Think of your Internet business as a garden. It may look great when you plant it, but if you stop tending it and just walk away, it will turn into a weed jungle in no time.

The same is true for the website that represents your online business to the world. The time you put into maintaining and improving your website will keep it growing and making more money.

There’s always that nagging feeling that says, “Yes, I know this stuff has to get done, but I just don’t have the time (or inclination) for it right now.” You just need to manage your time… because all those little chores need to be done!

So here’s a website maintenance schedule to make all those tasks a little easier to manage. This way you can see what needs to be addressed often, and what only needs a checkup every now and then.

Your website stats and PPC results will tell you what you need to test or change, so we recommend doing both short-term and long-term reviews. For the more static parts of your website, you don’t have to change anything if it isn’t out of date. Just do scheduled reviews to make sure it is still current and accurately representing your business.

Daily to weekly

• Add new content to blog
• Review results of PPC ad campaigns and landing pages
• Review and track website statistics and results

Monthly

• Test parts of salesletter: headline, subhead, product descriptions, headlines, bonus, etc. (or every 1,500 to 2,000 clicks)
• Test opt-in offer
• Add articles (add fresh new content whenever you can, but at least once a month)
• Clean up links to other sites (make sure they’re still current)
• Review surveys/polls (if your surveys or polls are out of date you will look unprofessional)

Every 3 months

• Intense PPC stats analysis (historical overview)
• Intense SEO stats analysis (historical overview)
• FAQ page
• About Us (you may not need to change anything, but it’s a good idea to check back fairly often to make sure you’re giving your customers an accurate picture of who you are)

Update these as soon as there is any change

• Contact Us
• Other administration pages, for example Returns Policies
• Product descriptions/prices
• News
• Videos/audio
• Images
• Testimonials
• Summary for directories

Put website maintenance in your schedule and you’ll see your online business thrive.

Your site’s layout, web copy, and navigation structure has a much bigger impact on your sales. And in the early days of running your online business, you’ll want to retain full control over these elements so you can find the best combination.

So save yourself some time and money, and use one of these three ways to build your own highly profitable business website:

1. Learn HTML using free resource sites like Davesite.com. HTML is actually very straightforward and there are some great tutorials that can help you break it down. Many sites even offer free sample pages or templates you can add your own design elements to. 
2. Use programs that do the coding for you. Software programs such as Dreamweaver or KompoZer let you design a site in a word-processing type interface, and automatically change it into HTML speak. 
3. Use an “all-in-one” business builder. If you’d rather eat slugs than try your hand at anything technical, you may want to consider using a complete web-building package like BeBiz. These programs allow you to create your own design using point-and-click wizards and templates — with no need to know HTML at all. This is probably the fastest way to build a business website that’s professional and functional.

These are all great ways to build a website yourself. The option that’s best for you depends on how much time and energy you’re able to put into it, as well as the complexity of the site you need.

Being able to control the design and sales elements of your business site is well worth any extra effort… so you always have full control over your conversions and profits.

"Recession"

It’s the elephant in the room — the thing no one wants to really talk about, for fear of being forced to admit it’s real.

… But the fact is, the U.S. economy (and by extension, the global economy) is experiencing a downward spiral right now, and the ripple effects are being felt by everyone from Bill Gates to the smallest home business owner.

However, hiding your head in the sand isn’t going to change things!

You can’t just act like everything is "business as usual" and pretend it isn’t happening.

Many of your customers are going to be forced to tighten their belts. You may find that people are going to be less likely to make a purchase online than they have been in the past. But that doesn’t mean you should close up shop!

The best way to deal with an economic crisis is to FACE IT HEAD ON and look for ways to make it work FOR your online business — instead of against it. By tweaking your sales message to speak to the financial challenges your customers might be facing, you will get a better response out of them.

