Chapter 2: Choosing The Right Niche For Podcasting

One of the biggest mistakes that people make with podcasting is that they don’t choose the right niche. Because it is relatively easy to create a podcast there is a temptation just to jump right in without thinking about the long term possibilities of what you are doing.

But if you are serious about making money through podcasting then you need to choose a niche that you are comfortable with that will also provide you with money making opportunities.

A lot of “experts” will tell you that you should always choose a niche that you are passionate about. This is particularly important with podcasting as the listeners will hear the passion in your voice.

But the problem here is that not all “passions” are profitable. While there are a ton of potential money making opportunities with a niche like dog training, there are a lot less with stamp collecting and model railways.

So when you are considering a niche for your podcasts you need to think about two important factors:

Is there demand and is there commercial opportunity?

You may be thinking at this stage that if you know nothing about a niche that is in demand and has good commercial opportunities, how can you be passionate about it? Well the answer is that you can certainly become really interested in a niche like this and when this happens your passion will rise to the surface.

Listeners Trust Experts

When you choose a niche that is in demand you will get a lot more followers with your podcasts. People who are interested in the niche will automatically believe you to be an authority even if you are not. Now we are not recommending that you try to create podcasts when you know nothing about a niche – that’s just dumb!

But these days you can learn a lot about a niche in a very short time. There are plenty of resources online and you can obtain high quality training courses for a lot of different niches. You will need to put in some effort initially to get up to speed and you will want to get to the point where you know more about your niche than most people interested in it will know.

This does not have to take you a long time. Just immerse yourself into the niche for a few days and you will learn a great deal. What you are doing here is “faking it till you make it” which you might not feel that comfortable with right now, but after immersing yourself into your chosen niche for a while you will feel a whole lot better about everything.

The best way to establish yourself as an expert with your listeners is to provide them with valuable tips and advice in your podcasts. Even if you are not well known it will not take long for most of your listeners to warm to you and trust you as an authority. Once you have achieved this then you can start recommending related products and services.

So choose an in demand niche with good commercial opportunities and stick with it. Whatever you do, don't go dancing around from one niche to another. You will lose your listeners very quickly if you do this.

How to choose the right Niche

The best way to start to identify your niche for podcasting is to write down a list of your interests and passions. Also include niches that you know a lot about even if you do not consider that you are passionate about this.

Have a look at different podcasting websites to see which niches are the most popular. Also you can use the Google Keyword Planner and see how many searches are happening each month for niche ideas that you have. If there are thousands then you are on the right track.

For each of your niche ideas use Google to see if there are products and services available that you can become an affiliate for and make money. Just search for “niche name” + affiliate programs. The more affiliate opportunities that you can find for a niche the better. You can also head over to Clickbank.com and see if there are any digital products on offer there for your niche ideas. Clickbank is the world leader in digital products and they sell products in tons of different niches. You can also check out physical product opportunities on Amazon.com where you can become an affiliate and make money.

Eliminate any niche ideas that do not have the demand (tested with the Google Keyword Planner) or not enough commercial opportunities in the form of affiliate offers that you can promote. Once you have done that you can move on to the next step.

How can you help people?

With the remaining niche ideas on your list write down how you can help people in each one. In every niche there are problems and at this stage just identify these and don’t worry if you can solve them for people or not.

So for example if one of your niche ideas was making money online then there are a ton of problems that you can come up with here including:

Which is the best online business model?

How do I stay motivated with my online business?

What is the best web hosting?

What is the best autoresponder?

These are the kinds of questions that people interested in the niche ask every day. You can find the answers later online. Having a number of problems to solve and the ability to provide solutions for them is a strong indicator of a good niche.

Who are your Competitors?

For the niche ideas that remain on your list check out the competition. Having competition in a niche is a good thing as it tends to show that there is demand and also commercial opportunity. Other podcasters want to make money as well as you do so never be concerned about competition.

Take a look at what kind of podcasts your competitors are putting out and think about how you can find another angle or do it better. Your aim is to stand out from the crowd. How many followers do your competitors have? What subjects are they creating podcasts about?

If you really like a niche idea but are concerned that it doesn’t have the right level of commercial opportunity then don’t worry because there are a number of different ways that you can monetize the podcasts you create which we will cover in a later chapter.