a money making niche.

Goal = Finding a niche.

What I’ve done so far?

On Day 1,

• I found several potential niches on clickbank.
• I also quickly checked the profitability of the niche with the gravity numbers.
• I decided to pick 7 niches, and compare between them

On Day 2,

• I checked the Demand (how many people search for this term every month)
• I started with one niche (spyware)
• I used the Google Keyword tool to quickly get the main related keywords for my niches.
• I used the Seo Book Tool to check the demand (as Nick – a blog reader – stated in his comment, this tool is not an EXACT number. It doesn’t matter at this stage because we want to COMPARE between the niches).

I will NOT go for all these niches at once. I just want to compare between these different niches, and then, choose ONLY one.

My criteria to find a niche:

1. Easier to go after (even if there is less money),

Or,

2. I like the subject (this keep me motivated even more),

Or,

3. There is a lot of money to be made (even if I don’t like the subject)

In these three cases, I make sure that there is enough DEMAND (traffic), and that people actually BUY (competition).

Why many beginners (I was) are afraid about competition, competition is GOOD.

Why?

It’s the proof that there is a lot of money to be made in the niche.  And if you have a plan, you are also going to make money. Plus MOST of your competition don’t know what they are doing anyway. They just through up a blog or a site, and forget about it…

Saying that …

We are NOT in the keyword research process yet (this will come later on), we are just trying to START the plan, and to start the PLAN, we need to find a NICHE.

Important Note: Do the homeworks for each day before going to the next (This sounds obvious, but everybody want to go faster. Me the first, and this is one of the first reasons I failed in the first place. I use to read a tutorial, and … finish it, and then going to the next. No wonder why I wasn’t making any money! Learn from my mistakes. ok?)

Ready for Day 3?

If it’s your first time doing this, it will seem difficult at first.  It’s not!  Make sure that you do one step at a time.  Don’t try to read everything at the same time. READ step #1, and then, DO it. Then, READ step#2, and then, DO it, etc…

Important: This is not the keyword research phase. We are just checking to see if we are going to continue with this niche or not.

Good, let’s start …

Niche Marketing Case Study (8 Jan 2009)

MODULE 1. Finding a money making niche.

C. Checking the PROFITABILITY of the spyware niche

Goal:

Now that I know that there is a decent number of searches in the spyware niche, I want to find out 2 things:

1. Is there anyone spending money in this niche?

2. How affiliates are making money in this niche?

3. Will it be easy for me to enter in this niche?

Then, once I find the answer to these 3 questions (above), I will take notes, and then, start with another niche (it may be Registry Phone Lookup) to start my niche comparison process.

Step #1: Are People Buying Actually Buying Spywares Related Products Online?

A.  Google Sponsored Search Results

Now that we know that advertisers (people just like you and me) are willing to pay $3+ to be on the first page of Google for the keyword Spyware, we are going to check those results on Google.

1. Go to Google (www.Google.com)

Important: according to where you are living, you will not get the results from google.com in the US, and you will not be able to see the paid ads (sponsored results).

To see the ads, you can either:

1. Add this at the end of the query in your addressbar:&gl=us
2. Browse with a proxy (I use freeblox.info sometimes, it’s not the best, and there are a lot of popups, you may want to find a better one)

You will see (see image below) that:

a. Paid advertising are in the red ellipse.

b. FREE advertising are in the black rectangle

Checking Paid Results In Google

At this point, we are just checking if people are willing to PAY Money in this niche (spyware). We don’t bother with the free results.

They are because there are many Google Adwords ads.

Rule of thumbs: More than 8 ads is a good sign that the niche is profitable.

The Google Adwords sponsored ads are the sponsored link in the red ellipse.

Now that we know that people pay money for this term, let’s find out how much they are willing to pay …

B.  Google Keyword Tool External (Click Here)

For this, I am going to use Google Keyword Tool External.

I want to know how much money people are willing to pay to be on Google paid results.

Generally, the more they pay per click, the better the market!

Advertisers are willing to pay money because they know that they will earn more in return, otherwise, they don’t spend.

1. Type the word “spyware” in the search box, like I did on Day 2.

Once I got the results, I will do the following:

2. Click on the drop box menu in the elipse (Choose Colums to display), and then, select: “Show Estimated Avg. CPC”

Drop Box Menu

Now, you have the same screenshot,

BUT,

As you can see, there is a new column (in the red elipse): the costs per click (see below).

Cost Per Click New Column

Important: You need to get the cost per click in dollars. If you are not in the US, make sure that you:

a. Use the drop box menu (above the arrow on the picture above), and then,

b. Choose US Dollars.

c. Once you’ve done this, click “Recalculate” and you will get the CPC in dollars.

