To Niche or Not To Niche?
There is an interesting tussle of views between online mass marketing and online niche marketing . Internet marketing traditionally began with information-giving and this has given rise to the perspective that the internet is appealing to the masses. And rightly it should. The extensive growth of e-commerce and affiliate marketing has however given rise to online niche marketing, and has become a very profitable topic of discussion at that too.
There is no right or wrong about which perspective one takes. It all boils down to the objective of the site owner and his or her trade, of which will determine what perspective he or she will take to catapult the site to the next level. For instance, a site owner representing a corporate entity would likely design the site with an information-centric perspective, whilst an avid online e-marketer will be ecommerce-centric.
I would consider that every business is in a niche of its own. The main difference being that it’s either a broad niche or a narrowly-defined niche .
While searching for business ideas, both traditional or internet marketing alike, we start off exploring a viable board industry, narrowing down to a digestible segment and finally specializing in providing a focused line of product offering.
So essentially, the extent of the niche depends on the breadth & depth of your product range, your chosen target market(s), and the market needs to be fulfilled.
For example, you could consider an Aston Martin dealership selling a couple of Aston Martin DBS per year. Or you could also consider a Toyota dealership selling a couple thousands of Toyota Corrollas per year. The former is obviously a Super Niche while the latter is a broad one.
Similarly, in internet marketing, there is also need to niche both your product offerings and target segment. The reason being that as an internet marketer, you only have that much time and energy to ensure certain level of success.
Your internet SWOT and viability analysis are much more skilled and technology-driven. You use keyword search tools, and supply search tools to measure the product’s potential viability. You use traffic-driving tools to route internet traffic to your site optimizing backlinks from social networking & bookmarking, article marketing, link-exchanges etc.
The smaller the niche, the greater the amount of effort to grow your product offerings separately, differentiate them, maintain your clientele base. Traditional brick and mortar businesses need to build-in the niche segments expansion requirements, be it from marketing or budgeting perspectives.
Internet marketers are able to achieve greater operational efficiency, sometimes at faster pace, by leveraging upon ready or customized technology-driven tools to manage the ever-growing number of niche offerings within a portfolio.
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[...] Andrew Goodman wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThere is an interesting tussle of views between online mass marketing and online niche marketing. Internet marketing traditionally began with information-giving and this has given rise to the perspective that the internet is appealing … [...]