Here are a few ways you can do this:

1. Emphasize the VALUE of your product — and the amount of money people will save in the long run by buying it. (For example, if you sell dishwashers that are energy efficient, explain how your product will cut down on electricity costs!) Emphasize value on your website… in your newsletter… in your pay-per-click ads — everywhere you reach potential customers. By showing them how your product will help their bank balance rather than harm it, they’ll be far more likely to make a purchase!

2. Offer special discounts and free trials — The best way to appeal to people on a tight budget is to offer them a great deal. And there’s no better deal than free! A great way to convince people of the value of your product is to let them try it out for free for a limited period of time. It’s far more difficult to say "no" to a great product once it’s already in your hands! Also consider offering other perks, such as free shipping or free gift wrap. You could also include more free bonuses with your main product. By offering "added value" items like these, you’ll set yourself apart from your competitors and encourage more people to buy from you.

3. Focus on your existing customer base — The greatest asset of any business is its customers. These are people who have already shown they trust you by buying from you once — which means they’re far more likely to buy from you again. … And THAT means it will cost you less money to convince THEM to buy, compared to someone who’s never even heard of you. Work hard to build a strong relationship with your existing customers. Offer them lots of free valuable information, combined with special "customers only" discounts to encourage them to buy.

Above all, make sure they haven’t forgotten you — and that they always think of you as the person who "sends them all that interesting and useful stuff!"

By staying on their radar, you will guarantee that when they do decide to open their wallets, your site will be the first place they go.

If you’re already feeling the effects of the current economic crunch — or have discovered some successful ways to shield yourself from it — please tell us your story.

We are always looking for ways to help serve you better and your input helps us do this!

These qualities are: ACTION, DEDICATION, AND PERSEVERANCE.

(If you haven’t yet watched my free 30-minute instructional video, ‘Reality 101′,
you can view it here: www.marketingtips.com/reality101 )

I’ve discovered that’s not something everyone wants to hear.

Some people don’t want to be told that making an online business will require some hard work on their part.

They want to hold on to their belief that there’s a "magic bean" solution that’ll help them instantly sprout a successful profit-generating website in just a few hours.

… And I wonder, is that because so many false promises are being tossed around the Internet marketing arena these days? Or do so many people really believe that building a "virtual" business involves virtually no work at all?

Do you believe that?

Is that what you’re looking for — a business that requires zero effort on your part?

I really want to know.

So what I’d like to hear from you is, exactly WHY are you interested in starting an online business?

(As opposed to all the thousands of other possible businesses out there.)

What do you hope to gain from your Internet business? What are your goals?

Please leave me a comment and let me know!

Point at your computer screen.

And give clear directions?

100 Internet marketing newbies attended my 5-day clinics in 2007.

100 people walked out the door on Day 5 with their own LIVE, fully-automated Internet businesses.

(That’s what you call a 100% batting average!)

Wouldn’t it be EASY to get started if there was a "live" person you could talk to?

Someone who could…

==> Help you decide what to sell

==> Design and build the website for you…

==> Show you exactly how to accept credit card payments on the site?

==> Then, walk you 1, 2, 3 through how to get swarms of visitors to swarm your website and BUY?

… Well, that’s exactly what we want to help you do!

(To find out how, click here: www.marketingtips.com/5-day-clinic)

I’m about to open registration for my Internet marketing clinic, and
each event is STRICTLY LIMITED to just 10 participants only.

But before I reveal all of the details on this event to you,
I have just a few questions to make sure you’re qualified to attend.

(Can you blame me for wanting to keep my 100% success rate?)

For the full details on this elite 5-day e-biz EXPLOSION program,
click here now: www.marketingtips.com/5-day-clinic

To your success,

Derek Gehl
The Internet Marketing Center

internet marketing clinic

How many online business owners regularly check under the hood of their web site to make sure it’s running smoothly?

And even if you do perform frequent check-ups on your site, are you sure you’re giving it a really thorough once-over? Because just like you can’t tell whether a car is roadworthy by kicking its tires, you can’t tell if your business is operating at peak performance just by giving your web stats a cursory glance.

