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How To Check Out The Competition In A Niche Market

Written by: Janet Beckers

Article Overview: There are a lot of search engines out there but let's face facts. Google is used by the majority of people in the world so if you are doing research, this is the best place to see who else is out there that you are competing with. When you search on a keyword in Google, you will see 2 types of listings. There are the main results which are listed in the body of the page. These are pages that come up automatically (also called organic searches). I'll talk about those in a minute but for now I want to talk about paid listings.

How To Check Out The Competition In A Niche Market

There are a lot of search engines out there but let's face facts. Google is used by the majority of people in the world so if you are doing research, this is the best place to see who else is out there that you are competing with.

When you search on a keyword in Google, you will see 2 types of listings. There are the main results which are listed in the body of the page. These are pages that come up automatically (also called organic searches). I'll talk about those in a minute but for now I want to talk about paid listings.


Paid listings on Google


If you look at the right hand side of the page when you search on Google you will see a list of websites which have a heading, 2 lines of text and then the website address, or url, at the bottom.

These are paid listings. If a website is listed there, they are paying Google money every time someone clicks on the link. This is the first place you should look because if you have a competitor who is selling a product in this niche, they will probably be paying for advertising to get new customers. Check out each and every one of these sites, keeping a list and your thoughts on each one.

If there are more than 2 pages of paid listings then it is not usually worth your while to enter this niche because it will cost you too much in advertising to be seen. It is ok to have some competition though if every advertisement leads to a site that is selling a product similar to the one you want to create, you will need to rethink your strategy.

Competition can be a good thing

A word of hope. Competition can be a great thing. If there is competition in your niche that means that there is definitely demand. Look at what your competitors are doing and importantly what they aren't doing. You may be able to create a product that addresses an angle the other products don't cover.

GOOGLE FOR FREE

The next thing to do is look at all the sites that are listed in the main body of the page when you search in Google. There is no use creating a product on a topic if there is already a lot of information available for free. Keep in mind though that there may be a lot of free information but if it is only available in really technical format then you may have a market that is hungry for easy to understand language.

Take the time to look at each site on the first page of the top 10 listings. If you decide to go ahead with the topic then also look at every site on the next page in Google, i.e. the first 20 listings. Keep a list of them, especially noticing any that you could approach later to ask them to recommend your book (or other product) to their customers. Remember not all competition is bad news.

Take the time to check out your competition this week. Keep a list of all your competitors because remember, not all competition is bad. Many of your competitors may turn out to be great joint venture partners who can sell your product to their customers.

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Article Tags: advertisement, competitor, doing research, face facts, google, heading, money every time, niche, search engines, website address, what your competitors



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