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How can I tell if the market I want to get into is good?

by Dr Bloggood
17 replies
I want to put up a blog about writing fiction. How can I determine if it will be possible to make money with it?

I don't see the kind of website I want to put up anywhere out there and I have some really good ideas (just believe me). I guess writing fiction is also a skill not too many people have aquired and the ones who have don't have an internet business on their mind. There seem to be a lot of rather crappy sites up out there and they are visually unattractive as well.

I'm not sure whether to take the fact that there is no really good competition as a good or a bad sign. Maybe I just have a lot more to offer, or maybe I just don't see them. My site is going to be in English.

Google keyword tools tells me there are about 20 million hits on "writing" per month (part of them interested in fiction), and the competition is low. People are striving for self development, and many of them for creative expression. I believe that if I create something really good and stick with it, there can be a lot of money earned.

Do you agree?
#good #market
  • Profile picture of the author EnterIn
    Hi

    If my best friend asked me that question, my answer would be this: "Use the market research tool provided at sitesell.com".

    In a nutshell, that's how I determine if any market I want to enter in will be profitable.

    Of course it helps if people are buying what you plan to sell, on amazon. Fiction books sell very well on amazon so maybe the business model your competitors are using is to sell on amazon.

    Another thing you can do is to do a google search using search terms you think your target market would use to find you. When the results page comes up, check if there any advertisement at the top or on the right side of the page.

    If there are many ads, it means people are making money from those ads. That's why they keep running them. Importantly for you, it means this is a market which has potential to make You money.

    Hope this helps
    Bruce
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  • Profile picture of the author Alex Blades
    "How can I tell if the market I want to get into is good?"

    =================

    Test Test Test.... And don't target generic keywords like "writing" even if Google keyword tool tells you it has low comp. Start with long tail keywords...
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    • Profile picture of the author rixlo
      Originally Posted by Alex Blades View Post

      "How can I tell if the market I want to get into is good?"

      =================

      Test Test Test.... And don't target generic keywords like "writing" even if Google keyword tool tells you it has low comp. Start with long tail keywords...
      I agree to test in various ways and when using Google to use long tail keywords. However, you need to research your market you want to get into. You can use old fashion methods, bookstores, asking friends, relatives in additions to the internet. Some times the old gumshoe method can give you some insight.
      ric
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      • Profile picture of the author Steve B
        Doc,

        One other quick test is to use Nextmark to see how many (if any) mailing lists there are on the subject you are interested in.

        This site provides a search function of 60,000+ mailing lists from magazines etc along with the size of the list. If the market is large enough to have several mailing lists of customers, you should find a good amount of prospects online.

        I searched "fiction writing" and tons of results came up, mostly in science fiction and poetry.

        By the way, you can get email leads from many of these lists for about $80 per thousand - that's 8 cents per lead a pretty good bargain.

        Good luck on your project,

        Steve
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        • Profile picture of the author Steven Wagenheim
          If you're looking for a crystal ball, good luck.

          You have four basic possible conditions for any given niche.

          1. Low Demand, Low Supply
          2. Low Demand, High Supply
          3. High Demand, Low Supply
          4. High Demand, High Supply

          Low Demand, Low Supply - In this case, you need to determine if there is
          enough demand to make venturing into the niche profitable. With a low supply,
          it shouldn't be hard to break in. But if we're talking about maybe 1,000 visitors
          a month at a 1% conversion, making 10 sales a month on a $27 ebook, is $270
          monthly income going to give you the life style you want?

          You may have a corner on the market, but if the corner itself is the size of a
          pea, why bother?

          Low Demand, High Supply - This will actually rarely, if ever, happen. If
          there isn't enough demand for something, you'll rarely see a whole bunch of
          people clamoring to get into the niche. But if you see this, run in the other
          direction.

          High Demand, Low Supply - This is your gold mine but will rarely happen
          except at the beginning of a niche's life cycle. This is ideally what you're
          looking for. But these conditions are not easy to find.

          High Demand, High Supply - This is what you will normally run into
          when encountering a niche that appears to be viable. You have a lot of
          people wanting the item or service and a boat load of people selling it.

          The question is, can you compete with them? What is their daily ad spend?
          What is the PR of their site? How old is their site? How are they getting their
          visitors?

          If they've got a page 1 listing right at the top of Google with a PR of 8, how
          easy do you think it will be to knock them off their perch?

          I could go on as this actually gets very complex, but I think you got the
          idea.

          Writing?

