Step 1 - Defining Your Own Strengths

Although it is a mistake to assume that everyone shares your interests, knowing your own strengths are areas of expertise will help you though the learning curve of developing your own product. For instance, I have always been a bit of a health and fitness junkie, so my first site was on Antiaging & Wellness.

II knew my existing knowledge would not only provide an abundance of content but also help me distinguish between real competition and clutter [junkie sites] in the market.

But before I went a step further, I completed a full analysis.

So start off by listing all the things you have done in your life, and all the areas of expertise your family and friends possess.

Step 2 - Identify Needs and Wants

Find out what people are searching for:

1. Make a list of keywords that define your niche.
2. Check the number of searches on major search engines on Overture Suggestion Tool or Google Keywords
3. Filter out unrelated, duplicate and unwanted keywords to form the Master List.
4. Make a list of all the 3-word phrases used that have more than 5000 searches a month. Searches using 1-2 words are generally not buyers.

Other Free Tools

Good Keywords

Step 3 - Analyse Keywords for Profitability

Profitability is factor of Current Bids x Inventory x Competition.

1. Find out current bids using Google Adwords Account or Yahoo Bids. This is the price website owners are willing to pay to get a good placement for their ads. The higher the Average Bid price; the higher the potential earnings.
   1. You can sign up for a Free Google Adwords Account Here OR use this external tool without an account.
   2. Yahoo Bids
   3. Overture Bid Tools
2. Check the number of ad campaigns - Higher number of Google Ads = more competitive the keyword for PPC marketer = more potential advertising revenue for Google AdSense publishers.

Step 4 - Preliminary Competitive Analysis

1. Identify Niche Competition. The more high quality competitors. You can define exactly what you want your Search Engine to return using keyword:yourkeyword. Leave NO SPACE after the colon. This will give you a number of result lists of sites and blogs using your keyword.
2. Use Google Advanced Search to give AllInTitle. AllInURL, AllInAnchor Results. The lower the number of AllInTitle results, the less competitive the niche
   1. allintitle: ONLY Results that have the keywords in the page title
   2. aillinURL: ONLY Results that have ALL the keywords in the URL
   3. link: Shows links to specified webpage
   4. related:Shows pages that are similar
3. Check each sites Metatags, Keywords Used & Content Relevancy. A fantastic FREE tool for viewing the relevancy of competitor sites and their use of metatags and keywords.
4. Check Google Page Rank Data - Top 1, 2, 3 and 10 ranked web pages. Load Google Toolbar
5. Check Alexa Position - Load Alexa Toolbar
6. To analyse keywords on specific pages - use this free online keyword analysis tool from one of my favourite sites - Webmaster Toolkit
7. Build an Analysis Grid - Once you have your keywords, and competitor lists, check out the top competing sites. Look for:
   1. General site design and content
   2. Alexa Ranking and Traffic
   3. Check Other sites linking to them - Use your Alexa Tool Bar information box.
   4. Meta Data - what page titles, keywords and descriptions were used.
   5. Subscribe to their Newsletter - see how they are communicating with their market.
   6. Read through their press releases - get an idea of how they have developed their company and products.
   7. Consider signing up for their affiliate program. If you are really sneaky, selling someone elses product first may give you more insight into how to develop a better version.

   Give each site a total overall score. You may be pleasantly surprised and find that although there appears to be a lot of competition, many sites are poor quality and could be easily usurped.

Top Tools the Professionals Use

WordTracker - Free Trial

Keyword Elite - Builds keyword and anlyses lists, Adword campaigns, builds Adsense article pages.

Rapid Key - Builds and analyses keyword lists and competitors.

Step 5 - Learn About Your Customer

Understanding your customer, where they are, how they purchase gives you more insight into how best to market your own product or reach them, if you are planning Adsense Content Sites.

Identify:

1. Demographics - What kind of company is it that you sell to? Is there an industry description that includes size and location? For individuals you might want to find out what kind of income level, gender or education, etc.
2. Psychographics –mental profile of a potential customer. What kind of values do they have? What category of interests do they focus on? This becomes a buying profile for the market when you can match a psychological profile to the market’s wants and needs.
3. Problems/Opportunities - Why do they need your services? What benefit do they receive if they use you? What is not working or what do they want to work better?
4. Distribution of Your Products - where you can find them. Where do these companies/people cluster? What do they read, where do they network, and what form of mass media is connected to them?

Further Resources

WordTracker Magic - Ebook outining how to easily find niche phrases within Wordtracker's database.

Strategies to Dominate Any Niche - Devastate Your Competition by Getting Their Customers to Refuse Buying From Anyone Else, but You!

BONUS - For a Free Copy of Brad Callen's Adwords Made Easy [3.32MB PDF] Ebook. Learning about Adwords and Adsense is a great way to get an overall view of IInternet Marketing.