Choosing the right niche for your Shopify store
Ever wanted to know if the niche you've research for a Shopify store is the right one? Well, creating a Shopify store is relatively easy, but you need to fill it with products and to do that, you keep coming across people showing you how to research a nice. But what makes a good niche?
I advise people that, at a very top level, there are four basic things you need to consider when creating a Shopify store from scratch:
Creating an online e-commerce store using Shopify is an ideal option, although don't be fooled into thinking only a little effort is required. One of the biggest hurdles is knowledge. Having website development experience and a good understanding of what makes a good website tick is a huge bonus and can't be learned overnight. That said, applying a little common sense will go a long way. Look objectively at your website and say to yourself "would I buy from that store?"
This article is designed to help you find a good product that people want more than they need; choosing a product that will sell.
I've created a simple matrix with the axis showing how passionate an audience might be about a product and if you would classify the product as a need or how passionately they might want it.
There is no science behind this, but it's my view that you need to find something within the green rectangle. Something that's niche without being too narrow and that people are at least somewhat passionate about - they want it more than they need it.
Take fishing for example (or you could choose most hobbies). Men (mostly men anyway, from what I see sat down along the river bank each weekend morning) get up at 3 am in the wet and cold and go fishing for hours on end. This involves leaving partners and family week in, week out. That's passion!
I know a guy who is testing bait for a friend who intends to sell it across the country. The family holidays have come second to this as he travels across Europe fishing different waters.
On the flip side, think about work clothes? A lot of people enjoy their work and many are even passionate about it. But the clothes they wear are generally a requirement for work, not because they passionately want them? So in this case (apart from in exceptional circumstances) work clothes are a need, not a want, and I'd not want to run a small Shopify startup store from home for that niche.
How niche is your niche?
To help your Shopify store to succeed you need to find buyers; they don't just appear from nowhere! For a lot of you, this will involve paid advertising on networks like Facebook, Instagram or Pinterest. And for this to work, there needs to be a community of them on the aforementioned social networks.
So, when choosing the right niche, consider if the niche is too broad or too narrow in the eyes of Facebook, Instagram and so on. Is it a niche or simply a category?
But what is a niche? The Oxford Dictionary says "A specialised segment of the market for a particular kind of product or service". And that's what you're looking for, something specialised. Something specialised can fit into the same category as other specialised niches.
A good example of a category is 'Pets'. Do you choose Pets as your niche? I'd suggest Pets is a category. Dogs then? Again, I'd suggest this is too broad to fit in as a niche. Pugs are more niche (although a much-used example that I would personally not choose, purely because it's nothing new. It's become the low hanging fruit that lot's of gurus use to exemplify). Pugs are a particular breed of dog, something more specialised.
Think of a popular hobby, lifestyle or profession. Then do some quick research to see if there are any areas within your chosen subject. For example, lots of people like football, but lot's of people on Facebook will have expressed an interest in Football by liking a page without being entirely interested. Or they might friends with someone who is, so simply like posts that they like. This obscures your audience and doesn't provide a true reflection of how passionate they are.
However, if you think of a football team, for example, Leeds United (I know...). This appeals to people that not only like football, they've also expressed an interest in a particular team. If you have a t-shirt with a great Leeds United design, this would be a passionate audience; a niche that would be easy to advertise to!
- A well-researched niche
- A good product that people want
- A trustworthy, good looking, high converting website
- A good understanding of your audience so you can target paid ads and other social media marketing
Creating an online e-commerce store using Shopify is an ideal option, although don't be fooled into thinking only a little effort is required. One of the biggest hurdles is knowledge. Having website development experience and a good understanding of what makes a good website tick is a huge bonus and can't be learned overnight. That said, applying a little common sense will go a long way. Look objectively at your website and say to yourself "would I buy from that store?"
This article is designed to help you find a good product that people want more than they need; choosing a product that will sell.
I've created a simple matrix with the axis showing how passionate an audience might be about a product and if you would classify the product as a need or how passionately they might want it.
There is no science behind this, but it's my view that you need to find something within the green rectangle. Something that's niche without being too narrow and that people are at least somewhat passionate about - they want it more than they need it.
Passion
Think about it. If you have a product that people are very passionate about AND it's something they really want then this must be a far easier sell than if it's something they aren't passionate about and is something they need, not want.Take fishing for example (or you could choose most hobbies). Men (mostly men anyway, from what I see sat down along the river bank each weekend morning) get up at 3 am in the wet and cold and go fishing for hours on end. This involves leaving partners and family week in, week out. That's passion!
I know a guy who is testing bait for a friend who intends to sell it across the country. The family holidays have come second to this as he travels across Europe fishing different waters.
On the flip side, think about work clothes? A lot of people enjoy their work and many are even passionate about it. But the clothes they wear are generally a requirement for work, not because they passionately want them? So in this case (apart from in exceptional circumstances) work clothes are a need, not a want, and I'd not want to run a small Shopify startup store from home for that niche.
How niche is your niche?
To help your Shopify store to succeed you need to find buyers; they don't just appear from nowhere! For a lot of you, this will involve paid advertising on networks like Facebook, Instagram or Pinterest. And for this to work, there needs to be a community of them on the aforementioned social networks.
So, when choosing the right niche, consider if the niche is too broad or too narrow in the eyes of Facebook, Instagram and so on. Is it a niche or simply a category?
But what is a niche? The Oxford Dictionary says "A specialised segment of the market for a particular kind of product or service". And that's what you're looking for, something specialised. Something specialised can fit into the same category as other specialised niches.
A good example of a category is 'Pets'. Do you choose Pets as your niche? I'd suggest Pets is a category. Dogs then? Again, I'd suggest this is too broad to fit in as a niche. Pugs are more niche (although a much-used example that I would personally not choose, purely because it's nothing new. It's become the low hanging fruit that lot's of gurus use to exemplify). Pugs are a particular breed of dog, something more specialised.
Think of a popular hobby, lifestyle or profession. Then do some quick research to see if there are any areas within your chosen subject. For example, lots of people like football, but lot's of people on Facebook will have expressed an interest in Football by liking a page without being entirely interested. Or they might friends with someone who is, so simply like posts that they like. This obscures your audience and doesn't provide a true reflection of how passionate they are.
However, if you think of a football team, for example, Leeds United (I know...). This appeals to people that not only like football, they've also expressed an interest in a particular team. If you have a t-shirt with a great Leeds United design, this would be a passionate audience; a niche that would be easy to advertise to!
How popular is the niche?
Once you've thought of a niche that you think has a passionate audience and is niche-enough to be worthwhile, you need to consider the size of the audience. If your niche has too small a following, it will be tricky to sell to it.I learned this the hard way when looking to target eco-friendly products a while ago. I had a great product(s) and a VERY passionate audience. But I failed was on two levels: 1) the audience was way too small to make it work, and 2) risk of the product not being 'green enough' so, in fact, alienating a segment of the already small audience. If you recall my introduction, I failed on my third step: understand your audience.
That's all for now. Choosing the right niche requires some effort, but done with some common sense shouldn't be too difficult. I hope you found this post useful. Any comments or feedback please feel free to use the comment below. If you would think I could help you with this or any other Shopify related matter, please drop me a line via my contact form.
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