Are some warriors giving bad advice?

The answer is: It depends.

Sometimes, if you turn your passion into a job, you may lose that passion and it becomes a JOB.

But, sometimes, if you just chase after what's profitable, you may never really enjoy it.

So, you've got to find what works best for you.

I think the advice to find something you are passionate about comes from musicians and actors and sports players etc. People who say "I'd do this even if they didn't pay me."

Then job counselors started telling people, find something you love to do to earn a living and it won't be work for you.

In the real world most people have jobs that run the gambit from love to hate, and they work them because they have to.

I figure that a lot of us in IM love the fact that we can work any place and any time and earn a living.

To me that is what matters and that is what I'm passionate about. Not the niche.

By the way, I love Ice Cream.

George Wright

I think for a beginner, it's got to be something you will stick at.

If you have already had success, then you are completing a business transaction that you know something about, in which case creating something where there is a demand makes more sense.

The trouble seems to be that that advice by and of itself isn't terribly useful, it probably needs to be qualified as a niche that has good search volume and a commercial intent, AND is something that interests you?

I agree with PimpSEO. If what you are passionate about is a good niche, go for it, but without keyword research, you won't know if it is or not. That said, my highest paying niche is one I 'fell' into because I loved it. Lots of traffic to the keyword, though I didn't know that at the time. At the same time, I have lots of sites that don't do anything. I didn't know enough about keyword research when I developed them. They would take a major overhaul, which I don't have time to do right now, to get maybe start making some money.

Now, if I am passionate about something, before I put in the time, effort, and expense to build it, I do a lot of keyword research from every angle I can think of, as well as researching to see what, if anything, that market segment will purchase.

It's true that it is hard to drop a dead project when you love it. Otherwise, I would have quit paying for domain fees for several sites over a year ago.

Even so, tying yourself down to a good money making niche that you don't like probably isn't a good idea, either. In that case, if you are like me, you won't put the time into it to get it to the point of making money.

Linda

After being in a niche that had a lot of potential but I did not have much interest in I started to loose hope in internet marketing.

I am now in SEO and love it. This is far more competitive than I have worked with before but I am a strong believer in making something work if the passion is there.

So as others have stated, it depends. If your passion is to just make money, you can potentially do well in any field as long as you focus and persist in it.

But if your focus is in your specific niche, like SEO, you will love it even when you aren't making a dollar, and this is important for newbies. The money will flow later as long as you put your own spin on it & persist.

Why wouldn't you be able to compete?

As a marketer, you need to look for new and untapped angles, I personally don't think it would be that hard to wiggle your way into it if the passion is there.

I run a small Amazon review site on technology items, I have not done much SEO on it to be honest but it makes me a pretty penny each month.

I don't have that many product reviews, nor do barely get 50 visits per day. But my conversion rate on those low searched keywords is through the roof, so my sales do come through regularly.

Just an example of a small site making money in a competitive arena.

At the end of the day, whatever keeps you going with IM needs to be taken into account, if making money is your passion, then choose a lucrative niche. If golf is your passion, tap into that market and enjoy what you do while the money comes in.

Like what the OP said above - It depends.

If you can enter a market you're passionate about it's so much easier to make money from as you'll enjoy marketing to that crowd.

When I first started out I got told to enter a market I'm passionate about and looking back it wasn't a massive market... Infact it's was tiny and would of been considered unprofitable by most.

But you know what? I enjoyed participating in the Forum discussions, making video tutorials, uploading them to Youtube, writing Blog posts etc.

I learned a lot and it was easy... Because I was passionate about what I was doing.

I eventually turned this niche I was in, into a $1000 per week business... And remember - this was a niche most would of considered unprofitable.

The only bummer was I kinda found it's ceiling... Meaning no matter what I did. I couldn't make anymore, but so what, I learned tons and by then I got hooked into internet marketing by then ;-)

So would I recommend entering a market you're passionate about? Like I said above... It depends but I reckon 99% of the time, yes.

I believe it's not "if" a market is profitable but "how" profitable a market is.