About once a month, you should "pop the hood" of your web site and perform a comprehensive check-up. Here’s what you should be looking for:

Traffic stats: Your web host should provide basic stats, but you might also consider joining the free Google Analytics program, or using the services of a fee-based web analytics company.

You need to be checking your traffic stats constantly, so you can answer the following questions and get a clear picture of how your visitors travel through your web site:

What pages do your visitors leave your web site from? For example, do they abandon your site from the order page without placing an order? If so, maybe there’s a problem with your checkout process.

• How long do your visitors spend on your site, and on each individual page? If, say, they enter your homepage and then leave almost immediately, you’re obviously not grabbing their attention.
• How do your visitors find you? Are there any particular sites sending lots of traffic your way? If so, can you capitalize on this by partnering with them in some way? Do your visitors mostly come from one particular search engine? What might be the reason for this — and how can you snag traffic from the other search engines?
• Where do your visitors live? If there’s a lot of interest from a particular location, can you tweak your web site to cater specifically to these people (e.g., by offering services in their language, if it’s not English)?
• What search terms and keywords result in the most traffic to your site? Can you place more of these — or other similar keywords — in your content to attract even MORE traffic?

You should also look for traffic spikes and try to work out where these visitors are coming from. Is there a new link pointing to your site? Did you send an email campaign out recently? Could there be a seasonal reason? Maybe there’s a way to turn these spikes into regular occurrences.

Sales stats: As with your traffic stats, you should always keep track of your conversion rates — the percentage of your visitors who actually convert into paying customers!

Your sales will vary according to how and where you market your business online. Only by monitoring your traffic and your sales will you get a feel for which strategies are working for you, and which ones need improvement.

Email response stats: Always check your traffic and sales stats carefully after each email you send out. At the very least, maintain a simple spreadsheet that includes the number of people you emailed, the traffic you received in the days after you mailed it, and the number of sales you made.

Then you can find out which times of day, week, and year are best for your mailouts, and which subject lines and promotional offers work best for you.

General "housekeeping": Other checks you should regularly make on your web site include:

• Searching the Web for random phrases from pages on your site to make sure no one is using your content without your permission — it happens!
• Searching for keywords relevant to your industry to see whether or not your site turns up in the search engine results.
• Checking your competitors’ sites regularly to see if they’re running any special promotions or have any new products. And make sure you sign up for their opt-in newsletter if they have one! It’s a great way to keep tabs on them. (It’s a good idea to set up a "generic" email address with one of the free email service providers like Hotmail or Yahoo. This way, your competition won’t recognize you and exclude you from their mailings!)
• Checking for broken links and other technical faults on your site. Google Sitemaps can help with this. Another good resource for checking broken links and other factors that affect your site’s performance — such as your site’s loading speed — is www.sitereportcard.com.

An "accident" with your web site can be just as damaging to your business as a brake failure would be to your car. So, ideally you should set aside one day a month to undertake a major site review like this.

It’ll keep your business running as smoothly as a well-oiled engine!

All right, enough already! I cry "Uncle!"

When I asked you in the post below to leave me comments telling me about the top 5 things you most want to find in an online business creator, I had NO idea so many people would get involved in the conversation.

So far, we’ve had 485 comments, and the blog post is taking forever to load. (Sorry about that. But you only have yourselves to blame. Small wonder about the long loading time, though — I just printed the post and all its comments out, and it’s over 146 pages long!

One comment that caught my eye was this one from Barbara:

"I must say DG that it did cross my mind about whether you were "picking our brains" by asking us the 5 ideas most imp. to us. YOU are the expert. If YOU are the expert, you need to tell us what we need to know. For example, if I go to a dentist, an expert and a professional, and the dentist asks me what I want and what is wrong and what I think needs to be done (beyond general questions about why I came into the office today), then I am going to wonder if he knows what he is doing. Fair enough? I am a professional and people expect me to be able to determine what the real problem is and fix it for them; this is what they pay me for."

