Affiliate Marketing Niche/Website question

Hey there Hankus!

It doesn't matter which one you choose, both options are just fine.

The benefit of going niche specific, is that it'll be much MUCH easier to identify your target audience and demographic data.

The benefit of going broad, is that you can appeal to a much wider crowd but it will be MUCH harder to identify your target audience and demographic data.

If you were going to start your own AM website, I would recommend starting with a niche specific one (like Gaming Tech) and make it unique and cool.

For example...

GamersTech.com = Boring

GamersEdge.com = Cool

Then, you simply build your site to have high end gaming equipment (and reviews) catered to the hardcore gaming crowd that WILL spend top dollar to get an edge.

It's just like how Golfers spend top dollar to get an edge in golf. You can use the same concept, but take it into any niche you want.

Good Luck!

Yes, you're spot on.

If I were to build an affiliate site, I would keep it simple by having no more than 5 main categories... and simply position yourself as an EXPERT REVIEWER in those categories.

This way, you'll establish yourself as an Authority in the niche, and people will FLOCK to your site every time they want to see the latest and greatest gadgets in your niche.

If you go too wide, then it'll be much more difficult to keep up with the new stuff that comes out, and you'll fall short.

For example, back to the gaming idea.

Hardcore gamers are interested in:

1) Custom PCs

2) Headsets

3) Keyboards & Mice

4) Monitors

5) Not sure what else... but I'm sure there's something

So for your site, you would just position it with having those 5 main categories, and start doing reviews - leverage YouTube if possible to get loads of free traffic for people typing in the latest (______ Review) and sit back and enjoy the income stream.

Once you start establishing yourself as the Authority in the niche... companies will COME TO YOU asking for YOU to review their latest Gadget... and even send them to you in the mail to do a video review, etc.

Of course... that's long term... but you get the idea.

It's a great business.

It will be even better for you to take a smaller niche at first. Don't be too greedy thinking about big niches because you can easily fail with them.

Talking about the choice between blog and simple website, I would say it all depends on content quantity you will be able to produce. If you think that you will be able to add a lot of content every week you can make a bigger website, but if you won't do that it will always look like not updated one and it's not good. It's better for you to choose a blog if you plan to write only few posts a week.

I think most domain names are safe, just don't use a name of a product or a company name. Do a google search for the name before hand...if something comes up you may want to look for something else. Exact match domains (EMD) were all the rage a couple of years ago and then people started saying Google was clamping down on it. I don't see a problem with EMD but if you want to build out your own brand (like wirecutter) then be as creative as you want with the name.

I agree with Hartman that exact match domain names aren't as critical as they once were.

You can brainstorm possible domain names by using a tool such as Dot-o-mator (dot) com to build a list of possible names. You can then do a bulk search using one of the domain name providers such as godaddy or namecheap. You can select the desired top level domain names (.com, .net, .org) while doing your name search.