Hi everybody,
In today’s post I am going to be showing you a little trick for finding hot niches for affiliates, that focus on physical products. However the best part is that I am going to show you a great free tool from Google (no its not the keyword tool, but we will use it) that will make this process a whole lot easier.
What most affiliates do is focus heavily on Clickbank products, and this is not a bad thing, however the competition can be fierce in some niches. The great news is that you don’t have to stay in Clickbank, there is a HUGE amount of other networks that sell physical products which you can be an affiliate for too.
I have found that moving away from Clickbank can mean a lot less competition, which is always nice.
First of all, you will need to go the Google keyword tool and then click on the “Searched-based Keyword Tool” tab, see the image below:
The Search-based keyword tool is a free tool that is supposed to be used to enter your website into, and Google will provide some more related keywords for you to bid on in adwords. However you can also use this tool to find untapped niches that you can market in as an affiliate, either using PPC or SEO. All I can say is that this sort of market intelligence is absolutely priceless…yet you get it given to you for free!!
When you open the tool, you will then want to scroll to the bottom of the page and click the link that says: “or see top keywords across all categories”
Here is a screen shot to help you:
Then you will be taken to this screen, where you can browse categories of potential niches
You will notice that Google has kindly categorized niches for us, and when you open one up, by clicking on it, you can then drill down further and see more sub niches inside these larger ones.
This is some extremely valuable data for us as marketers, because Google are telling us what the hottest niches that people are searching for are, and they also show you, on the right, that people are spending money on these keywords, which is a healthy sign.
Now that you have a complete list of potential niches, that we know people are searching in, all we need to do then is go back to the Google Keyword tool and type some of these phrases in, and see what the results are.
For example purposes, I found the word “digital tv antenna”, so I typed that back into the Google keyword tool and I soon found more related keywords, such as “digital tv antenna reviews” that had a phrase match search volume of 1300 a month. Now that isn’t the greatest search volume, but it is a buying keyword phrase, so I know it would convert well.
What you then need to do is work out how competitive that phrase would be if you were going to build a simple website to promote it. You can do this by typing that phrase into Google itself in quotes and seeing how many competing pages there are. To do this just type your phrase like this into Google: “digital tv antenna review” .
How competitive is too competitive? Well that depends on your SEO skills, however as a rough guide if there is more 50,000 competiting pages when you type the word in quotes into Google, them maybe try another one.
Of course judging competition on the amount of competing pages alone, is not the greatest way to tell. Therefore you may also want to analyze the top 10 places in Google and in particular the top 5 and see what they are like.
I am not going to go into that now as I have covered this in previous posts and videos, however here is a quick checklist of what to look for: Page Rank, Back Links, Age of Domain, On Page SEO, and as a very rough guide, if you see a lot of authority sites like Amazon, and they are actually purposely trying to rank for that phrase, then that’s not so good.
When I say purposely trying to rank, I mean they have that exact keyword phrase in their pages Title tags, H1 tags, and meta description. Now I realize some of you reading this post might not be sure what I am talking about, so I encourage you to be proactive and do a quick Google search and learn what these terms mean, as it is crucial to know these basics of SEO.
Once you have found a niche and some keywords that you feel you could target, you will then need to see if you can find an affiliate program that you can join to promote products in that niche. You can do this by typing the niche word + affiliate into Google, so for example: “GPS + affiliate”, and searching this way. Or you can use the Amazon market place and simply place an Amazon widget on your site (see Amazon affiliates for more on this).
Well that’s all from me, I hope this has helped you to find ideas for more niches and products. Just remember when you are targeting keywords for SEO, make sure you take your time to find ones that you have the ability to rank for, and also words that have a high level of commercial intent, such as “reviews”
All the best,
Matt
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Hi Matt,
Thanks for a very informative and useful post on how to find potentially profitable niches using free Google tools.
Free is always good and your free 12 part video course contains some excellent tips and advice in a very easy to listen to and understand style (especially since I am an Aussie as well).
I highly recommend everyone watch and listen to your video course.
Regards,
Andrew
Matt Carter Reply:
November 1st, 2009 at 5:18 pm
Hey Graham,
Thanks mate, and good to hear you liked the free videos!
Cheers
Matt
Perfect timing…
Epic Project:
use API and get all the keywords out into a database sort the whole thing and profit 🙂 Thanks Matt.
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:24 am
Hi Sakana,
Glad you liked the post
Thanks
Matt
Thanks Matt for another great tip. Can’t wait to try it out. Keep up the great posts they really do help.
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:24 am
Hi James,
Good to see you on the blog again! Thanks for the feedback.
Cheers
Matt
Hi Matt,
every time I receive and email from you I make sure I read it.
And I receive tons of emails.
You, however always of a high standard.
