In this article, I’m going to tell you an idea for finding a profitable niche that I haven’t seen mentioned anywhere else. Most internet marketers tell you to find a subject that you love or are passionate about, but here’s what I think. I take the advice of “sell what you love” with a grain of salt. While I have lots of passions, some I wouldn’t want to make money from.

For example, while I’ve spent about 11 years troubleshooting computer problems, there’s no way I want to use those troubleshooting skills online in some way. It would still be hourly labor and it’s labor-intensive work. A better solution would be for me to sell computer-related infoproducts to help people fix their own computer problems, if they’re inclined to do so.

If you think of yourself as a marketer rather than as someone who sells xyz product, you can find a niche that is potentially profitable ( use http://www.nichebot.com which tells you potential profitability) and learn what you don’t know about it.

Here’s another underutilized source for niche ideas: If you have any ebook collections, I think they’re a goldmine, and not for the reasons people think. If you look at the ones that include special reports-Take for example Free to Sell-If you don’t have it, I’m sure you’ll find it for $2 on Ebay. There is the Ebusiness Encyclopedia which has dozens of reports you can resell. Now these reports may be outdated but they give you dozens of potential niche market ideas.

Plus you’re allowed to take the reports that are there and add to them. And you can do your research right on the web to expand this information into an ebook.

Some examples:

Catering Business
Used CD & Video Store
Child Care Business
Local Tour Operator
Show & Seminar Promotions
Limousine Service
Janitorial Contracting Business
Auto Detailing Business
Party Plan Sales (350 searches for how to be a party planner on Overture)
Bed & Breakfast (487 people searched for how to start a Bed & Breakfast on Overture last month)

Okay those are all business-related, but that’s because I took them from only one of the 20 report collections. Despite how outdated these reports may be, there are hundreds of people searching for information on these businesses on Overture alone. I suspect that’s because the person(s) who wrote these reports knew this information was in demand at the time, and it still is!

I hope that helps you come up with your some potential niche ideas to start with. Then you can narrow it down to the ones that interest you the most. In my mind, coming up with a niche idea isn’t as hard as choosing one and getting started.

Donna Knight is a Computer Trainer and Website Promotion Specialist. She has built over 270 websites and helps new site owners promote their site cheaply. For tips that will help you save money and save time when marketing online, visit Internet Marketing Tools and Reviews blog at www.DonnaKnight.com . Copyright (c) 2006 Donna Knight.

The recent announcement that .mobi domain names had been released for general sale caused very little stirring on the Internet. It has been heralded as the dawn of a new era for the mobile Internet but many believe that once the initial land rush for domains has passed, it will become just another top-level domain like all others. .Mobi domains have already been purchased by a lot of companies. Initially, from May of this year, trademark holders from within the mobile communication world were given the opportunity to secure the domain associated with that trademark. Then in June, all remaining trademark holders were given the opportunity until finally this month, September, domain names go on general sale.

Why Has The Mobi Domain Been Introduced?

The principle behind the mobi domain name is that it will make finding websites designed for use on mobile or cell phones easier. It is also hoped that the release will herald a new age of mobile Internet with the inclusion of industry standards. Above all else, though, the hope is that mobile Internet browsing and surfing will become as commonplace as the cell phone itself.

Guidelines And Suggestions

As well as having to apply and adhere to guidelines before you can register a domain name, the .mobi domain raises certain questions in terms of accessibility, design, coding, and optimization. Style guides have been released by mTLD that contain a combination of enforced guidelines and advised best practices. Again, though, this only accounts for a portion of the user experience.

The Rise Of The Mobile Internet

Running a .mobi website could potentially be very profitable. So far the mobile Internet simply hasn’t grown as many expected. While this has partially been because of the high and difficult to understand tariffs it is also because the mobile Internet offers very little in the way of a valuable user experience. There are very few sites with mobile compatibility and even those that have attempted have struggled because of a lack of well-worked guidelines.

Mobile Search Engines

As you can probably imagine the main focus of all guidelines concentrates on ensuring that websites load quickly and accurately and that the content and site is easy to navigate. The major search engines already have mobile search engines in some cases; probably the most notable expectedly being Google’s own addition.

