Getting started with your own online business? First off, congratulations!! This is a great industry to get started with and can be not only be very lucrative, but fulfilling and fun.

When you are getting started, you want to choose the niche or type of business you will be running. I know this sounds funny but I get this question a lot; “what niche should I go into to make money online?”

In my opinion, it is always a good idea to go into a niche where either:

(1) you have knowledge or expertise

(2) where you have an interest, then see if the market supports it.

Some good questions to ask yourself are:

– “What information do I possess that others are seeking?” With this in mind…are there products already in the market with information that I can talk about intelligently to give me an edge in my marketing?

– “What path have I successfully walked that I can share with others who might be looking for the same path or solution?”

IMPORTANT: *There must be a pool of existing products in the market that you can sell to this crowd to sustain your business!! (don’t be a trail blazer. Leave that to the “Settlers” 🙂

The next step is to narrow down the niche. Don’t just choose “Weight loss”, maybe try “weight loss for teens”.

Here are other steps to narrow down into your niche:

– Apply gender, age, G\group, etc. “Fitness for men over 50”

– Visit www.dmoz.org for niche ideas. Don’t just think in broad ideas, go deeper!

– Check if your topic of interest is shrinking or growing over time (a.k.a. trending down or up) using www.google.com/trends/hottrends. Click ‘Explore’ -> Add Term -> (interest over time)

Let’s tap into info that others have already created. Let’s find what people are already buying and what’s already selling. Once you do this, you goal is to find a unique way to to get in front of that market!

These sites are very useful: Amazon.com, Magazines.com, Dummies.com, Clickbank.com

http://amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/ -> Amazon is the world’s biggest online bookstore, and a goldmine of niche research information. Check out what products are the current bestsellers. Are there many weight loss books or wealth management books? See which are the current hot topics that people are buying.

It really comes down to supply and demand. Once you have your niche in mind, you need to measure “Supply” (products already selling in the market) and “Demand” (volume of people looking for the supply – aka, solution to their problem!).

In this case, demand is measured by how many people are actively searching for specific information. The specifics are found in keywords. Take one of the keywords or “keyword phrases” and use the Google Keyword Tool and search for volume.
https://adwords.google.com/KeywordPlanner (ex. “learn piano”) and look for “GRAVITY” = minimum 1000 global searches per month and up to 5000 xenical medication.

The supply is your competition along with your potential affiliate partners! Type your keyword into Google and look for advertisers.

Are others advertising to these people?

If so, people are most likely already spending money, which means affiliates are making money online as well.

So two ways to make money online are to:
1. Market as an affiliate where you do the marketing work for someone else’s product and make a commission.
2. Market as a vendor/product owner. In this form, you create the product but can get affiliates to do some of the marketing work for you. This is a little more advanced but is really the best option if you want to scale your business.

There are two types of products to market:
1. Physical products (think Amazon)
2. Digital (think downloadable how-to products, videos, software etc.) – Higher commissions = MORE money for you!

So I’m sure you are currently asking, well hasn’t someone already done a lot of this research and found the most profitable niches.

Why YES I have 🙂

Here are the top 5 most profitable niches for 2015:

1. Wealth
– Making money
– Managing money
– Keeping money
– Investing
– Real estate

2. Health & Wellness
– feeling better (fitness, more energy, etc.)
– Health prevention and cures (stop smoking, rid of acne, etc.)
– Aging
– Dieting and losing weight
– Healthy eating (nutrition, natural health, organic living)
– Stress reduction

3. Love & Relationships
– Dating
– Marriage
– Parenting
– Family
– Intimacy
– Conflict resolution

4. Personal Development
– Leadership development
– Self Esteem
– Motivation
– Career development
– Life coaching
– Spirituality

5. Hobbies
– Tennis
– Guitar and other instruments
– Scuba diving
– Mountain biking
– Scrapbooking
– Golf
– Dogs

So now that you know what the most profitable niches are, now what?
1. Do your homework.
2. Make a decision.
3. Then put a plan into place for getting in front of your audience and start making money!