I thank you very much from the bottom of my heart.
Thank you Matt.
Hi Matt,
Just letting you know I am new to this, but I am really hoping to turn my financial life around with the help that you and others are giving. Looking for the right niche and the right keywords and then going the rest ot the way and making some money with this. Thanks..
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 1:12 pm
Hi Rob,
Great to hear from you and good to see that you are getting into this!!
Cheers
Matt
Hi Matt
Thank you again for some great information, i have only just started your videos and they are fantastic . It looks like you like to over deliver.
I am looking forward to seeing them all.
Thank you again
Lyall
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 1:13 pm
Hi Lyall,
Also great to hear from you and that you are finding the free video course helpful. Keen to see you do really well.
Cheers,
Matt
Good stuff Matt as per usual.
Tell me, how would you rate Mark Ling’s Affilorama as an affiliate marketing system in terms of success, training, support, etc.
Cheers,
Peter
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 4:34 pm
Hey Peter,
Mark Ling’s stuff is some of the finest their is and his Affiloblueprint is top notch!!
Cheers
Matt
Hi Matt
Thanks for that, I have to be honest I haven’t been using the search based keyword tool as much as I should, I do use it through Market Samurai but other than that I don’t.
I’ll give this a try today and see if I can come up with any new niches to work on.
Cheers
Ben
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 8:58 pm
Hey Ben,
Yeah Market Samurai is a great tool, however this data is coming direct from Googles database, which I like the idea of!!
cheers
Matt
Hey Matt..
Much appreciated on the helpful tips as per usual!
Now its time for some work!
Looking forward to the next e-mail from you..
Sean
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 8:59 pm
Hi Sean,
Thanks mate, glad you enjoyed the post.
Cheers
Matt
Hi Matt, and thanks for this article about “Google Search-Based Keyword Tool”.
I never heard about it before, and it can help me in my business to complete some avanced SEO tasks.
I followed you in Twitter and I will join also the 12 Coaching Videos you prepared for us.
Thanks again and keep up the good work !
Alessandro Zamboni
Matt Carter Reply:
November 2nd, 2009 at 10:22 pm
Hi Alessandro,
Nice to meet you and I am glad you enjoyed this post.
Thanks for stopping bye too.
Matt
Hi Matt,
Great resource. Thanks so much for sharing….I’m using it already and have found new niches. Could you clarify something for me? When checking out the competition for these niches, “Shopping results for ‘xyz product’ ” appeared at the top of the page on Google (not adwords). Under this there was a photo and 3 places to buy the product. How should this be evaluated when evaluating whether or not you can rank #1 on Google?
Thanks,
Debbie
Matt Carter Reply:
November 3rd, 2009 at 9:10 am
Hi Debbie,
That’s an excellent question, well done! It is important to be able to analyze how hard it would be to beat them, so what you need to do is look at that site and in particular how many links they have coming to the page, what the pages PR is (above 3 is not great) how old the domain is (above 8 years is not great) but very importantly is that page that is ranking actually trying to ran for that term or has Google got nothing more relevant. To do this you need to look at that pages ON PAGE SEO.
Hope that helps, and by the way a few authority sites is ok, just not the top 5 full of them.
Matt
Matt
I have been through your free video course and thought that it was great, well explained and easy to apply.
I see someone earlier asked about Mark Ling’s AffiloBlueprint. I am about three quarters of the way through the course myself and have found it excellent. There is not a single question that I have come up with so far that has not been explained in the course. I have also met Mark and talked sociallly for a couple of hours. Very genuine and helpful.
I am also enjoying your Blog posts and helpful info. There is certainly a lot to learn.
Thanks
Ralph
Matt Carter Reply:
November 3rd, 2009 at 9:05 am
Hi Ralph,
Nice to hear from you again. Yeah Mark is a great guy and in fact a good friend of mine, his products are always the best!
Chat soon,
Matt
Thanks for the useful information. I am also enjoying the free videos, keep up the good work!
Matt Carter Reply:
November 3rd, 2009 at 6:58 pm
Hi Roger,
No problem, glad you like the videos!!
Cheers
Matt
Hi Mark,
My Google Keyword Tool doesn’t have the website content box or the Search Based Keyword Tool, do i have to sign up to adwords to get this version?
Matt Carter Reply:
November 4th, 2009 at 8:12 am
Hi Catherine,
If you live outside the US, like Australia where I am, Google sometimes doesn’t show all the settings for the tool. Apparently if you change the language setting to US english then it works, but even then I have had problems. I have been in contact with Google about this and they have told me they are working on bringing out a solution soon. If you do sign up for a adwords account you can get access.
Try going through the link on this page though, as that may work also.
Hope that helps
Matt
Thanks for the reply, Matt. I will treat these “sales listings” just like other competing pages and apply the same analysis. Wish me luck!
