7 Free and Easy Ways to Research Your Online Niche

You don't need to spend thousands of dollars on market research, especially when the world's greatest market research tool, the internet, is already sitting right in front of you. You just need to know how to "mine" this resource to pull out the gold. Here are some free methods that you can use to research your niche online.

1. Search for your products on eBay, see what others are selling and determine what if any accessory products related to your niche are popular. Gauge the average selling price of products. Have a look at the type of questions that auction watchers are asking. There's a lot of important data on eBay for you to dig through that can help you to understand your potential prospects.

2. Go to Amazon and look for the bestselling books in your niche. It doesn't matter what your niche is, someone has probably written some type of book about it. Read through the book reviews and make notes about what reviewers like and dislike about the items they have commented on. Make some notes of the most popular book titles in your niche, you may be able to use parts of these for sales page headlines or elsewhere in your marketing material.

3. Use Google's free keyword research tool to see what phrases people are searching for within your niche. Make a list of the top search terms as well as any phrases and terms that you may not have considered.

4. Search online for info-products within your niche. Study the sales pages that you find carefully and make notes of the bullet points used in these product's sales pages. Quite often someone else has gone through the trouble of researching your niche already. You can learn quite a bit about what other people believe are major selling points within your market.

5. Search Yahoo answers for questions related to your niche. Learning what types of questions people are most asking about your product are service is important. Create products or web content focused on providing answers to these questions and solving common problems within your marketplace.

6. Search for forums related to your niche and spend some time reading the most popular posts that you find. Look for patterns, questions that are asked about most often, areas that people are most interested in. Often you will begin to learn that people experience the same frustrations and joys with a product or service, learn what these are and incorporate them into your sales copy and marketing campaigns. Provide solutions and offer value.

7. Use your brain and the brains of others. Ask questions about your niche, what others feel about it, what their experiences have been, what yours have been. Make a list of ideas and thoughts or impressions that you and those close to you share about your niche. Some of the best niche research information comes from simply engaging in dialogue about your topic with those around you.

Try to build an overall picture of your market and also build a profile of your niche's prospects. What are they interested in?, where do they live? How can you target them most efficiently? What solutions can you offer them that aren't readily available? Use this information to offer your prospects real value and set yourself apart from your competitors.

Jeff Palmer is an Internet Marketer and Entrepreneur who has recently launched the Onpreneur blog a site which shows you how you too can make money online.