So you want to start a blog and feel lost when it comes to picking a blogging niche? You’re not alone. Many bloggers struggle with this question, and for a good reason – it’s not always easy to know which blog topic to focus on.
In this article, we’ll discuss:
- What is a blog niche?
- Do you need a niche?
- How to find your blogging niche and what to do when you get stuck?
- How to validate your selection?
- How to pick a profitable niche?
Let’s get started!
What is a Blog Niche?
A blog niche is the main focus of your blog. It’s what you write about most often or the primary subject of your content.
For example, if you are only writing about healthy recipes, your blog is focused on the niche of healthy cooking. Your blog is not in a specific niche if you write about various topics, including recipes, fitness, and parenting.
Some bloggers focus on a particular niche, while others cover various niche topics. There’s no right or wrong answer – it just depends on how you want to run your blog.
Why Do I Need a Blog Niche or can I go with a broader niche?
Many people ask, is it essential to define a niche for my blog? The answer is yes and no.
While having a specific focus can be helpful when it comes to branding and marketing yourself as an expert in that field, it’s not always essential either.
There are plenty of examples on broader blogging websites that cover many different topics altogether and still do very well. So it really depends on what you want to achieve with your blog and how much effort you’re willing to put into honing in on a specific topic.
An example of a successful non-niche blog might be The Everygirl, which has a wide range of topics from fashion to work/life balance to recipes.
If you’re passionate about many different things, there’s nothing wrong with writing about them!
You might even find that some topics become more popular than others over time. So narrowing down what works best for your audience will help improve how much traffic gets directed towards those posts too!
On the other hand, if you’re just starting out with a new blog and aren’t sure what you want to write about yet, defining a blog niche can be helpful.
This will give you direction and help you focus your content on a specific blog topic. When people come across your blog, they’ll know right away what it’s about based on your domain name (i.e., healthycookingtips.com) or your blog’s tagline.
How to Pick a Niche for your blog?
If you’re not sure what blog topic to focus on, don’t worry – we’ve got you covered.
Here are a few tips for how to pick a blog niche:
Think about your passions, interests, skills, and experience.
- What do you love talking about?
- What are some topics that interest you?
- What do you know a lot about?
- Are there any specific topics or areas that you’re an expert in?
- Think about what you want to achieve with your blog
- Do you want to be known as the go-to source for information on a particular topic?
- Or are you more interested in creating a personal blog where you share your thoughts and experiences?
- What are some of your hobbies? What do you like to do for fun?
- Do you have any skills or talents that you’re proud of?
- Think about the questions people ask you for help with the most. If specific topics come up over and over again, it might be worth considering them as potential niches for your blog.
- What are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced in life? Have you overcome any obstacles or difficulties that could help other people facing similar problems? Sharing how you overcame those issues is a great way to build rapport with readers and establish yourself as an expert on the topic.
This can be a great place to start when narrowing down your options.
Focusing on a niche that you’re passionate about and knowledgeable about is a great way to ensure high-quality content.
Remember, you don’t have to focus on one specific topic – you can cover a range of different things.
But if you have several interests, it might be helpful to pick the one that you’re most passionate about and focus on that first.
That’s what Hanna did when she started her blog The Work at Home Woman. “I was interested in so many different things,” she says, “but I knew I wanted to share my knowledge with other people who were trying to start their own businesses.”
Focusing on a blog niche allowed her to do just that and gave her a clear direction for her content.
Jillian Leslie, the founder of the successful blog Catch My Party, recommends spending some time thinking about what types of things make YOU happy before choosing a niche for your blog. “That’s going to help you decide if that is something people will want to read about,” she says.
If it’s something that makes other people happy too, then there’s probably an audience out there!
Think about how much time you have available each week to work on your blog and how long it takes for new posts to go live. If something specific interests you enough so it doesn’t feel like work but still allows content creation within those constraints, consider focusing on that topic!
Write down all these ideas and keep them somewhere safe so they’re easy to access whenever inspiration strikes! You can always come back later if none of those options seem like a good fit.
Did you get stuck?
If you’re still stuck after thinking about your passions and interests, try these tips:
Use A Mind Map
A creative tool you can use to find your blog niche is to create a mind map. If you’re not familiar with how that works, it’s a way of visually organizing thoughts and ideas on an online tool.
MindMeister is free to use and lets you organize your ideas into groups or clusters. This can be really helpful when brainstorming what topics might make for the right niche for your blog.
When creating a mind map about picking your blogging niche, start by thinking about your interests are and how they relate to one another. Then write those down as individual topics within each group or cluster. Finally, once you’ve got all of your ideas down on paper (or digital), look through them again and see if any patterns emerge.
