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Geoff
Forums Member
Joined: 17 Sep 2009
Posts: 5
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#1 · Posted: 28 Sep 2009 18:48
Hey everybody, how's it going?
My name is Geoff Parker, I just turned 21 on the 17th of September, and I'm wanting to start up an online business so that I can put the money I make from it into a Roth IRA type of thing so that I can be financially secure and perhaps (hopefully!) wealthy later on in life.
So that's the story of why I'm taking the 30 Day Challenge. I've watched the entire Pre-season, and I'll just say that the 30DC looks absolutely amazing. I'm very excited to really get into the main challenge.
My problem is that I don't know what niche to delve into. I'm guessing that this is an extremely common issue. What I do know however are some areas that pique my interest or that I am passionate in. I'll lay them out below:
1) American national politics, specifically the conservative movement. I don't want to get into a political discussion here, but I'm just laying it out that my passion is in seeing the conservative ideology implemented into the American national government.
2) Self help. Frustratingly, and I guess you could say hypocritically, I haven't found a way to implement the benefits self help provides into my life. But that doesn't mean that I'm not interested in self help... quite the contrary!
3) Philosophy. I find philosophy to be incredibly facinating. Sure, it may just be a bunch of mumbo-jumbo, but it's mumbo-jumbo that forces you to deeply think, contemplate, and reflect upon existence itself.
My question is how do I take these three interests and find out a particular niche for each one? I suppose that self help would be the easiest out of the three, but what about politics/conservatism and philosophy? What can you even sell in those fields?
And one more thing. About selling things. What do I sell period? I mean, I have nothing that I could give away in bulk, nothing that I produce. And I wouldn't know how to produce anything in bulk like that. I keep on hearing the word affiliate, but what exactly does that mean, and are there affiliate programs in each of the three interests I outlined?
Anyway, thanks for being patient with a noobie! I know that with time, I'll get the ropes of this!
Thanks,
Geoff
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TyBrown
Forums Member
Joined: 23 Jul 2009
Posts: 56
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#2 · Posted: 28 Sep 2009 19:07
Self help could be a good one. You don't need to have products to sell. Check out clickbank.com for ebooks you could sell and earn commissions. Check out Amazons affiliate program to sell actual books and earn a commission. You could also go to the self help gurus you like to see if they have affiliate programs for their courses.
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Geoff
Forums Member
Joined: 17 Sep 2009
Posts: 5
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#3 · Posted: 28 Sep 2009 19:42
The only problem is this: how am I to write articles and blogs and all that jazz on self-help when I myself have never successfully implemented its teachings into my own life? I mean, would you like to visit a website where some guy talking about how to incorporate self help into life, only to find out that that same guy can't even integrate the advise he's dispensing out into his own life?
Like I said, I'm interested in self-help because I want to find something that will work for me, but until I find that something, I would have to say that I'm not at all qualified to dispense self help knowledge.
Or am I wrong?
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Geoff
Forums Member
Joined: 17 Sep 2009
Posts: 5
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#4 · Posted: 28 Sep 2009 19:50
Oh, and one more thing I'm interested in:
Video games, specifically Nintendo. Although I'm trying to grow past this passion, there's no denying that it still exists deep down inside!
The frusterating thing though with all of my interests is that they are not catagories where you sell anything. I mean, yes, in politics, books are sold that are written by famous people and/or politicians, and yes, in videogames, videogames and game consols and accessories are sold by, say, Nintendo or Sony or Microsoft, but what about ME? Heck, in philosophy, nothing is sold!
Am I to try and sell political news, video game strategies and news, or philosophical thoughts when people get that stuff free on the internet already?
I just don't get it...
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krazyladyplz
Forums Member
Joined: 30 Aug 2009
Posts: 50
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#5 · Posted: 29 Sep 2009 01:15
I once read (paraphrased) if there are people interested in it, there's a business for it. Don't limit yourself. Once I thought about your passions, alot of things came to mind.
You have a particular ideology, why not promote books that promote that ideology. Amazon.com has thousands of books, why not research and see if there are authors there that have books you wouldn't mind promoting. Earn commissions. Share your passion.
Self Help is broad. What kind of self help do you want to promote?
Philosophy of what? Feng Shui. Change your environment. How to feng shui your home. Clothing, aromatherapy, foods, herbals, furniture, art, stress relief.
Gaming is a passion shared by many. Review video games, recommend videos games for the novice, for older players.
These are just some things that come to mind. If I'm completely missing your point, I apologize. It's late and I'm punch drunk.
Google your passions and see if someone is selling something.
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mountainmom5
Joined: 30 Aug 2007
Posts: 2445
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#6 · Posted: 29 Sep 2009 22:13
Geoff, here's my take on what you have so far... first of all, you are actually doing better than you may think...
