How to choose a market niche for your business

Todays post is by Al Mubeen. He is an international business graduate and former software developer at Ericsson. Mubeen is a passionate Marketing Consultant and copywriter who loves writing sales copies for the businesses and helps them sell their products and services online. He has now very interested in teaching people and creating entrepreneurship, online business, and marketing content online.

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Choosing a market niche is always a challenging task for the internet entrepreneurs, Sadly most aspiring entrepreneurs always think about the products that they want to sell when it comes to online business instead of knowing the target market and business they want to do. The correct approach is to choose an industry that you want to start a business and then drill down further to know the market. Almost 90% of the online businesses fail within a few months because all they think about is a product when it comes to starting a business. They also choose to serve the broad market segment which is impossible to fight with fierce competition. In a pre-internet era, more often businesses used to market themselves as everything to everyone because customers find it difficult to search a range of suppliers for the product. But things have changed drastically in the present scenario of the internet era where the customers can easily select different suppliers and also the products by comparing the cost. Because there will be no competitive edge in everything to everyone anymore. So, it would be appropriate to serve a specific group of customers instead of everyone, especially if you’re starting an online business. The broader perspective will never help you if you’re just starting the business online. When starting a business online many people think of Amazon, eBay, etc. Yes, they have a variety of products portfolio but the thing is when you are starting out an online business, it will be difficult to gather such huge investments and your marketing budget will skyrocket easily. Mostly, you would be a one-man army to start out all the work from top to bottom because you don’t have dedicated teams for different business functions. To achieve success, the entrepreneurs should follow the niche model as it is very well suited for starting out. I will also agree with the fact that finding your niche is one of the very crucial aspects of online business that we will see more detailed in the latter part of this article. As of now, I want to convey that focusing on a specific market segment will be a lot easier while starting a business online because it will save your time and money.

Start Small Think Big
It’s not a bad idea to start with a narrow segment if you’re starting an online business. The entrepreneurs don’t have to stock a range of products or even think of it. The customers will pursue you as a niche specialist in the chosen market. There are a lot of chances available to make business with you instead of generic suppliers as you become the first point of contact and also they will pay you a premium price for the product. Starting small will make you focus on a single product idea to enter the market and expand way going forward. As you can relate with most successful companies today had one single product to enter the market once started and expanded it further to explore other markets internationally with diverse product portfolio or tailor-made the same product based on the needs of the market. The main drawback of choosing the broader segment will make the entrepreneurs increase the advertisement cost as well. Instead, selecting a narrow segment will make these costs lesser and helps to charge a premium price for the product, more importantly, handling lesser customers. Let’s take an example that you are planning to sell pet products that include both cats and dogs. As you know there are a lot of competitors available for this particular market segment and it is flooded with cats and dogs products online. Your point of survival is very thin to compete with big and established competitors. So, It would be reasonable to select a narrow segment in any market niche because it will shrink the competition.

Choosing a Market Niche 
As I said earlier, what would be the most frustrating moment in starting an online business other than selecting a profitable niche? Now, it’s time to explore the right niche for you, it is none other than knowing your interest and demand in the market place. The right questions will give perfect answers to you. The potential niche would be based on your profession or it would be from your hobbies and interests or it could be an industry or social group you belong to, Finally, it could also be based on past and present physical habits. Ask questions, look out your resume, and analyze your experience and activities and try to find the best suitable answers. That could be your MARKET NICHE for your online business. If you’re not passionate about what you’re doing then it won’t last long. So, it is very important to choose the market niches based on your passion and interest. The fact here is you should enjoy doing it as a business and also you have to put every hard work into it. Even, for some time you have to tolerate everything, it could be success or failure. If you are passionate it will make you run because you love doing it and you always see the long-term scenario of it. As always it is easier to fill the demand than creating one. It is also important to create products based on your area of expertise, interest, or passion because you can easily understand the needs and problems of the customers in that market niche.

Conclusion
It’s very simple, just be a member of your target market. So, you can easily understand their needs being one among them. Also, it is vital to choose a narrow market segment to dominate the market. The entrepreneurs should keep in mind that being a small fish in the big pond does not make sense because you will be eaten by the fierce competition that already exists in the market. So, It’s wise to choose a single market niche and be a big fish in the small pond.

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Mubeen is the author of ‘The Right Way: The Ultimate Guide For Aspiring Internet Entrepreneurs’ which is the ultimate guide for internet entrepreneurs because of the core subject discussed in this book. The Right Way book not only talks about the business skills and knowledge which are essential for starting any business both online and offline but also about you. Al Mubeen is also the author of a blog exploring the same concepts. Please click on the links to find out more and share this post with anyone you think will benefit.

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