James Scholes

I think it depends on the marketer themselves. If you lose interest easily then maybe start with a niche that you are familiar with, especially for you first project. That way you can create a kind of step by step process which you can then repeat using other topics you know less about. It 'may' be easier to establish a blueprint for future projects if you use a 'passion' to first create it.

After that then I say think like a business person and go where the opportunities are. After all, Internet marketing is likely your passion... Rather than the niche itself, 'so' just get stuck in and enjoy it.

Such a hard question...

All points made above are totally valid.

My two cents is that if you can actually find something you are passionate and that makes money then you have hit the home run. However, it takes trial and error to find out how those two objectives can align.

Newbies should start with something they are passionate about and if they still would like to pursue marketing online, then once they have some knowledge and skills it will be easier to find a best of both worlds situation.

Honestly, I am still looking for mine.

I guess that's why there are so many products to do with sex and porn...

Of course, as for a newbie, he know nothing about niche marketing and even someone tells him which niche can make money yet he just can not achieve that as success can not be copied sometimes. Thus, the first step is to choose from what he passionate about and then to do keyword research. But if it is difficult to do, the second step is to find another niche.

i think a large part of my quick success was that I started in a niche that I was not passionate about.

So my ego wasn't wrapped up in it and I wasn't concerned with "making a name for myself".

I was more interestd in setting up the system (squeeze page, oto, newsletters and promos,etc), then the content itself.

I pushed forward with 'good enough', not looking for perfection.

I was willing to test different things I may have avoided (hard sell vs soft sell, hammer with promo email daily, or send a lot of good content, etc).

I think this helped immensely with avoiding analysis paralysis.

I finished at 2 or 3 am, and had clickbank sales when I woke up the late the next morning. I did in 1 day what some people will drag out for months (if ever)..

Interesting question, with varied possible answers.

I'd suggest ONE qualifier or supplementary question - "How long have you
been in your line of business?"

With no hard data to back it up, my guess would be that anyone who has
been at a business for longer than 10 years IS passionate about it -
and for others, by the time they reach 10 years working at a business
they have little or no passion for, it has become a drudgery they are
looking to escape from.

When you can merge a passion with a market, you're on to a HOT thing.
I've been fortunate that way. And so am biased towards the 'passion'
argument - even wrote a PASSION Manifesto!

All success
Dr.Mani

Hi Mike,

I personally think there is no right or wrong reason as different people will view it differently.

For me personally, I think it is better to start business in a market where there are demands for the product. If the market is profitable, it means that we can take our own share of the profit if we are willing to do the work to market the product.

I agree with your point on earning enough money from IM to outsource the mundane tasks so that there is more time to pursue your interest

Zack

Hi mrcouchpotato!

It is depends on the situation. It is important to be patient and persistent throughout the process.

yes it really depends

I ALWAYS recommend to start off in a niche you're passionate about, even if it's during the learning stage. It makes the process much easier, you are familiar with the content and prospects you're dealing with (CRUCIAL!) and thus it's easier to remained focused and motivated.

Besides, you can make make money in ANY niche, so it's not like you MUST be in a hot niche to make money online.

Some sage advice I received a while back...

First and foremost, you are a marketer. So you have to be passionate about marketing.

If can market, you can make money in any niche... regardless of your passion or otherwise.

Best,

Sal

To be able to do well, not only in marketing I guess but as well as in any endeavor, you need to be passiante about what you are doing and love and enjoy it. Passion is what gives you the extra boost to keep on going.

Finding a niche that is starving for a product or service and be able to offer to that niche would be a good point as well however for you someone specially newbies to be able to be adept to that approach, it would be best if they could start off with something that they would be passionate about and learn the ropes first before trudging into a hungry niche which they would need to research further on it and understand before catering to the needs of the niche.

Just my points to ponder. :-)

I think that short term, you can earn $ from stuff you're not passionate about, but I think if you want to develop your business long-term and make it BIG, do something that you like!

