Broad or Micro Niche Site

[steve123]

Hello,

My apologies for the newbie question still trying to grasp the basics.

Could anyone please advise, when starting out, the best way to go, as regards the type of website to go with.

If I target a broad niche, lets say cooking, would it be more beneficial to have a broad main site, for future/branding/expansion, with sub-niches within.

Or would it be better to build smaller independent sites targeting sub/micro niches such as Traditional South East Indian cooking.

I have been informed that targeted keywords within a url rank better.
So does going for a broad name/url broad niche site hinder the sites chances:
or is that where sub-domains come into play.

Thanks for your time
Regards
Steve.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Hi Steve,

I wish there was one right answer, but you'll find 2 schools of thought on this one. In part it depends on how good you are at marketing and SEO.

Some would say build niche sites for easier ranking.

I tend to think, go with a broader site with sub niches to focus all your efforts on one site instead of splintering your efforts. Focus only on one of the sub niches until you get some success with it and then gradually start building out the next.

James Martell one of the grand fathers of affiliate marketing used to teach affiliates the strategy of a bunch of small niche sites. Now he says in hingsight if he could start over and do things differently he would focus all his efforts on one site - just one!

Hope some of our other members weigh in. I'm sure they have some other opinions.

 

[Ron Bechdolt]

The other thing to consider is trying 3-4 sites. Build your broad one, then pull out specific smaller niches from that broad site and try them on smaller sites. For me, I'd rather try that approach than work hard on just one route and, later when it is not working, wonder if I should have done something differently. This way you do indeed do it differently as well and later can evaluate which worked best.

 

[steve123]

Thanks so much Linda and Ron for the sound advice.

It may sound stupid to you both, but this problem was like a mountain for me.
Wish I had asked this a week ago.

I guess what you're saying, in a nice way, is learn to walk before you can run. Your comments also reminded me that split testing is important and not to put all my eggs into one basket.

Being flexible and covering as many bases as possible seems to be favorite.

Thank you both again for your clarity and your time.

Sincere Regards,
Steve.

 

[Clintoc]

My second site faced this same issue. There are many different products in the niche, but I knew where I wanted to start. I also wanted to branch out into other aspects of this niche without much extra effort (minus article marketing landing pages and such) so I went broad.

Instead of building the whole thing at once I am building it piece by piece, sub-niche by sub-niche. None of the individual sub-niches affects the other, but is all related by a common bond.

That way, even starting from ground one I was relevant to the topic of the blog/site without limiting what I could do with it.

 

[Linda Buquet]

That sounds like a great strategy Clint!

 

[Joseph Ratliff]

Although I am not a proponent of trying to "figure out" this affiliate business before going out and just testing ideas and using what works...

Thinking about this for a second, and thinking along the lines of creating a long-term business and not just going with "whatever will make me the most money" in my mind...

I would start with a combination of both approaches.

Think about it... if you build a large core site...that has a general niche focus...then build smaller niche sites around it...you'll have built yourself a mini-network of sites that gain the advantages of both approaches.

However, you really have to plan this out, and think in terms of building a business long-term...because your larger site (the one I would build first in this example) would probably take a little time before you built a solid income (maybe not, I have seen clients build these up rather quick).

The smaller niche sites related to (and linked from) the bigger site would pull in faster income (so long as you understand how to make money with them)...but in my mind (IMHO) you would not build these first, because your large site would establish a "foundation" to build your smaller sites from (which of course would link back to your bigger core site).

It's an approach that takes time to build (not what many people want to hear)...but once built properly and thoroughly...would serve you well.

I could go on and on, but this idea can get you started.

 

[steve123]

Thanks, Clintoc, Joseph, All.

Valuable advice.

The fact I'm still trying to grasp all of this draws me to Linda's first comment:

In part it depends on how good you are at marketing and SEO.

Simple answer is I'm not. So I will keep going until I do understand the basics.

I'm also a bit confused if parent and child responsibilities would need role reversal at the outset. But that's me complicating the issue and a different kettle of fish.

I suppose it's a matter of constant improvement, aiming for realistic achievable goals, in a realistic time frame. I will however gratefully take all this valuable advice on board.

Thanks again.
Best regards,
Steve.