.Mobi Sites Should Be Short And Succinct While Still Offering Value

From a user perspective, the most important thing is having quick access to relevant data. Humans do not have the capacity to read as quickly off screens as they do off paper. When writing standard website content it is important to reduce the size of pages, the length of paragraphs, and the structure of sentences. When transferring this onto a mobile screen, which is potentially very small, the need becomes even more pronounced.

Some General Guidelines

Among the mTLD guidelines there are several important factors you must look at when creating page content for a .mobi domain. These rules are enforceable and this means that if you are found to break them you could potentially lose the right to use the domain name. A lot is fairly common sense. If you use color elements on your page, ensure there is a non-color equivalent. Limit the amount of content to specific details regarding the user’s requirements. Limit the amount of graphics that a page uses and ensure that the graphics themselves are not too large. These are just some examples.

Specific Text Content Guidelines

There are actually surprisingly few guidelines that look specifically at the actual word content of the .mobi page. Use clear and simple language, use introductory and relevant text before you progress a subject, and keep the number of keystrokes to a minimum. It really is quite basic stuff and more care should be taken to ensure that you really are giving your users the most valuable experience.

Accurate And Informative Page Content

Every page should be tightly channeled towards the topic it is based on. A cell phone screen is not the place to be injecting surplus words or sentiments. Similarly, just because the page will be read on a cell screen doesn’t mean everyone can understand “text talk”. Only very few sentences should be used per page and each must provide value.

Being Part Of The Revolution

The mobile Internet is virtually untapped and even though a land rush to register the most popular domains is predictable it doesn’t look likely to be as popular as similar releases like the .eu domain. However, as the price war wages between mobile Internet providers and the quality of the mobile network increases, there is a very real chance that the majority of the population that owns a cell phone will start to regularly access the Internet through their cell phone browser. You could be one of the first to take advantage.

About WebWiseWords

WebWiseWords is a new media or web site content writer. As such they have invaluable experience of writing specifically for digital media. Whether you’re interested in taking advantage of the .mobi landrush or simply want top quality website content for your website then WebWiseWords is the copywriter you need. WebWiseWords is planning on further enhancing the section of their website that gives information on optimizing and marketing .mobi website content so bookmark and check often or join the free newsletter.

Make sure you check out my earnings for September…

Traditional ways of generating traffic to a website have revolved around PPC advertising, search engine optimization, reciprocal linking, content generation, and a wide variety of other means. As the internet continues to evolve another form has made waves in the online world: Myspace. Myspace is categorized as a “social networking site.” What that means it is it is a gathering center for almost everyone. People find old high school friends, arrange for potential dates, communicate with friends, and most importantly to those in the SEO and web analytics fields they use myspace to promote a product or service. Although advertising businesses is technically against myspace’s terms and conditions (they would rather you pay to advertise) hundreds of thousands of businesses and bands reside on myspace. With reports of 100 million users of myspace the potential for promotion is incredible. Myspace, for the first time ever directed more traffic to online retailers last month than yahoo did according to hitwise. That was just from paid advertising, not from individual users of the site.

As an example of the power of myspace we had a staffer create a myspace profile with her name, a few pictures, and a description of the company she works for, us. She added her friends, and then added some friends of her friends. Within four days she had over 650 friends that generated hundreds of hits onto our main website. At the time of this article she was upto 3000 friends in two weeks of Myspace membership. Other myspace members had tens of thousands of friends, and used the myspace bulletin feature to send traffic to events that they were planning, or invitations for their “friends” to visit their website for a new promotion. In addition to this your website link is indexed by Google, further enhancing your position for link building as well. The potential unique visitors that myspace can generate is increasing important on today’s rapidly changing internet. If you have any further questions that we haven’t clearly addressed, or just need some advise feel free to email us at info@sonicko.com or visit us at http://www.sonicko.com

Jeff Lawrence is the owner of Sonicko Consultanting. This article may be reused provided that the full content is published. Sonicko focuses on web analytics and search engine optimization and is based out of Los Angeles, CA. You can reach them at their website at http://www.sonicko.com