I appreciate your comment, Barbara. You raise an interesting point. But I think your analogy is a bit off.

Instead of "dentist," let’s use the word "doctor."

When you go to the doctor’s office, one of the first question he asks you is, "Where does it hurt?" — right?

Even though a doctor is an expert in medicine, he’s not going to prescribe a cure without consulting the patient and figuring out what the problem is.

And for the same reason, I’m not going to claim to understand exactly what you need, without consulting you first — and finding out what YOU think you need.

As my grandfather always liked to say, "It’s not what you know that’ll come back to bite you on the butt, it’s what you THINK you know."

Because the truth is, I am not a "guru." Honestly, I’m not even exactly sure what a "guru" is. Whenever I hear that word, I think of a cross-legged guy floating on a cloud somewhere above the Himalayas — in other words, someone who has achieved a state of complete otherwordly perfection.


And me? I can assure you, I am NOT perfect.

That’s why I asked for your input — because no matter how much of an Internet marketing expert I consider myself, I know there’s always more I need to learn.

I was fairly certain I had a good idea of what you were looking for in a complete online business builder… And after reading all 485 of your comments, now I have a REALLY good idea of what you want!

My team and I are going to spend the next week putting your ideas into action. What can be implemented, WILL be implemented.

So stay tuned… On Thursday January 24th, you’ll be able to see the results!

In the meantime, tell me:

What springs to YOUR mind when you hear the word, "guru?"

Is there really such a thing as a "marketing guru"? If so, how can you tell when someone really IS a guru — as opposed to a scam artist or wannabe?

This should be a fun conversation…

My response? "So what?"

Now, that may sound harsh, but my response is meant to help. As I see it, anyone who thinks they can dream up an idea that’s guaranteed to make money online is doing just that – dreaming!

Sure, there are a few dreamers out there who hit the jackpot with an inspired idea that catches the world’s attention and skyrockets to fame. But for every one of those fortunate success stories, there are literally THOUSANDS of entrepreneurs toiling away at an idea that’s just plain doomed to fail!

Why am I telling you this? Because I don’t want you to be one of those tragic failures.

The good news is, it doesn’t have to be that way! In fact, I truly believe that with the right plan, anyone can create an eBook that’s guaranteed to sell.

Ready to get started? Keep reading!

1. Identify your skills and interests

Before you start developing your eBook, or even considering any specific topics, you should make a list of your own skills and interests. As you’ll learn, this list will drive the process of finding a profitable market for your eBook – and it will also ensure that the business you create is one that you’ll enjoy managing and growing for years to come.

You’ll be much more passionate about creating your eBook if it is based on something you love. Plus, you’ll find that with a business founded on your own skills and interests, you’ll end up having a lot in common with your future customers – which is a big advantage for both of you!

That’s why – before you even begin brainstorming possible topics for your eBook – you need to seriously consider the following:

• What are you interested in?
• What are you passionate about?
• What subject or topic do you know a lot about?
• What are people always coming to you for advice about?

Whether it’s expertise you picked up on the job, skills you developed through a hobby, or interest in a subject you have long wanted to explore, just about every single skill or interest you have is something that can become the foundation for a successful eBook.

And if you choose a topic for your eBook that you’re already familiar with, you’ll be building on your existing knowledge base – which means you’ll avoid the steep learning curve and research involved in writing about a topic you don’t already know about.

Time and time again we hear people say, "I can’t develop my own information product! I don’t have any skills or knowledge that people would be willing to pay money for."

If you honestly believe you have no valuable skills or knowledge, you’re selling yourself short. We’re absolutely certain that every single person has some kind of knowledge or skill that could be the foundation of a successful eBook.

