Have you ever searched the internet for an online forum or club that only discusses video games, poker, a hit TV series, or a particular delicacy that tickles your senses? Or have you searched for like-minded people who only play the same video game when you spend hours mashing your controller buttons? If you haven’t been able to find buddies who share the same passion as you, then you’ve stumbled upon an untapped niche. And that’s what most successful marketers and entrepreneurs do: find a gap (niche) and fill it (sell).
A niche, or more specifically a niche market, is a “subset” of a broad market or industry. Analogously speaking, a video game market/industry branches into different niches, and each niche branches into a different set of niches called microniches.
The video game industry consists of different genres. These genres include:
- First Person shooters
- Hack-and-slash games
- Racing Simulators
- Sports simulators
- Role playing
- Casual / arcade games
- Strategy games
From a marketer’s point of view, these genres are niches, as each genre has a different fanbase; these fans often have a common set of traits, like first person shooter fans for example: they prefer to use a mouse instead of a gamepad or joystick.
PC gamers, who always play first-person shooter game titles, usually have a bigger budget set aside for a more powerful game rig and won’t hesitate to upgrade their computer if their PC doesn’t meet the game’s hardware requirements – even if it costs them hundreds of dollars.
If you know what I mean, a savvy marketer knows how to empathize with the needs of the fanbase – but more importantly, he knows how to provide them with the products they need. As of now, there are more than a thousand forums and websites around the world where gamers can meet and discuss their opinions about hardware, and the community members themselves also provide information about what they want to buy in the future. In the simplest sense, everything is laid out for the marketer: demographics, brand popularity, budgeting, and shopper trends.
After gathering all the information about that niche’s fan base, you should start building your own website forum or blog, populating it with content and interest more repeat users to participate in the daily discussions. After accomplishing that feat, you are now officially a “niche master”, someone who has gained traction in a niche market.
And being a niche master is not an easy task. Competition will choke you as more marketers look for growing niches. Again, once you gain traction, you should immediately start selling products to your users.
And the best thing about niche marketing is that successful marketers don’t even own products. They simply sign up as affiliate marketers and call up banner codes on different parts of their website.
Items advertised on these niche websites are usually offered at discounted prices, so users are more tempted to buy from the member sites than to buy from the company’s own store. There are also several ways niche marketers can make money in addition to affiliate sales or cost-per-action (CPA) advertising:
1. Paid product reviews
2. Advertising cost per impression
3. Sell lead information to companies with a different niche
Some marketers have even jumped the fence and patented and developed their own products to be sold exclusively on their niche websites.
So why not give niche marketing a shot? Many successful marketers have started from scratch and now have Porsches parked at their doorstep. The rule is simple: find a hole and fill it.
Niche marketing for beginners
World News,Next Big Thing in Public Knowledg
#Niche #marketing #beginners