Debbie
Matt Carter Reply:
November 5th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
Hey Debbie
Good Luck!
HI Matt,
I must say that I’ve found you and Mark Ling very genuine guys . Always throwing some useful info and not just promoting affiliate products.
I make a point that I read all you posts and email coming through…Keep up the good work…
Regards,
Manish
again, a totally awsome post. Matt im a big fan of what you do.
(sent you a small testimonial, in a huge email (sorry) hope you get around to read it, anyways love your stuff)
oh and Catherine:
if you want to reach the sk-tool categories you could just type:
http://www.google.com/sktool/#keywords
And you will go straight to it.
you dont have to sign up for adwords. I had the same problem as I live outside the US and thats how i got around it atleast 🙂
hope i was of help
best regards
//Martin
Matt Carter Reply:
November 9th, 2009 at 10:05 am
Hey Martin,
Great to hear from you!
Also I don’t think I saw your email, do you mind emailing it to me again, as I would
love to read it.
Also thanks for pointing Catherine in the right direction for the sktool.
Matt
Matt,
When looking at the top keywords , a lot of the list comes up in different languages. Is there a setting that I missed or is this normal?
Thanks!
Susan
Matt Carter Reply:
December 21st, 2009 at 8:19 am
Hi Susan,
Sorry it took me so long to reply, I’ve been busy and my blog is now burried in SPAM comments!!!
Anyway I am not sure why the results are coming up in different languages, sorry, there must be
a setting for English, hope you have worked this out
Thanks
Matt
There’s something I think you sh’ld know. I think I’m in LOVE!
I just followed your method concerning the google search based tool and discovered a niche in the medical equipment market called…Ah no, can’t tell, and the funny thing is…your videos taught me how to buy not the .COM extensions but for other countries as well and I’ve seen gold in this.
Yes…truly, I’m in LOVE!
From Lagos, Nigeria.:)
Hi everybody,
Matt like everyone else, I just want to say thanks from my heart for all the info you freely give. Your videos are wonderful. Often you say one phrase and it answers questions I have had for months.
Question…. should we use wp or sitepro to build our sites? I know wp for blogs but we now have pluginins like wp spire which does, sales pages, optin boxes and pretty must everything.
Have you mentioned SEO for Firefox to your followers, I am new to your blog that’s why I asked.
Matt Carter Reply:
January 29th, 2010 at 7:39 am
Hi Tunukwa,
Firstly its great to see you on the blog and commenting, thanks!! Also I use both xsite-pro and wordpress, but I am using wordpress more and more these days because it is just so easy and like you said the plugins are great.
Thanks
Matt
a think a lot of people totally dismiss google tools thinking that the data they provide wont be useful. But as u show here, google’s data is probably one of the best sources of info. I have created a pange ranking tool that actually gets the data straight from google to find free high page ranked blog sites where you can leave comments and get back links to your web site.
Cool article Matts…
Nitin
Matt Carter Reply:
February 4th, 2010 at 4:21 pm
Hi Nitin,
Yes I agree with you totally, Google has some great data for us marketers
Regards
Matt
Thanks for a nitty gritty google database tool where not all people are aware of. Keyword research is a very important process. It should be the primary task to perform before building any webpage. Also, it’s no point targetting a niche keyword that has no economic value.
The new interface on Google’s external keyword tool is very comprehensive. It allows you to drill into niche markets much more efficiently.
Hi Matt!
I always use Google keywords tool but never bother to check the links and understand better. No wonder there is a difference between successful IM and IM.
Thanks a Million!
Joel
I’m really impressed by your rich and generous site.
I am doing my first steps in the Internet Marketing, so it is not that seldom that I get confused. One of the things that I cannot understand about the keyword research with the Google tool is the dramatic change of the results in a very short period of time.
E.g. last week, keyword “excelerator genie” had 8100 monthly local searches. This week it has dropped to 2900. And that’s only one of the examples, there are a lot more.
Could there be an explanation for such a fluctuation?
Wow this post made me realize im not soo lost in the techniques to find niches you just describe how i check my keywords towards profitable markets Thanks Matt
great video course btw
i check your blog everyday! i think i have the same idea as you to search for niches and opportunities, im glad i found a person with no hype about its just straight forward information and good advices
Cheers from Mexico
Hi Matt,
I have purchased several of your products, and have found them very useful!
I am interested in learning more about niche research, both as an affiliate, as well as selling on eBay. I went to the link mentioned in this post
http://www.google.com/sktool/#keywords
Since then, the keyword tool has been updated to combine with the tool in the above link, and just forwards to the External Keyword Tool.
Any suggestions on how to use in current fashion or other freebie niche research?
Thanks,
Dave