Archive for the ‘Idea’ category
Niche Marketing: Finding Hot Markets
November 13th, 2009From Keyword to Business Idea in 8 Steps
October 27th, 2009from: http://www.entrepreneur.com/ebusiness/ebusinesscolumnist/article201870.html
Learn the language of people’s problems, and you’ll discover untapped markets.
By Allen Moon | May 27, 2009
Keyword research is incredibly effective for market research because the main reason people use search engines is to find solutions to their problems. And people with problems might be willing to pay money to solve them.
But there are so many ways of expressing the same problem. “Cat food” could also be “cat treats,” “food for kitty,” “organic cat food.” Someone who needs to feed a cat could use any of those terms in their search, or hundreds of others–and search engines record every one of them. That means there’s a mountain of data about what people are searching for–and it’s all waiting to be analyzed. That’s why initial keyword research is a crucial first step if you’re just starting an online business.
Low-cost research tools, like Keyword Discovery, Wordtracker, and BeBiz, make sense of all the data the search engines provide. With that knowledge, you can uncover untapped niche markets by finding problems a lot of people are seeking answers to–and not getting many results. If you find a hungry market first, and develop a product to serve that market, you’ve already won half the battle.
Keyword research in a nutshell
- Use one word to describe a passion or interest, e.g., dog.
- Combine your interest word with “how” to generate problem statements in your keyword research tool, e.g., “how dog.” We use Google’s free AdWords Keyword Tool for this brainstorming process.
- Record the “action words” that come up, e.g., “how wash dog,” “how housetrain dog.”. These are terms that people are using to search the internet to solve a problem they have.
- From that list, choose some problems that you have the interest, knowledge, or skill to solve, e.g., “train dog.”
- Find as many ways as possible to express your interest word and your action word, e.g., training, educate, teach, show, obedience, commands, stop. To find similar terms quickly and easily, try entering each term into Thesaurus.com or the new Google Sets.
- Enter your interest-plus-action phrases into your paid keyword tool–you’ll get a long list of real searches that people are doing in the area you’re focusing on, e.g., “stop Pomeranian yapping,” “teach dog cute tricks,” “paper train puppy.”
- Organize the top keywords into groups according to the action being performed, e.g., barking, basic obedience, tricks, housetraining, professional dog training, puppy training, etc.–now you have some pretty specific problems you can investigate.
- Look for the largest clusters and add up the number of actual searches–a large cluster with lots of searches is worth exploring further because it indicates that a large number of people are trying to solve the same problem.
You might not find a serious money-making niche the first few times you go through the process, but keep going. You’ll find one eventually, and you’ll get faster and better at it the more you do it.
Once your business is established, you’ll continue to use keyword research. You’ll look for the keywords that will attract the people who are most likely to buy your products, and you’ll use those keywords throughout your web pages.
You’ll use those same keywords in your advertising, and every time you reach out to new audiences via social networks or article distribution. You’ll build special landing pages based on keywords to attract targeted traffic to your opt-in offer or products.
When you’ve mastered the keyword research process, you’ve unlocked the door to online success.
Allen Moon is the Marketing Director of the Internet Marketing Center, which creates information products, software, and training services that have helped thousands of people establish and grow their own profitable online businesses. He has just released the completely updated 2009 edition of the comprehensive Insider Secrets to Marketing Your Business on the Internet course
Competitor’s Keywords
October 26th, 2009If you want to find out your Competitors Keywords, try this keyword to find out with google and yahoo.
Keyword: Competitors Keywords
Here is result link.
googl
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&q=Competitors+Keywords&btnG=Search&aq=f&oq=&aqi=
yahoo
http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=Competitors+Keywords&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&fr=yfp-t-701
Search Engine Optimization SEO Tutorial — WebBizIdeas
October 24th, 200911 Businesses You Can Start In Your Pajamas in 2009
October 23rd, 2009from: http://www.inc.com/ss/11-businesses-you-can-start-your-pajamas-2009
11 Businesses You Can Start in Your Pajamas
Pet Care — Paul Mann, Fetch! Pet Care
Virtual Assistant — Tawnya Sutherland, VAnetworking.com
Bargain Hunting Website — Karen Hoxmeier, MyBargainBuddy.com
Accounting Services — Melissa Nash Andrews, Accounts Receivables
Technical Staffing — Bill Foster and Ruben Santana, XRoads Consulting
Home Improvement and Organization — Allan Young, ShelfGenie
Green Construction — Nic Darling, Chad Ludeman, and Courtney Ludeman, Postgreen
Graphic Design Services — Sam Feuer, Mindsmack.com
Resume Writing — Kathy Sweeney, The Write Resume
Corporate Educational Services — Joseph Pickett, Experts Briefings
Online Dating Site — Markus Frind, PlentyofFish
For the above entrepreneurs, wearing pajamas for a day at the office isn’t far from reality. From pet care to virtual assistants and even online dating, we found entrepreneurs who are not just enjoying work from their living rooms and bedrooms, but they are also making a good living at it. In one case, a business owner grossed $10 million in a year, and cleared half that amount. Here’s a look at the hottest industries for home-based entrepreneurs — illustrated with some fun CEO self-portraits.