You simply need to stop and think about your life experiences. Create a list of all the jobs you’ve ever had… all the hobbies you’ve ever pursued… any volunteer work you’ve ever done… and all the things you’re interested in or think you’re good at. Carefully consider your own interests, hobbies, and areas of expertise, and write down anything that comes to mind.

Once you’ve done that, arrange your list of potential topics from "Most Passionate" to "Least Passionate."

Finally, get rid of everything except the top three items on your list. You now have three potential subject areas that you can use as the foundation for your information product!

2. Look for a problem to solve

Now that you’ve identified your top skills, interests, and passions, you’re ready to start looking for a problem that needs to be solved.

The key to succeeding with your eBook is to find a group of people who share a problem, then come up with an idea that will help solve that problem.

To start, you’ll identify potential target markets for your solution, then identify the problems that those markets are facing. Let’s take a look at your potential target markets first – the people who will be your potential customers.

You will need to do some research to find potential markets that are related to your skills and interests. For instance, if one of your interests is gardening, you need to identify markets that relate to gardening. These could be casual indoor gardeners, organic gardeners, professional landscapers, gardening store owners, etc.

Once you’ve brainstormed a list of general markets for your potential topics, get on the Internet and see what kind of online presence these markets have. When conducting research online, use the major search engines to look for businesses that are already selling to your market.

Pay attention to how existing businesses are talking to these market segments. Take a look at how much competition there is in a particular market segment. For example: Are there tons of sites catering to organic gardeners already? Are they giving away information? Selling information? Selling products?

Other good places to find information about your target market are newsgroups, discussion boards, and chat rooms. You’ll get a good idea of what your potential customers are actively talking about, what they like or dislike, and most of all, what questions they are most desperate to have answered.

The longer you hang out in these areas, the more you will begin to notice that certain questions appear over and over again.

Remember, only a small percentage of the online community participates in forums and discussion groups. So if a question is popular among these people, there are very likely hundreds, possibly even thousands, of people out there wondering the exact same thing!

A good place to start looking for discussion boards and newsgroups related to your area of interest is Google Groups at http://groups.google.com.

While you’re doing this research and learning about your potential market, there’s one thing in particular that you should be looking for: problem statements. A problem statement is just that – a statement that expresses a problem someone is experiencing.

Here are a few examples of problem statements you might find from a target market of gardeners:

• My back gets sore when I plant seeds
• I’m concerned about unnatural chemicals in plant fertilizer
• Why is good potting soil so expensive?
• My gardening gloves wear out after a couple of weeks

As you can see, a problem statement can be phrased as a statement OR a question. Make it your mission to collect a file of these statements – because each problem statement you find could literally be the map to finding an online gold mine!

3. Find a hungry niche market – BEFORE you decide what to sell

Why are problem statements so valuable to entrepreneurs? Because behind every problem statement is a potential customer… or possibly THOUSANDS of customers!

Remember the "dreamers" I mentioned earlier? They’re people who skip the step you’ve just learned about – gathering problem statements – and go straight to work developing a product to sell. And this is the reason the majority of Internet startups fail!

Most marketers make the mistake of looking for a "hot product" to sell when they’re first starting out online – and they end up choosing a product before they determine whether there’s a market for it.

The fact is, of all the people searching the Internet on any given day, most have NOT gone online looking to buy something. Why are they online? Most likely, for one of two reasons:

1. They are looking for information
2. They are trying to solve a problem

You need to do is find an untapped niche market: a group of people who are going online to solve a common problem, but aren’t having any luck finding a solution.

By doing some simple research, you can discover EXACTLY what these people are looking for – and then figure out a way to give it to them. That way, you’ll KNOW you have a market that’s eager to buy your product – before you even know what it is!

It’s time for you to dig deeper and start looking for a more targeted group of people within your larger market – people who share common characteristics and have the same problem. In other words, you need to find a niche market.