Browse Amazon and see what’s popular
Another way to get some ideas for your blog niche is to look at what’s popular on Amazon. You can do this by going to the main website and clicking on the Books tab. Then, in the left sidebar, select Kindle Store. This will take you to a list of all of the best-selling books on Amazon.
Now, it’s important to remember that just because a book is popular doesn’t mean it would be a good fit for your blog. But it can give you some ideas about what people are interested in reading about.
You can also use this method to find potential podcasts or video topics. Just head over to YouTube, type in a keyword related to your niche and see what comes up.
Google Trends
If you want to get a broader picture of what’s popular online, take a look at Google Trends. This tool lets you see how often particular keywords are being searched for on the internet.
You can use this information to help you decide if there is potential for a profitable niche blog or not. Just enter a keyword related to your chosen topic and see how it compares with other topics.
Exploding Topics
If you’re looking for a profitable niche, you should try to find it on exploding topics. This tool identifies the topics growing in popularity and has a lot of potential for future growth.
How to Validate Your Selection
The next step is how to validate your selection. This means making sure that there is a market for your blog niche and that people are interested in reading content on this topic.
There are several questions you need to ask yourself before deciding on a niche:
1. Will I love writing about this topic 50+ posts from now?
I think that’s a huge thing. If not the most significant thing.
There are hundreds of blogs on the internet where people begin publishing a post each day for a couple of months, and then they stop.
I think if you are not passionate about your topic, it will be hard to publish a post every day or week for years and years.
As an example, I have a blog about indoor gardening. I began this blog because I was very passionate about the topic, and that’s why I’m still writing content for it years later.
You can also use this question to help you determine how frequently you should publish content on your blog. If you’re not passionate about the topic, it might be best to stick to a bi-weekly or monthly publishing schedule.
2. Are people looking for content on that topic?
The first step in validating any niche idea should be checking how many people are searching for information related to that topic each month (monthly search volume).
This will indicate how big the market might be – and determine if it’s worth investing more time into researching further or not. (hint: if no one’s looking on the internet, then chances are not many people care about that topic).
I suggest starting with brainstorming for keyword ideas. When coming up with ideas for content, start by thinking about all the possible terms and phrases related to your topic. Write them all down and then group them based on similarities.
Here are some tools to see how many people search for information on specific topics:
1. Google Adwords Keyword Planner
This free tool from Google is a great place to start when you’re doing research into keywords. You can enter in a few terms, and it will give you information on how often those words are being searched for and other related phrases and ideas in google search.
2. Semrush keyword research
This paid keyword research tool offers information on how difficult it would be to rank for specific keywords, which can be helpful when trying to determine if a topic is worth pursuing.
3. Ubersuggest
You can also use Ubersuggest which is a free tool to get a list of related keywords that you might not have thought of. This is a great way to develop content ideas for your blog.
Once you’ve come up with a list of potential keywords, take some time to check out what kind of content is already ranking high for those terms. Chances are if there’s enough demand for a topic, there’s already content out there addressing it. Try to find what’s working well for them and see if you can improve on it.
Can you make money in that niche?
Once you’ve decided on a niche, it’s critical to ask yourself whether or not there is potential to make money from it. After all, you want to blog about something that you’re interested in, but you also need to think about how you can monetize your blog.
There are various ways to make money from your blog. Most common include affiliate marketing, sponsored posts, and selling digital products or services.
so how do we know if a niche is a profitable blogging business?
1. Look at your competition
The best way to determine whether or not making money from your blog will be possible is by researching how other bloggers in that space are doing it.
Look at the top blogs for your niche and see how they’re making money from their website.
I would also suggest following them on social media to learn how they promote their content so you can get ideas about what might work well for you too!
2. Search for relevant affiliate programs
See how much they pay per click/sale. This will give you an idea of how profitable it might be if you could get a certain amount of traffic on your blog. You can always use this to identify other profitable blog niches.
3. Look at amazon categories
It can also be helpful to look at Amazon categories for your niche. This will give you an idea of how much people are spending on products related to this topic, which indicates that there’s potential money in it!
4 of the most profitable blog niches (and are great for beginners)
Many niche blogs exist for hobby and professional bloggers alike. Many are profitable niches.
Here are statistics on the most profitable niches in 2022:
Food Blog
Food blogging is a popular blog niche idea because, well, everyone loves food! And there are endless possibilities when it comes to what you can write about – from recipes to restaurant reviews and everything in between.
Plus, people who love food also tend to be passionate about it – which means they’re more likely to be interested in reading your blog posts.