3. Then, write down (or save in excel) the cost per click (CPC)

So for me, I will write: Spyware $3.30

Step #2: Research Organic Competition

Now, I need to find out how many competing sites are there (the sites in the black rectangle from the picture above):

1. I go to Google.com

2. I type spyware in the search box

3. I write the number (in the red ellipse)

Google Organic Results Number

That’s it.

Step #3: Check for Magazines

This step is pretty easy. All you need to do is to type: spyware + magazines

I just checked, and there are several magazines.

The more magazines, the better.

Why magazines?

Simple. Because magazines make money via their advertissments. In fact, advertisers (people like you and me & companies) are the ones who allow the magazine to survive.

Conclusion:

Now, we know if the niche is profitable:

Now, in my notebook, I have:

Spyware Niche:

Search (Seo Book Count): 119K / Month

Cost Per Click:                    : $3.07 /Month

Paid Advertisers in Google:   8+

Organic Sites:                       121,000,000

Clickbank Gravity:                 88 & 81

Nb of clickbank products:     10+

Magazines:                            4+

There are even more things to do to check your niche’s profitablity, but this is enough.

Stay tuned …

Franck

PS. Don’t forget your homeworks:

Here is what you need to do step by step:

1. Go to Google.com
2. see if people are advertising in your niche In Google paid results
3. Go to Google Keyword Tool External
4. Find out how much advertisers pay per click
5. Research your organic competition
6. Check for Magazines
7. Write the numbers down

And…

That’s where you have to WORK:

8.  Do this for all the potential niches you found in DAY 1 (at least 3 niches).

9. Get all the numbers for EACH of your niches

10. Choose A Winner (I mean choose ONE niche)!

In my next post, I’ll post the different numbers, and choose a niche.

I have something that is going to motivate you even more. Yesterday, one of my private coaching students sent me this email:

Hi Franck..

How is things going with you?…

I am little stuck here bro. Don’t know what to do…I have my site you helped me to startup and I told you a 2 month ago that it makes me $500/mo, it is making me $800/mo now…

Don’t know were to go from there…Shall I continue with affiliate marketing or make my own product in IM niche (I am writing on my ebook)….I have been thinking of coaching again…..I saw at your site that you have mentoring for $497?…

Mehmet

It’s a nice problem to have. In fact, I advised him to build another site, and another, and another. It adds up after sometimes.

His site is following the blueprint I am going to teach you and earn $800 per month. He is now on the first page of Google for his main keyword (I just checked and there are 5 Millions+ competing pages – without the quotes).

Do you see the potential here? Build 10 of these sites, and you can earn a good amount of money.

Back to our case study.

Niche Marketing Case Study (6 Jan 2009)

MODULE 1. Finding a money making niche.

Part 2 – Checking Niches Popularity & Profitablity!

Step #1: How Many People Search For The Keyword

Why am I doing this? I want to see if there is a lot of demand in the niche, and if people are actually buying online.

As a reminder, here are the niches I found yesterday:

1. Wii Downloads
2. Gov Records
3. Reverse Phone Lookup
4. Registry
5. Spyware/Adware
6. Satellite Tv For Pc & Mobile
7. World of Warcraft

A.  Google Keyword Tool External (Click Here)

I will compare between my different terms and find out how many times people search in the search engines every single month.

Since I don’t have a clue about these niches, I need to know what are the keywords people use when they search in this niche.

Question: What’s a keyword?

It’s a word or a sentence.

Example: If you want to find more about WII downloads, you need to go in a search engine like Google, and type something. This “something” is called a keyword, whether it is a single, or several words.

Example: UFC, Ultimate Fighting Championship, Pride. Each of these 3 is a keyword.

(By the way, my Sparring partner won the UFC 92 last week!)

Let’s continue…

Now, I want to learn more about the niche, so I will use : The Google External Tool

I will start with the “Spyware” niche.

1. I simply type the keyword: “Spyware” in the search box:

Google External

The tool returned a lot of keywords (see below):

Kewyord Results

2. Getting some related keywords

But what I want at these point are the related keywords.

I will just scroll down until I get the “Additional Keywords to consider”

See screenshot below:

Related Keywords

As you can see, there are many related keywords. They will help me to understand the niche and check the profitablity. Here are the main related keywords (I just downloaded the whole list in .txt format, and copied these from the list)

• adware
• ad ware
• xoftspy
• trojans
• malware
• spywear
• keyloggers spyware
• virus
• dialers
• trojan
• popups

As you can see, it seems to be a pretty large niche with a variety of keywords.

What I will do with these keywords?

1. They will help me to find out:
2. What is the niche all about
3. The number of people searching in the niche every month
4. Finding out what my competition is doing
5. Getting hundreds of kewyords (that many of my competitors are not aware about)

3. Conclusion

It seems to have potential because people in this niche have a problem. They are “Desperate Buyers”, they have a problem with a spyware and want to get rid of it, or know if they have one.