Right off the bat, here is a link that will tell you a gob of stuff on Affiliate Marketing - click here---> What IS Affiliate Marketing??
Then secondly - have you learned how to do a keyword research?
Google has a free tool that I like to use to see what phrases people are using the most when searching for something within my niche.
Here is the link to the tool ----> https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
Once you are there, you can enter any phrase - lets just use conservative politics for now... okay I entered that... oh, wow, that is a GOOD phrase.
Go do it for yourself.
You will see a whole list of actual phrases that people are using to search for stuff on politics, which by the way is a hot topic right now.
For instance , look at the phrase "conservative politics" - there are about 18,000 searches but the little green box is full so that means you will have too much competition when you use that phrase, but then "conservative party political" has 1300 searches and the little box is empty - EMPTY is good.
Now if you read through the link about affiliate marketing that I gave you earlier it will hopefully help you make sense of some of this but there are several ways you can make money with a blog or Squidoo lens, which is what I use for free methods.
You can link to Amazon stuff, Clickbank products, books and other products on CJ.com.... from your blog or website.
You have to write good quality content to attract visitors FIRST and then if you have links to stuff from your website, they will click on them.
The same goes for Nintendo games, and actually ANYTHING you want to market. The trick is searching for some keywords that you can use to build something with.
It will never do to build a lens on just the word Nintendo[/u], but if you are more specific , like Nintendo 2009 [u]for some reason looks like a really great one - don't ask me why, I don't know hide nor hair about Nintendos.......although I am considering looking into it now that I saw the numbers on the keyword search tool - lol
Okay - that's all for now. You will get it - before you know it!
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HowardVanover
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#7 · Posted: 16 Oct 2009 22:11
Hello Geoff, Sounds like you have the same concerns many other people have. There are ways to come to a conclusion. Your three areas of interest are out of my category, but sounds interesting. You could write an ebook about your most passionate interest.
Just do not rush into anything, do some research and then just maybe you will be able to decide.
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gowriter
Forums Member
Joined: 16 Nov 2008
Posts: 155
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#8 · Posted: 30 Oct 2009 00:53
Geoff, this is easy!
The best thing for you to do is write a blog. Blogger is free and owned by Google. It seems you like the American conservatism thing the best. Pick the topic that is most interesting to you.
I recommend that before you write such a blog, scour the internet for other people have a similar blog. Look at how it's constructed. What kind of advertisements do they have on there, if any. Most blogs of that nature will have contextual ads. Google Adsense is one program, but there are other like Kontera. You know those words in a post that have the double underline, your mouse goes over it and some ad pops up.
Building up money with your ads on your blog will take time because you want to gain traffic first, then put ads. Some advertising sites won't even consider you if you're not drawing traffic first.
Another thing you can do, especially with niches like that, is to comment on fellow political blogs. Get involved. Social network on Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, Blog Catalog. Etc. Anything to draw traffic. But you'll have friends in this blogosphere that you love reading their blogs, and they'll love reading yours, too.
As for affiliate products...for those niches, that might be hard. But don't just throw some random affiliate product if it's not relevant, not unless you went on to Cafe Press or Zazzle and designed your own political T-shirt.
There are some content sites like Triond, Associated Content and other platforms that will allow you to write about your views. The more viewers read your stuff, the more you earn for page views. Write more and more and more articles to get more and more and more traffic. Be careful to read the terms of service. Many sites will not accept what they consider hate speech.
So I think article writing on revenue sites and blogging would be your best bet for your niche with options to monetize with Adsense, Bidvertiser, Kontera, Chitika, Text Ads, etc.
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Dillie
Forums Member
Joined: 3 Nov 2009
Posts: 1
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#9 · Posted: 3 Nov 2009 14:16
Hi Geoff, why don't you start writing about all three and see which one takes off. Yes, this is going to be hard work to start with, but until you start you won't know.
I'm with gowriter and the idea of starting a blog, or three .
If you're really into self-help, write about it and how you are trying to implement it into your life. You don't have to be an expert if you let your readers know that you're on your own personal journey. They may be able to relate to you better that way.
Good luck whatever you choose.
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granny
Forums Member
Joined: 3 Nov 2009
Posts: 8
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#10 · Posted: 3 Nov 2009 15:14
Have you considered doing network marketing and using your interests as a way of developing relationships to build a network marketing business? I have many associates that do this successfully.
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getagrip
Joined: 20 Feb 2006
Posts: 2038
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#11 · Posted: 9 Nov 2009 12:24
I agree with mountainmom5 - use the Google Adwords Keyword Tool to start out with general keyword phrases with your niche. Then, once you have some keyword ideas, see if you can use the keyword tool to dig deeper and find other keyword ideas - it should help you come up with some great ideas!
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