In working with my clients on finding niches to focus their sites on – I am still surprised at how many people are still focusing their attention on the wrong niches and keywords. One of the biggest areas or error I see is wanting to focus on fads and short lived topics.
This can include Sporting events ( such as the Olympics ), a product popular on Television such as a piece of exercise equipment, a political figure or a product for a popular toy or fad product.
The reason I caution you against building around these niches is that the site’s long term potential is cut immensely short and the risk of the site maturing fast enough to catch the falling star is very high.
A fresh niche site takes 4 to 6 months to really gain traction in the search engines, and most fads in our fast paced society fade off and are replaced by another long before that.
Take for example in 2013 the popularity of the KEEP CALM t-shirts and signs based on the famous WW2 sign created by Winston Churchill as a reminder to the British people that they needed to stay focused and calm despite the nightly bombings. Shirts, bumper stickers, coffee cups etc all popped up as the fad took place – and now – less than six months later the fad is falling fast. Can anyone say – ” where’s the beef ”
Fads all come with a get rich quick mentality. Whether it be a pet rock or the latest fashion trend – the one thing that you can be sure of is it will die as quickly as it zoomed to popularity.
Niche building is about creating lasting, long term value and the two are not compatible. A mature niche site can earn well over $500 a month – and potentially as high as $1500 per month.
With proper maintenance, that site can earn you a substantial income for an indefinite period of time.
Even at just $300 per month – that site is capable of earning an income in excess of $3500 per year and over three years that site has a cash flow value of $10,000.
Some might argue that if you catch a fad at the right time – you can earn far more than 10k – but I would caution you that this is the equivalent of betting on the long shot at the race track.
The changes of catching that fad are slim and in comparison to the long term near sure value of a solid niche site, is a poor business decision.
Keep in mind that there is only so much time in a day and niche sites take a minimum of 30 hours to build out even if you are an expert developer.
This means that if you work at 5 hours a day – which is a lot to stay focused on one site – then it will take 6 days to build out. At best you will be able to build 4 sites a month if you focus on quality and are working at them at a near full time pace.
If you are like most people who are building niche websites as a side business or hobby – then a pace of one site per month is likely about as much as you can maintain. Do you want to waste an entire month’s work on a fad that by the time your site even sees the light of day on Google it’s already disappeared ?
I stress this continually to my readers and clients – plan and build for the long term. Suppress your desire to get rich quick and cut corners – it doesn’t work.
If you stay focused – constantly reminding yourself that you need to stay the course – and focus on top quality niche sites then in two years you will have 20 to 30 sites all earning between $7500 to $15,000 per month for you.
Once you have achieved that goal – and are able to quit your job and live of your site income – then that is the time you should focus on fad niche sites. Although I have a feeling at that point you will rather spend your time on a beach somewhere during a winter vacation and leave the fads to the get rich quick guru’s ripping people off on Warrior Forum.