Pet Care — Paul Mann, Fetch! Pet Care
Virtual Assistant — Tawnya Sutherland, VAnetworking.com
Bargain Hunting Website — Karen Hoxmeier, MyBargainBuddy.com
Accounting Services — Melissa Nash Andrews, Accounts Receivables
Technical Staffing — Bill Foster and Ruben Santana, XRoads Consulting
Home Improvement and Organization — Allan Young, ShelfGenie
Green Construction — Nic Darling, Chad Ludeman, and Courtney Ludeman, Postgreen
Graphic Design Services — Sam Feuer, Mindsmack.com
Resume Writing — Kathy Sweeney, The Write Resume
Corporate Educational Services — Joseph Pickett, Experts Briefings
Online Dating Site — Markus Frind, PlentyofFish
For the above entrepreneurs, wearing pajamas for a day at the office isn’t far from reality. From pet care to virtual assistants and even online dating, we found entrepreneurs who are not just enjoying work from their living rooms and bedrooms, but they are also making a good living at it. In one case, a business owner grossed $10 million in a year, and cleared half that amount. Here’s a look at the hottest industries for home-based entrepreneurs — illustrated with some fun CEO self-portraits.
Approximately two-thirds of American households own pets, making the pet industry the sixth-fastest-growing industry in the nation — with $43.4 billion projected to be spent on pets in this year alone. It’s no wonder then that Fetch! Pet Care, a Berkeley, Calif.-based company that provides a wide range of pet-sitting and dog-walking services is thriving. The 2008 Inc. 5000 company brought in revenue of $3.5 million last year and operates on a franchise model that includes 200 locations nationwide with a network of more than 3,800 pet sitters. “Pets don’t know that we are in an economic downturn, and it’s been proven that pets are therapeutic for people,” says founder and CEO Paul Mann. “You don’t stop feeding your pet in bad times.”
Virtual Assistant — Tawnya Sutherland, VAnetworking.com
As business owners have become more comfortable working virtually, and work/life balance has increasingly become a necessity, the demand for virtual assistants has grown significantly. Tawnya Sutherland would know — five years ago she started VAnetworking.com, the largest online social network for virtual assistants, which has seen membership triple in the past year to over 10,000 and revenue exceed $150,000. She created the site as a space for fellow virtual assistants to share information, exchange ideas, and discuss industry best practices. Sutherland maintains that “VAs are a really diversified group that can do just about anything.” And, in addition to saving business owners the cost of having an in-office employee, “it relieves you as a business owner to work on the thing that you’re most interested in doing.”
Bargain Hunting Website — Karen Hoxmeier, MyBargainBuddy.com
With just a computer and an Internet connection, virtually anyone these days can start their own website and market their products and services from home without spending a lot of money. But despite the low barrier to entry in this industry, not all businesses have worked out the model for success quite like Karen Hoxmeier. The stay-at-home mom founded MyBargainBuddy.com, which publishes hundreds of daily deals and coupon codes for shopping sites all over the Web. “My business happens to be a hobby that pays me,” she says. “I love shopping and I love bargain hunting. And if what you do helps someone else, that makes it even better.”
Accounting Services — Melissa Nash Andrews, Accounts Receivables
In a tight economy, one of the primary goals for a business owner is staying on top of cash flow. But let’s face it — nobody likes having to ask for the check. That’s where Melissa Nash Andrews and her company, Accounts Receivables, come in. A full-service collection agency, Nash Andrews stays on top of her clients’ accounts receivables and provides a range of bookkeeping services for business owners looking to outsource accounting. “If I can help another small business person to stay in business and to keep their business, then I’ve met my goal,” she says.
