Adventures in Blog Sitting: Part 3

or…
Grab that pick and shovel and start diggin’… there’s GOLD in them thar hills!

During the California gold rush of the mid 1800s a frenzy of fortune hunters fought their way to the golden state. In fact over 300,000 men women and children came from all over the world to claim their piece of the pie. Not unlike the gold rush of yore, the internet is ripe for mining a fortune with digital gold.

When it comes to finding a topic, or a niche, as it is commonly referred to industry terms, it is not much different than mining. You scout out a location determine what resources can be exploited and then start digging, and blasting, and posting your claims.

Tip #2: Find a topic that can be monetized.

Let’s look at some basic data and see how the gold rush relates to finding topics for your blog and whether or not there is any money to be made.

During the gold rush people flocked to where ever the big claims were found. As a result San Francisco grew from a tiny little hamlet of tents to a boomtown. Road systems, churches, schools, and other towns sprung up all over the place. With that many people residing in a common place shop owners and inn keepers found a thriving community of commerce and trade. This broad scope of things can be referred to a mass market.

Now let’s look a little closer. Take for instance the shop owners. What types of things do you think they sold? The short answer, everything. Clothing, food, tools, tobacco, maps; you name it, they sold it. And think of the diversity of cultures that were represented. Asians, Latin Americans, Europeans, Australians, and of course the settlers. Shops and services were as diverse as the people who traded with them. So out of all the commerce taking place you could say that owning a shop was a mega-niche.

The thing most common on everyone’s mind at the time was gold and it would be safe to say that the majority of the fortune seekers came specifically to find their share. However, fortunes were made in other ways. Intentional, well thought out, strategic ways. Consider the guy who moved to California with his family specifically to open the inn//saloon/gambling hall. He wasn’t going there to dig in the hills for gold. He was there to PROFIT from the gold diggers. They all needed a place to sleep, clean-up, grab a meal and blow off some steam. These inn keepers made a fortune providing a much needed service (niche) in a mass market.

And what about the shop owner who sold picks and shovels. Can you imagine digging for gold with your bare hands, or hacking away at the sun baked clay with a boot or a branch? The shop owner who sold picks and shovels had a virtual revolving door of customers. He also filled a niche; something that solved a problem that people were eager to pay good money for.

So what were your ideas that you wrote down in your notebook? (Adventures in Blog Sitting: Part 2) What ideas did you come up with that could fill a need in a niche? Take those ideas and start researching potential value. Is there an active audience looking for a solution to a problem? Are there people wanting to learn how to do something pertaining to your topic? Are advertisers in spending money online to attract new customers? Is there a product that you can promote? Or better yet, is there a product you can create to fill the need of these potential customers?

In closing I’ll leave with a couple of action steps:
1. Search online for topics that pertain to your interest. Are there a lot of results? Are there any advertisers in the search results?

2. Search for products being sold in your market. Check places like Amazon.com, eBay.com and Shopping.com. These are great places to find out if people are spending money on your topic.

Take those 2 things and start digging. Don’t be afraid to get dirty either; you never know what treasures may be buried in your own back yard.

I hope you take something from this and put it to use. Leave your comments below if you feel like sharing your thoughts. Until next time… Cheers!

~Richard