          Man, that is a BROAD niche. The first thing I would do is narrow it down to
          a specific type of writing. Then look at the competition. What are they
          selling? If it's all just free info, why would somebody pay for what you have
          to offer unless it was really special?

          I've been writing for almost my whole life, plays, TV scripts, songs, novels,
          articles, you name it. There is more info out there on how to write than
          Carter has liver pills.

          In short, you have a hell of a mountain to climb OR a sub niche where there
          is very little true demand, meaning people who are willing to spend money on
          the info you're willing to provide.

          As much as I would want to tackle such a niche, as I am more than
          qualified to, I wouldn't touch it with a 10 foot pole unless I had something
          truly revolutionary to offer.
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  • Profile picture of the author youngsiteowner
    Banned
    One thing I always do to see if their is money in a market is by searching it in google and seeing how many ads come up for it. If their are tons of ads, then you can be sure to make tons of money through adsense as long as you can get the clicks.

    I only use the Google Adwords Keyword Tool for finding popular topics, not high paying topics.
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  • Profile picture of the author betterwtveter
    Write what you are good at teaching about. Go to the google keyword tool and type in keywords to see what type of competition you may have in your niche and focus on those keywords that will work best with your niche.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jesse L
    As a fiction writer, would you visit the blog you have in mind?
    If so, then there is a good chance there are many others that will be interested.
    Also, who cares what Google says? You will get most of your traffic from other resources and from your networking with like minded writers. At the very least you will have a blog that you enjoy working on while increasing your blogging skills.

    Good luck!

    JL
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    • Profile picture of the author connorbringas
      I think the best way to see if its a good market to get into is checking the traffic for different keywords associated with this blog. For example, if you use raventools you can get some really good information on keyword competitiveness.

      Its really important to check keywords-if there is no traffic for this niche market then you really wont stand a chance to make any money.

      Just my opinion.
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  • Profile picture of the author Randall Magwood
    Do background research. Find your main keyword term and search on Google for the competition. Study their sites. Then if you find that it could be worthwhile, put up a squeeze page and invest in Google Adwords real quick to see if people are actively subscribing to your list. If they are, then you should proceed and enter into the niche.
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  • Profile picture of the author Dr Bloggood
    @EnterIn: Thanks, that's a good answer! I checked out sitesell, as far as I see, you have to be a member there though to be able to use the tool. Would you recommend joining (not just for the research, but I'm looking for some overall guidance)? When I google my key phrases, I see a tiny bit of advertising coming up. It's very little, but it's more than none. You are right, btw, this is a lot about amazon.

    @youngsiteowner: Thanks, did it, see above

    @JesseL: Thanks, of course I would visit that blog. Interresting comment.

    @connorbringas: Thanks for input!

    @Randall Magwood: Thanks. My "competitors" sites look awefull, in both content and visuals. The way I envision this, this won't be competition for me. But the question is if it can make me enough money though.
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  • Profile picture of the author Don Schenk
    I took a quick look at Amazon where I searched for "how to write fiction."

    For that topic, Amazon lists...

    1,672 paperback titles
    584 hardcover titles
    244 Kindle titles
    5 HTML titles

    So I would guess it's a good market.

    To make money from a site you must have products to sell.

    Have you written a course about "how to write fiction?" Perhaps several courses about writting different types of fiction?

    What do you have that people interested in writing fiction would want? Now sell that.

    :-Don
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  • Profile picture of the author Dr Bloggood
    Awesome, Don, that's an excellent point - I don't see any good online courses on that topic, but there are many physical books out there, that's for sure. Which brings me back to my line of thinking that creating websites is not quite the first thing that's on the mind of somebody who is driven by the wish to create awesome fictional stories.
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  • Profile picture of the author Manie Amari
    Ensure you have the Exact field checked when using market research tools.
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    This will NOT be up for long. Get it now whilst You still can. Btw it's FREE...
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  • Profile picture of the author John Romaine
    I havent read any of the responses here but...

    1. Are there any big forums?
    2. Is anyone advertising?
    3. Is anyone actually selling anything in the marketplace?

    If NO NO NO, then ditch it.
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  • Profile picture of the author wordpressmania
    Actually you have to be tricky to get traffic from a website targeting fiction publishers. You have to bear it in your mind that your targeted users want intellectual thoughts. So give them what they want. Like I personally use iGoogle to get traffic, But there is a sad news that within next November iGoogle will no longer be supported by Google. But you still can use it to get traffic. The people who love literature surely add your gadge in their site.

    Hope this helps.
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