Newb question: Narrow niche = good, but how do I get traffic

I had a super narrow niche a few years ago related to a free web design software. It was nothing to get ranked #1 on Google for my term, and I also put up a video on YouTube that is STILL generating traffic and sales. Tried my hand at PPC and got 5 cent clicks on the relevant terms.

Ultimately, this was a very successful venture...well technically.

The problem was, even with all of those gears running at top efficiency, I was still only making 1 sale a week in my peak period. There just wasn't enough quality traffic to sustain a business model. This is probably because the tutorials I offered were for a free software, so most of the traffic were people who were not willing to pay anyway. But the point is still well taken. If there's not much traffic, you get not much sales.

Try some right angles. What are people who are interested in your niche ALSO interested in? For instance, if your target is weight loss, how old is your audience? Are they male or female? If you were to determine that your target prospect is a man in his 40's, where does he hang out on the web? Maybe a golfing forum (I know, total cliche)? But you get the idea. Understanding right angles will get you cheaper traffic that is just as targeted and more effective.

Ok, so my broad niche is "how to beat depression and anxiety". For that, I'm told it would be too hard to compete. So narrower it's "how to beat depression and anxiety without drugs"... there is traffic for that term, but I don't know how realistic it is to think I can get a #1 google ranking for that. I would like to rank #1 for that term, and I have about 80-100 great articles with original content (of my unique paradigm) that I can put out on that topic...but because I'm not familiar with exactly how to assess what it would take to rank in the top 3 in google, I don't know if I would be wasting my time trying to compete for that niche (i.e. if it's still too broad). In other words, I don't know if after I spend months writing those 80-100 great articles, if I'll be in the top 3, or if I'll still be on page 26 of google, you know what I mean???

I can take the niche even narrower than that, and have a great idea for the specific narrow subniche I want, but again, to go narrower than that means I'm using keywords that have little to no google traffic.

Being #1 on a page of google results is good, but sending inexpensive targeted traffic to your website may make you more money. And building a list where you can send email offers can also be very lucrative.

It's not necessarily better - the conversion rate will often be higher because your site is super targetted, but the potential for traffic will be lower.

The majority of my sites are on fairly narrow niches, but I still target keywords that get traffic. Even if my entire site is built around 1 keyword I make sure that it's a keyword that gets enough searches. That way when I rank on page 1 of Google (hopefully in the top 5) I can be almost certain that I'll get traffic and of course make sales.

By all means go for a narrow subniche, but make sure it's still something that people are actually searching for.

Here's what I think that can help you.

When you want to target a narrow niche, try to think out of the box instead of the traditional way.

Let's say you're trying to target the market of Pregnant Women who wants to Lose Weight. It is a sub-niche of 2 different markets (weight loss + pregnancy).

In this case, you can try partnering up with people who are in the pregnancy market and offer them something they can sell to their customers after they have gotten pregnant.

If you don't want to find partners, then try Forums.

There are forums with broad segments that are divided into smaller sub categories.

In the case of Weight Loss after Pregnancy, you can find several weight loss forums with sub topic discussions on losing weight. Start from there.

The problem with narrow markets is that there isn't a direct route you can take to target them.

You have to put on your creative mind and find ways to mix and match the different marketing channels to reach your very niche market.

Hope this helped!