Now, I want to find out how many people are searching for these keywords (the related ones).

B.  Checking The Demand

Another Keyword Tool

1. Getting the numbers

I want to know if there is an interest in this market, because obviously, if nobody is searching about spywares, I am not going to earn any money…

So How do I find out how many people are searching for these terms every mont?

I’ll use the Seo Book Keywod Tool (It’s Here)

I just typed spyware in the search box:

And here is what I get:

Results for the keyword spyware

There are 3,974 people searching for the main keyword “Spyware” every single day. That’s (let me take my calculator…), that’s 119220 person searching for “spyware” in Google, Yahoo and MSN every month. It’s pretty popular.

Note that this is ONLY for the main keywords. There are way MORE people searching in this niche in any given month.

I typed the related keywords in the seo book search box, and I got this.

• Spyware: 119220 searches per month
• Adware:  48210     “”       “”
• keyloggers:16200  “”       “”
• malware: 34710      “”       “”

Interesting: I noticed by looking through the keywords in the seo book that most of these people are searching for FREE spywares, adwares, etc.  I didn’t see this with the Google tool.

Now, I start to understand the niche.

It seems that adwares and spywares are the same, or pretty similar. I will find this out later on.

2. Stay Organized

I make sure that I keep all these datas in folder on my hardrive.

You can create a main folder and call it Project #1. In this folder, you will create a folder for the “spyware” niche (or any other niche you chose). Then, you will create another folder called “Keywords”. In the keyword folder, you may have: a folder for Google External tool and another for the Seo Book tool (you can download the keyword in CSV for excel).

Save all these keywords because you will need (some of) them when you start your website.

(I also write them in my journal. For each niche, I have a simple notebook, nothing fancy).

Let’s continue …

3. Let’s Recap!

Do you remember what I am trying to do right now?

If you are lost, this will keep you on track:

I am trying to do ONLY two things:

1. Finding how many people are searching for the main keyword.
2. Learning more about the niche in the process.

Why in the world am I doing that?

Because I am trying to find ONE profitable niche (one of the 7 I found yesterday).

So far, What I’ve learned?

1. There is a lot of people searching for imformation about spywares (119K per month for the main keyword)
2. Most of these people are searching for FREE spyware/adware scans
3. Adware/Spyware may be the same thing (I’ll check this ONLY if I decide to go after this niche)
4. I’d like to enter this niche because I’d like to learn more

The next step is …

C. Checking the profitablility of the niche

I will see how affiliates are making money in this niche.

Stay tuned …

Franck

PS. Don’t forget your homework:

This part (and what comes after) is really important, because you don’t want to find yourself in a market with no money, or with very few people…

Here is what you need to do step by step:

1. Pick ONE niche in your OWN list (or mine if you want)
2. Go to Google Keyword tool External
3. Get the related keywords (to start thinking like your niche)
4. Download the related keywords
5. Organize your work
6. Go the the Seo Book Keyword tool
7. Type your main keyword
8. Take the number of searches (it’s daily searches, so you need to multiply by 30 to find how many people search every month)
9. Get a journal (like you want, for me it’s just a simple notbook) and write down your numbers. Here is what I wrote: Spyware: 119220 searches/month, then, I wrote that people are searching for free stuff. I also wrote that I like this niche. That’s it.
10. Wait for my next post …

I’d like to see your work, just let what you found below …

Update: I’ve added all the links to the case study below (links open in a new window):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Ckecking Niche Profitablity

5. Choosing My Money Making Niche

6. Learning More About The Spyware Niche

7. Domain Name Registration

8. Getting Website Content And Backlink Strategy Starts

Build 10 of these niche affiliate sites, and if each of them earns $200, you are at $2000 per month.

Note that many people charge thousands of dollars for course that don’t have 1/10th of what I am going to teach you. You’d have to get many products to get everything together.

The beauty of this system is that one your niche site is up and running, you can start the next one since there is very little maintenance.

If you want a proven plan that you can replicate over and over to make money on the Internet, this is it.

There are many ways to earn on the Internet, and this model is how I got started. I have so many friends offline who ask me how I earn money on the web that I decided to show how I do it.

And …

There are many tools to earn money on the Internet. In my tutorial, I’ll show you what I (or any of my students) use with success. I’ll keep everything simple, because all you want is to get started. The details can come afterward.

The KEY to earn money on the Internet is to start with ONE model and stick to it. Do not try to do everything at the same time because this won’t work. Most of the people earning a lot of money on the web outsource the “non-money-making” work.

If you are on a shoestring (I was when I started), you can do almost everything without spending money. If you are more experienced, you can outsource everything to speed up the process.

I really hope that you enjoy following my tutorial (I am) and learn valuable things for your web business.

Before you start, I hope you already read my “7 Deadly Affiliate Mistake” report. If not, just subscribe to my blog to download it.