The term "niche market" is one that you’ll hear in just about every discussion about marketing – online or offline. But it’s important to note that everyone thinks of niche markets a little differently.

Traditional marketers, for example, may define a niche market as a large group of people sharing several characteristics (for example, men aged 30 to 40 earning between $50,000 and $75,000 per year).

However, when you’re selling online, you need to narrow the focus A LOT more than that!

A niche market is a group of people who are searching the Internet for a solution to a problem – and NOT finding many relevant search results.

Identifying a strong niche market is one of the keys to developing a profitable eBook, because it means you’ve found a group of people who are searching the Internet for a solution to their problem.

All you have to do now is create an eBook that supplies this niche market with an answer to their question. It is a well-known fact that, no matter what you’re selling, you’ll be most successful if you concentrate your efforts on a niche market.

Your goal should be to develop a narrowly focused, topic specific eBook that provides clear and concise solutions to one or two specific problems. Why? Because you are not trying to sell to everyone. You will be far better off, and far more successful, developing an eBook aimed at fulfilling a need or solving a problem of your niche market.

So logically, the next step will involve determining who your niche market is. By identifying your niche market before you start writing, you will be able to…

• Locate your potential customers before you even have a product to sell!
• Produce a publication that is custom-tailored to their needs!

This is an incredibly powerful strategy – because by locating your potential customers and then developing an eBook specifically geared to solving a problem they’re actively seeking a solution for, you are guaranteeing that they’ll be interested in your eBook the moment it comes out!

By defining your niche market in the early stages of developing your eBook, you will be able to efficiently focus both your time and your money on marketing to those people most likely to buy from you.

Through your research, you should already know where your niche market is and what they want. All you need to do now is put your product in front of that niche market and your sales will explode!

4. Create an eBook that laser-targets your niche market!

Now that you’ve identified your target market, your next step is to figure out how to position your eBook as the solution to the problem they’re trying to solve. In other words, you need to define your topic.

For example, let’s say you’ve been working as a realtor selling houses, and you want to write an eBook for sale on a topic related to your expertise in real estate. After doing some research online, you discover that a lot of homebuyers are using words and phrases like the following to describe their problems:

• Home inspector turned out to be a rip-off
• Is this house for sale too good to be true?
• Shady inspection services – beware!
• Not sure if I should be buying this house – help!

What common problem do these people share? They’re all shopping for houses, and they’re desperately looking for reliable home inspection services to make sure they don’t buy a "money pit"!

With your inside knowledge of the process of buying and selling homes, you could easily come up with an eBook that shares the secrets to finding a reputable, top-notch home inspection service that will guarantee buyers are purchasing a safe home for their family.

Once you’ve done that, you can simply put your eBook in front of these potential customers – and it will practically sell itself!

Remember: the key to having a successful eBook is to find a group of people who share a problem, then come up with an idea for an eBook that will help solve that problem. So not only do you need to choose a topic about which you are knowledgeable, but the information you provide also needs to be in demand… if you want people to pay for it, that is!

Most people go online to search for solutions to their problems. Once you identify a group of people with a common problem, you can then start to think about a topic for your eBook that provides a solution to that problem.

Once you’ve identified your topic, you’re ready to start writing your eBook. In the next lesson, we’ll look at how anyone can create an eBook… even if you’ve never written anything longer than an email in your life!

Final thoughts

Remember: If you "dream up" a topic for your eBook, there’s simply no way to guarantee that it will sell. Just because you’ve got an eBook for sale, it doesn’t mean people are going to buy it!

This is a common mistake many online businesspeople make… so make sure you avoid it!

You need to find a problem before you start trying to sell the solution! It’s much easier and more lucrative to find out what people are searching for, and then simply offer them what you KNOW they already want!

This means doing a lot of research, and keeping your eyes open for any possible eBook topics. So get on the Internet and explore sites that are geared to your potential markets. Get to know the people who belong to these markets by visiting the sites where they hang out – discussion forums, chat rooms, and newsgroups.