There may be times that something that you are passionate about may not
attract attention or interest from potential markets. Now if you can find a niche where you would see that you can have a product or service that you can be passioante about than that would be a move in the right direction.

No; it's a plain bad answer that misses the point, resting as it does on the assumption that if you're passionate enough about something, there are going to be customers there with money to spend.

A better answer (though still not necessarily entirely "correct", for all-comers) is "Find a niche that's starving for a product or service and sell it to them." The reason it isn't necessarily correct for everyone is that that, too, rests on an assumption: in this case, the assumption that finding such a niche will in itself enable one to get money out of it. It's a far better assumption than the previous one, of course, because at least in one case there's money there to be targeted, which is by no means necessarily true for the passion-followers.

For myself, I tend to develop a bit of passion gradually when the income starts arriving. That always makes me more enthusiastic.

In reality, it depends to some extent on the business model which one's adopting. For an article marketer, for example, there's a disadvantage to selecting a niche about which one knows absolutely nothing and has to go to night school just to get to grips with the vocabulary.

Yes, hellishly bad. But this really isn't exactly a supreme example of that. At least in this instance Warriors are saying what they believe, and for the most part not purporting to offer more than opinion. Take a look down in the SEO department, if you want to see "bad advice" and have a strong enough stomach to handle it. Truly the blind are leading the partially sighted, down there, and the reasons are sometimes only too evident for all to see in their sig-files. :p

Call me a facetious, callous skepchick, if you want, but the instances of which I see a slightly macabre, amusing side are when a new Warrior starts a thread expressing his/her urgent need for additional income and asks for advice about how to achieve it: it sometimes seems to me that the lower the standard of literacy of the OP, the greater is the certainty that someone will advise them to set up an article-writing service.

Finding and perusing something your passionate about is how to make yourself an authority and leader in your niche.

Which in the end can earn you great rewards and a lot of money. Its usually something you have to be in for the LONG HAUL!

To just earn some money is a completely different matter altogether and doesn't require passion about that particular niche, it can earn you money quicker but in most
cases the long term rewards do not provide exponential rewards like being an authority and leader does.

Alexa, your such a material girl! :p:p:p

In a way i agree with you, We may be passionate about lots of thing,,, but no one else is interested.. So we r not going to make any sales..

If we choose some niche we actually believe it's going to make money and in our personal interesting arena.. that would be easier for us to work on with.. what i mean by,, it's easier to write article for that niche...

if your looking to blog about something you gotta be passionate about it, but also it will be much harder if that niche already is flooded with others trying to do the same thing. You will have to stand out of the crowd of course

Last night I posted a 1,300 word article on my blog - try doing that in a field you know nothing about. Everything in the article came straight out of memory and I did not have to look anything up.

Even coming from memory, that 1,300 word article still took over 2 hours to write.

If you enjoy doing research, and more time studying and doing research then creating content, then find a niche that needs content.

The truth is that it works both ways.

If you are passionate about something and can provide professional info about it as well, you can earn a good income from it but most likely in the long term despite fierce competiton.

Income from the above comes by you doing what comes naturally and not really by what you are taught online. You naturally should blog about something you are passionate about, write tons of authority articles, submit to articles directories, create videos, network on social bookmarking sites etc. You are determined to get the word out!

A football fanatic probably knows all the best football sites or those related to his club. He naturally post comments on the clubs official forum after every games either giving praise or biting criticism. He may already have a following on these forums.

Were he to decide to monetise his passion with a little IM training, he would be reeking in cash.

On the other hand, finding a product for a starving market and profiting from it is where the true IM professional excels in.

He may be total ignoramus in regards to that niche but will be prepared to put in the "sweat" to make money from it.

"Sweat" may mean outsourcing article writing, ghostwriting a book, banner ads, videos etc. Not much effort really if outsourced and making a ton of money from it.

Finding a starving market will bring in a rush of quick money.