Another great thing about food blogs is that there are tons of affiliate programs and sponsorships available for promoting different types of foods.
So if you have a favorite type of cuisine or want to focus on a specific type of cooking, there’s a good chance you’ll find an affiliate program or sponsorship that caters to that interest.
Personal finance blogs
Personal finance is one of the most popular niches among bloggers because so many people are looking for ways to save money or make more money – and they’ll pay top dollar!
This means that personal finance bloggers have no shortage of potential customers looking for their services and advertisers willing to put up ads on their sites (which equates to income).
This also makes personal financial advice relatively easy since there are plenty of other experts out there who can provide insight into how best to manage finances without needing much experience yourself – which means less research time required before getting started.
Nevertheless, these blogs tend to give beginner bloggers better opportunities to get paid primarily for their services.
Lifestyle/Mommy blog
A lifestyle blog can encompass several different topics. Still, the unifying factor is that they all center around the blogger’s life.
This could be anything from posts about traveling to how to decorate your home on a budget – and everything in between!
Since there are so many potential topics to cover, lifestyle bloggers have a lot of flexibility regarding what they write about. And this also means that there’s something for everyone who might stumble across their blog.
Another thing that makes lifestyle blogs so popular is the fact that most people are interested in reading about other people’s lives (even if they’re not bloggers themselves). So this type of blog often has a large readership base.
Travel Blogging
Travel blogging is a great niche because it appeals to a wide target audience. People love traveling for different reasons, and there are endless places in the world that still haven’t been explored.
This also makes travel blogging an evergreen topic – which means that people will always be interested in reading about new travel destinations and how to plan the perfect trip.
Plus, there are tons of affiliate programs and sponsorships available for promoting different types of travel-related products and services.
So if you’re passionate about traveling, there’s a good chance you can make money from your blog by promoting related products and services.
Fashion blogs
Fashion blogging is another popular niche, and for a good reason: people are always interested in learning about the latest fashion trends. Plus, fashion bloggers often have their own unique style that sets them apart from other bloggers.
Marketing Blogs
As a blogger, you’re an expert in your field. And what better way to share your knowledge than by writing about it?
That’s the premise behind marketing blogs – which are designed to help business owners learn how to best market their products and services.
Since there’s so much competition out there, marketing is a difficult niche to break into. But if you can find a way to differentiate yourself from other marketing bloggers, you’ll be well on your way to success.
Popular Monetization Strategies
Here are a few monetization ideas that are also very popular:
Affiliate marketing programs:
Affiliate programs allow people who want to sell or promote products without having an inventory themselves – like Amazon Associates or ShareASale.
You’ll need to join these networks to participate as an affiliate marketer, but there are many options out there. Check out this post listing some of the best affiliate programs for beginner bloggers.
Sell services or products:
If you’re interested in selling your own products, start by determining how much time and resources it will take to create them. Then figure out how many people would need those goods before committing yourself entirely!
Some great ideas include ebooks (digital books). Start with what’s already available on Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing or Kobo Writing Life.
These sites are free platforms where authors can self-publish their work without having any experience whatsoever.
If this doesn’t appeal, look into creating something new, like online courses that teach how to do something specific. This could be done via video lessons and PDFs or even live sessions using Skype/Google Hangouts, etc.
Display Ads:
Another way to monetize your blog without selling products or services is advertising. This could be in the form of Google Adsense (which places ads on your site based on the content) or other programs like Media.net, Mediavin, and Taboola.
To get started with this type of monetization, you’ll need a certain amount of traffic coming to your blog.
Here are 32 blog niche ideas to get you started
- Arts and crafts
- Automotive
- Beauty
- Sustainable Living
- Online business
- Computer and internet
- Cooking, food, and wine
- Culture and society
- Education
- Employment and careers
- Environment
- Family and parenting
- Fitness and health
- Gardening
- Home improvement
- Hobbies
- Houseplants
- Pets
- Legal issues
- Marketing and sales
- Music, dance, theater
- News and politics
- Personal development
- Photography and videography
- Real estate investing/development;
- Religion and spirituality
- Relationship advice
- Technology/gadgets
- Weddings
- Women’s issues like menstruation/hormonal changes during pregnancy as well as menopause;
- Sex
- How to be a successful woman etc.
Concluding Thoughts
So, these are a few tips on choosing a blogging niche. It’s important to remember that it’s unnecessary to nail down your niche right away. You can always change it later if you decide the original selection isn’t working for you.
The most important thing is to find something that interests you and that you’re passionate about, so you’ll be more likely to stick with it in the long run!