Finally, identify a niche market and generate eBook topics that can solve that market’s problems. The fact is, any successful eBook will be based upon two things: A viable market that has a problem, and an effective information product that offers a solution to that problem.

Got a topic? Okay, let’s get writing!

In a recent survey, we asked blog readers to answer the question, "Where do you most need help with your Internet business?"

And the number one answer was, "Finding my niche."

Surprise, surprise.

Finding a profitable niche is the most important step you’ll take in your entire online business career. And it’s one a lot of our readers have problems with.

So over the next couple weeks, we’re going to do a series of blog posts focusing on finding a niche, so we can help you through this fundamental stage of building your business.

But before we get into it, we have just one piece of advice to pass on…

If you’ve been searching and searching for a profitable niche, but can’t seem to find one no matter how hard you look — and you’re panicking because you’ve invested so much time and energy with nothing to show for it — here’s what you need to do right now:

Take a deep breath and relax.

Finding a niche can be a time-consuming process… but if you know the proven 3-step formula that allows you to take a logical, systematic approach to your "niche hunt," then you will dramatically reduce the time you spend chasing after lost causes — and fast-track your way to a hot business idea that’s guaranteed to be successful!

And what is that proven 3-step formula? Glad you asked!

Here are the three critical "niche finder" steps we teach all our students, as we work with them to help build their online businesses:

Step #1: Reveal a potential market (Find a problem!)

You should start your search using a keyword research tool such as Keyword Discovery (www.keyworddiscovery.com). This useful tools shows you exactly what words and phrases people are typing into Google and other search engines, so you can discover what they’re looking for online.

What you should be looking for is problem statements. In other words, look for phrases that would be used by searchers who are actively trying to solve a problem.

For example, "bike riding" is NOT a problem statement… "How to teach a child to ride a bike" IS. See the difference?

Once you identify a problem statement that lots of people are searching for information about, you’re well on your way to discovering a profitable market!

Step #2: Validate market demand (Make sure they’re willing to pay for a solution!)

Okay, so you’ve done your keyword research and discovered a problem statement that shows a lot of promise.

But how do you know for sure people are willing to pay for a solution to this problem?

Simple: you ask them!

Find out where people with this problem hang out online, and see what they’re saying about it. Check to see if people are actively discussing this problem in online forums, groups, and blogs. Then join in the conversation and find out how big this problem is for them.

Are they finding solutions for it? What do they think of the solutions? Where do they fall short of the mark? What do they *wish* they could find in a solution? And would they be willing to pay for it?

These questions will give you a good idea of how strong the demand is for a solution to the problem you’re researching. If people are willing to pay for a solution, and aren’t finding what they want, then you know you’re on the right path.

Step #3: Assess your competition (Make sure there aren’t already 1000s of solutions available!)

So you’ve identified a problem and you know a lot of people are willing to pay for a solution to it. Think you’re done?

Nope! There’s still one more essential step you need to take — and that’s analyzing your competition.

Your competition is the sites that appear in the search results when you type your problem statement into a search engine like Google. How many of these sites are actually offering a solution to this problem? Can you compete with them in terms of price, features etc.?

If you can’t see any way of improving on the solutions that are already out there, then it’s probably time for you to go back to the drawing board and start exploring a new idea. (But don’t be upset — you’ve just saved yourself a lot of wasted time and money!)

However, if you take a look at your competition and *know* you can offer something better, then congratulations! Looks like you’ve just identified a profitable online niche.

We’ll be exploring these three steps in much greater detail in upcoming blog posts. Make sure you sign up for our RSS feed so you don’t miss a single post!

Remember, finding your niche is THE most important step you’ll ever take with your online business. You want to make sure you do it right, so you don’t end up investing a whole lot of time and money in a business that’s doomed to failure.

Stay tuned for our next post on keyword research…

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