On the other hand, something you are passionate about in a very competitive niche may eventually bring in the cash, but in the long run

It really depends, and personally, I will not say that some warriors here are giving bad advice. Maybe it's what they think is the best advised that they could share or informed a newcomer to the IM business. I mean, we all have different ideas and concepts about something, and I believe that at that time when they are trying to help or give some newbie an advise, they probably felt that by giving some of the things that they learned will be the best advice to help that newbie.
Although I would have to agree with the idea that not what fellow warriors here have been giving some advise are all applicable and are used by the newbies. Since they have different viewpoints on what and how to start on their IM business, and at that time, that is the best advice that they could offer to these newbies.
With regards to the advises like "Find a niche that you are interested about", Yes, I would say that the warrior who gave the advise felt that it is important for newcomer to have their niche that they are interested with since they are familiar with it and can explain to their clients about their product or blogs.

In my opinion... It's always bad advice to tell anyone that what you chose to do is what they must do, too.

It's true that you can't always monetize what you're passionate about but it does help to have at least some interest in your niche. But that's not true for everyone.

Some people are passionate about marketing or making money and the niche doesn't matter to them.

It is important to stress that no matter how passionate they are...there still must be a market. Though I must say, I'm sometimes surprised to find there are markets in areas that I would never have dreamed of.

Giving someone the benefit of your experience is what this forum is all about. However, everyone has to play to their own interests and strengths.

It's like when someone says they need to make money quick and everyone says they should write articles. If they hate to write and they're terrible at it then that's bad advice for them.

Rose

I think we should tell the job and interest clearly in mind.we should have a job to feed our family and run the life.whatever we hate or like the job, we have to do it, as long as we can earn enough money on it.
But for the interest,i think it is a just a leisure lifestyle.we can do the interesting thing in our after work time.Thus, it brings us happiness.
so now, you can choose which is more important in your situation.thus, it will be better.

It's a lot easier to work on things that you're "passionate" about when you're not worrying about paying your bills and buying food.

Before I knew anything about IM, I launched a ClickBank product based around my passion. Then I learned about keyword research.... And very few people were searching for anything remotely related to my product. Needless to say, I don't sell many of those.

If you're in internet marketing and making any kind of money from it, then that's something to be excited about already. I mean c'mon, you're making money online...how freaking cool is that?

Once you have a good income coming in, THEN do stuff that really interests you because by then you'll have amounted some experience, know-how and understanding which will make your new venture all the more likely to succeed.

The only question you need to ask yourself before taking anyones advise is "How much experience does this person have in this business?" and "Are they where I wanna be?"

Answer those two, and you have your answer...

In my personal experience those that have no genuine interest in the more popular niche rarely make anything. It's a very good question and I even considered the answer many times before.

I think of the person's passion as a better start because of the following:

• If they fail, they wouldn't feel as if they have genuinely wasted their time.
• If they fail they are more likely to try again since they enjoyed the experience.
• It's easy to make money in a field you have knowledge and skills in.
• Procrastination is not as prominent as in starting an an area you've never ventured into before
• You have a distinct advantage in a niche you know about

• there is less time spent learning

You get the picture, So when someone asks "Hey what should I do first?" I will always ask them what do they like to do. It's the smoothest path a person starting out can really take without getting too overwhelmed.

Yeah in most cases it really is flawed advice. Although it really depends on someone's personal situation...

Ideally you can find something you're passionate about - or at least interested in - that you can also make profitable.

But if you're desperate to make money quickly, it makes sense to enter a market that people are already making money in. Personally, I've found the more competition the better. It means there's money there.

Advices are advices, I am a newbie too, but I assess first whatever advices people are giving me. But I agree, hope to get replies that will and can truly help us newbies.

I think it can be both. Some people make a good living with the things they are most passionate about while others just choose something that is profitable and go with that. I personally feel that it's good if you can make profitable something that you are passionate about because you will enjoy it and probably stick with it longer but I'm not opposed to branching out and trying something new if it's profitable either as long as it's legal and not a scam.

I think for a lot of people there is this assumption that if you want to make money in IM, you need to become a prolific writer.. cranking out content of some sort or the other all the time.. articles, blog posts, etc..

