Niche Market & Niches - DefinitionsNiche Market: Just like Wikipedia said, a subset of a market on which a specific product is focusing on. So, Identifying a niche market is only one step (first step) of the process on building a great online business.
Niches: In my opinion niches are just used by marketers to exploit a very small market segment of a niche market. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but in my opinion that is not a real business. There is obviously a business behind the business; but in my experience online marketers that promote niches just provide useless information that clutter the search engines; I would love to see examples of marketers (especially affiliate marketers) actually promoting their niches by providing useful information to search engine users.
Niche Market - Examples Japanese Mahjong: David Hurley sell Japanese Mahjong Sets. A niche market within the "board game" or market. I would call Japanese Mahjong an example of a great niche market, David has done a great job at promoting this niche by becoming an expert within the "Japanese Mahjong" niche market by publishing very useful information about the game.
Automotive Accessories & Promotional: Jeff Foster's company, WebBizIdeas, sells Automotive Keychains. A niche market within the "Automotive Accessory" or "Promotional" market. They are working on expanding into what would be defined as a "Mainstream Niche" by selling every single "Keychain" imaginable.
Automotive Clubs: Within the Automotive Industry there exists many niche markets. Automotive Dealers could be considered a niche market. Automotive Clubs could be considered a niche market. Marketing to these niche markets selling a product/service would be considered marketing to a niche market.