Technical Staffing — Bill Foster and Ruben Santana, XRoads Consulting
As more companies contract out specialty services like recruiting, staffing companies like Atlanta-based XRoads Consulting are seeing an upturn in business. Founded in 2006 by neighbors Ruben Santana and Bill Foster, XRoads specializes in placing people for technical positions at companies located primarily in the southeastern United States. They also help companies select and implement information technology solutions that will best meet their needs. Both Santana and Foster have leveraged their prior experience in the industry to grow their revenues to $5.58 million in the first two years of business. “There are definite financial rewards to being home-based and not having the upfront overhead needed to start a business,” Santana says.
Home Improvement and Organization — Allan Young, ShelfGenie
Those who are making money in the beleaguered housing industry these days are people like Allan Young, founder and CEO of ShelfGenie, a company that designs and installs custom-shelving units for the home. “A high percentage of our clients are people who are staying put in their homes but want to do an affordable upgrade,” says Young, who recently began franchising the sales model in April. Because the shelving systems are customized for the client, there is no inventory for the franchisee, and appointments are handled through a call center, making it very feasible for the franchisees to get their business up-and-running and achieve positive cash flow quite quickly.
Green Construction — Nic Darling, Chad Ludeman, and Courtney Ludeman, Postgreen
When it comes to purchasing products and services, consumers are increasingly making their decisions with the environment in mind. One company that has capitalized on this growing consumer awareness is Postgreen, a Philadelphia-based real-estate development company whose mission is to build green homes that are affordable for the average family. Founders Chad and Courtney Ludeman, and marketing director, Nic Darling, are working on a line of LEED-certified homes that will sell for $100 a square foot — a cost equal to a regular home without green efficiencies. “We are making consumers look at houses differently,” says Darling. “Instead of just a monthly payment, they are starting to look at all the costs that go into owning a home, and we have a distinct advantage in being much less expensive [to maintain] than a normal house.”
Graphic Design Services — Sam Feuer, Mindsmack.com
The way a company represents itself on the Web is becoming increasingly important, and no one understands this mission better than Sam Feuer, founder of Mindsmack.com, a full-service Web-design firm whose projects include everything from iPhone application design to commercial animation. From his home based in North Brunswick, N.J., Feuer manages a staff of 44 along with a network of freelancers, some of whom work globally. “The real key is doing the work at an elite level,” Feuer says. “It doesn’t matter where my employees are — I don’t care if they work from the moon — as long as they get the job done and they are two steps ahead of what the client is looking for.”
Resume Writing — Kathy Sweeney, The Write Resume
Given the dismal job opportunities at many companies right now, job-seekers are looking for any and every way to distinguish themselves from the competition. Kathy Sweeney, founder and CEO of resume writing service The Write Resume, is busy like never before, with revenue growth of 21 percent in the past year alone. Sweeney, who is recognized as one of the foremost experts in the industry, has written resumes for people all over the world, most of the time just from information that she has gleaned from phone conversations with the client. “It’s really about relationship building and I believe you can do that without meeting someone. If I can develop a bond with people then I know I’ll be successful in helping them.”
Corporate Educational Services — Joseph Pickett, Experts Briefings
Complying with federal regulations is a tricky business, especially for companies in the pharmaceutical and medical-device industries, where many will spend hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to send their employees to required educational conferences. Joseph Pickett of Experts Briefings has found a way around this big expense by offering companies the same experts and packaged information through his teleconferencing business. Pickett lines up the speakers for the teleconference and then hosts it from his home computer, charging companies $400 a head. Pickett purchased the company in early 2008 and has increased revenue from $25,000 to $300,000 in less than a year. “My price for customers and for most pharma companies is chump change, but for me working out of my house, it’s a lot of money.”
Online Dating Site — Markus Frind, PlentyofFish
A new ecosystem of free software and low-cost Web services have made it possible for Web start-ups with a little bit of traffic to bootstrap their growth without raising tens of millions in venture capital. No one has done this as effectively as Markus Frind, the founder of PlentyofFish, an online dating site based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Frind launched his company in 2003 by himself and with no idea how to run a Web business. Five years later, PlentofFish is the largest dating site in the United States, according to Hitwise, and the company pulls in $10 million a year. You can read more about Frind, who still works only a few hours a week, in Inc.’s January/February cover story, The Money Comes Rolling In.