I call that being a writer

But that is only one model..

As I pointed out earlier, it took one long day to get my first online business running, and making a profit overnight. That 1 project ended up making 1k-4k a month nearly handsoff for several years.

my advice isn't to start a business in something you are passionate about...
It's this: be passionate about starting your business.

Exactly.

Passions change and passion gets diluted with familiarity and the loss of choice. It is OK to be passionate about something when you have the choice of whether to deal with it or not, but when it is your main income source and you HAVE to deal with it day in and out any niche becomes stale.

BUT if you are passionate about building your business, or a method of building your business - like site promotion, SEO, PPC, social media or some other method then the fire will keep being ignited with every win/sale/new subscriber/new skill learned.

Having an interest in the niche..... now that is helpful

Passion is about LONG TERM -- it doesn't necessarily mean it is a money maker.

The passion approach is for several reasons -

1. Because you know about it, you will be able to create alot of content and do it quickly -- you don't have to research it, you don't have to pay someone to write it

2. It is about being able to put the time in to build the business. If you like a topic and want to talk about it, then you don't run the risk of becoming bored.

3. The passion comes through to the readers of the site. They trust you. They will trust you when you recommend something.

But, you must also look into selling opportunities within this niche. Whether it is a physical good, an affiliate program, or creating a digital product.

Recommending this as a way to get started in IM is not a bad suggestion. It has its merits.

You can possess all the passion and expertise know to mankind...

But if you ain't got the right mindset and you ain't got slightest bit of marketing nouse...

Then you ain't gonna go far.

Too many people advise on niches... blah blah blah.

So if this is the case, why do so many fail?

Passion + Success Mindset + Hot Market + Marketing Skills = Success.

advice is still an advice, good or bad
it might be good for someone, but then again, it might be bad for you
there is always a second opinion.
ask for advice, and get a second opinion.

I agree.

And as to your question "Are some warriors giving bad advice?"

Well, there's over 350,000 of us, we can't all be right.

The actual intended answer there is:

"First, find something that will not bore you to tears so thoroughly that you give up long before you have a snowball's chance in hell of making any money."

But if you actually give that answer, people make bad choices.

I agree that ideally you should be providing something your audience/traffic wants, it would be good if you are passionate about it, to better be able to defend it

Funny...

I was passionate about real estate. Now I don't care.

Set your goals and then you'll discover the passion.

It's not one or the other. Passion v Money.

It's more than that.

Once you have a clear vision and a burning desire, you'll find the passion, regardless of a niche because deep down, you know that it's going to help you achieve your ultimate goal.

Working on business that drives from your passion is the best way motivate yourself working harder to make things work. But if you generating good profits from it, its not a bad way for motivation.

The answer is get passionate about the marketing process, then what you sell doesn't matter.

Ask an offline salesman if he would only take a job with company that sold products he was personally passionate about.

Most salesman love their job becuase they are passionate about the selling process, they get off on sale itself not the product

You can do it that way, but if you find something your passionate about you'll have the motivation to see it through

Some warriors may be ignorant or blindly repeating the advice they've heard from other IMers, but for the most part, I don't think our warriors are meaning to give out ill advice. The problem is everyone is unique. The techniques & strategies that work for me may not be the best fit for you. If you've got the drive to focus on money-making potential & stick with creating & promoting a site even if you aren't interested in the topic, then good for you There are other people out there who need to pick a niche they're passionate in, otherwise they lose interest & stop before ever succeeding.

And with so many good legitimate ways to make money online, you might as well spend a little time finding the approach that suits your personality & run w/that.

This mentality might seem all well and dandy to begin with, but have you given any consideration to support?

What are you going to do when emails from buyers/potential buyers start flooding in with indepth questions about home made ice cream?

You cant exactly answer with "I dont know, Im just in this to make money..."

I say, ""First, try to find something you're passionate about, that's profitable.""

There's a much higher chance to succeed with something that you enjoy doing.