Let’s start…

Niche Marketing Case Study (Start 5 Jan 2009)

MODULE 1. Finding a money making niche.

This is where everything should start.

Most of my students tell me that they are stuck at this point.

Heck, believe me, in 2006 I wasn’t getting it. But a niche is nothing complicated.

What’s a niche?

Keeping things simple, I say:

A niche is a group of people with the same:

• interests
• hobbies
• problems

This is it.

How I find my niche?

I will pick three niches that are already proven to make money, and use a quick 4 step process to see what I choose.

I prefer highly competitive niches because people are already earning money…

My final choice will be the niche that have a big potential… or just the easier niche to go after.

Here is what I am doing right now:

Step 1: Clickbank Marketplace (Getting ideas for my niche)

If you don’t know clickbank, it’s an affiliate network. It’s a place that brings vendors (also called merchants) and affiliates together. In a nutshell, merchants find affiliates to promote their products, and affiliates find products to promote.

A. I just went here (open in new window): http://www.clickbank.com/marketplace.htm

clickbank marketplace home

B. Researching my profitable niche

On this page, you can see that there are many markets: I will click on Home & Family

Many Main Markets

C. Checking profitablility

For this, I will just look at the gravity of the products on this page.

What does gravity means?

Clickbank says on this page (open in new window): http://www.clickbank.com/ranking.html

Gravity: Number of distinct affiliates who earned a commission by referring a paying customer to the publisher’s products. This is a weighted sum and not an actual total. For each affiliate paid in the last 8 weeks we add an amount between 0.1 and 1.0 to the total. The more recent the last referral, the higher the value added.

I say: Gravity indicate you how many affiliates made a sale during the last two weeks… BUT you need to know that some “savvy” or “blackhat” marketers can inflate this gravity.

Why?

Because they pertinently know that more affiliates will promote their product.

Now that you know what gravity means, let’s continue …

You can see that I added a red elipse around the gravity number.

Clicbank Gravity

I like choosing niches with products with high gravity because I know that other affiliates are already making a lot of sales.

Clickbank Gravity

There are 10 results on this page.

As you can see, in the Home & Family market, these are the top results.

I went ahead and added all these products/gravity together:

=========================
Earth 4 Energy
410.10

Home Made Energy
93.82
=========================
Unlimited Wii Downloads
259.12

My Wii Downloads
127.82
=========================

Reverse Phone Detective
502.51
=========================
Gov-Resources.com
218.61

Government-Records.com
136.69
=========================

Rocket Spanish
89.17
=========================
Kingdom Of Pets: Dog Training
121.96

It’s interesting to see that all these are decent numbers.

I went ahead and clicked on page two and found out that there are many other gov records products (I don’t have a clue about this market) with a gravity between 60 and 100 which is a good number.

There are also two other Rocket languages product (Learn German and Learn French).

Then, on page three, there are other dating and wedding products.

What I will do now?

Since I already have a site in the Learn French market and one in the Renewable energy market, so I will not go for these niches.

I took a note of these 3 markets:

1. Wii Downloads
2. Gov Records
3. Reverse Phone Lookup

D. Looking in other clickbank categories

I just look in other categories to find if I find some other products with high gravity. l make a search in the other top categories (like I did above – from point B to C).

I found some interesting in the Computing & Internet category.

See screenshot below:

Clickbank Computing & Internet

Computing & Internet

I found 4 interesting niches to go after:

1. Registry
2. Spyware/Adware
3. Satellite Tv For Pc & Mobile
4. World of Warcraft

I’m done with clickbank!

I know that affiliates are making sales in all these markets, and in the next step, I will try to choose a winner by researching on Google.

I have now a total of 7 markets to work with:

1. Wii Downloads
2. Gov Records
3. Reverse Phone Lookup
4. Registry
5. Spyware/Adware
6. Satellite Tv For Pc & Mobile
7. World of Warcraft

I don’t have a clue about these markets, except the registry and spyware. I know people making money in these markets, so I may just go for them. I will see.

Next Blog Post: Step 2: Searching for my market in Google.

Stay tuned …

Franck.

PS. Your Homework (for those who are following):

1. Go to clickbank.com

2. Find at least 3 markets to go after.

3. Wait for my next post

Note: All the posts will be added in the Clickbank Case Study category of this blog.

If you have any question, just leave your comments below.

Update: I’ve added all the links to the case study below (links open in a new window):

1. Introduction the the niche marketing case study

2. How To Find A Profitable Niche

3. Checking The Niche Popularity

4. Ckecking Niche Profitablity

5. Choosing My Money Making Niche

6. Learning More About The Spyware Niche

7. Domain Name Registration

8. Getting Website Content And Backlink Strategy Starts

About The Author:

Franck Silvestre is a full time Internet and affiliate marketer who teaches others how to create an online business at http://www.mynetmarketingland.com