Why Evergreen Niche Markets?
In today’s Marketing Monday, I cover evergreen niche markets for affiliates and why they’re important to consider as an affiliate.
Too many times I’ve seen advice that basically tells new affiliate marketers to do whatever they like to do best. Even though there’s some merit to that advice, it definitely shouldn’t be the only deciding factor!
Why? Because if it’s something that a rare number of people are interested in, you won’t make any money at it. Unless it’s a high ticket item like a yacht.
Instead, choose something that’s large enough with others that have a buying interest in it, while not being too competitive. And if it is also something you like or have knowledge about, the better.
What is an evergreen market?
Before going any deeper into this topic, it’s important to understand what an evergreen market is in the first place.
An evergreen market is one that is in continual demand, year after year. It’s a market where the interest stays constant over the years and new people are added to it regularly.
Think about groceries. I have the habit of buying them all the time. No matter how many times I try to quit, I find that I’m back in the store buying them again. But it’s not just me, I see many others afflicted with that same need as well.
What is a niche market?
A niche (or sub) market is a smaller, more specific market within a larger market.
Take the above grocery example I gave a moment ago. Groceries is a niche market within the food market. But groceries isn’t the only market within food. Restaurants, fast food, carry-out, catering, are all examples of niche markets within the food market.
The important thing about niche markets is choosing one that isn’t too big if you are just starting out. At the same time you don’t want to choose one that’s too narrow with little or no market at all.
Groceries would be too big a niche market to start with. You could continue to break that market down into even smaller niches, say soft drinks. Still large enough to make a profit but small enough to have a chance.
You could break this market down even further into diet root beer. You would still have a number of brands to promote and enough to be profitable. Besides, you could build this niche up enough to become known as the root beer king or queen.
What are some top evergreen markets I can choose from?
The top three evergreen markets available to you online today would have to be health, wealth, and lifestyle markets.
But each of these markets are huge in themselves and contain many opportunities within. Each big market would need to be broken down further into more manageable niche markets.
For example, the health market can be broken down into niches like weight loss, exercise, quitting smoking, and so on.
The wealth market contains niches like make money online, personal finances, debt reduction, investment tips, mortgage advice, etc.
The lifestyle market includes niches like self improvement, personal development, time management and things like that.
What are the most profitable niches for affiliate marketing?
This question is kind of tricky to answer because almost any niche market that has a large number of buyers and affiliate products to sell can be insanely profitable when done correctly.
However some of them are also short term niches because they come and go so quickly. Even though you can make a decent profit from them while they’re still hot – it won’t build a lasting business for you once the interest had diminished and your site stops making a profit.
All true evergreen markets have almost endless sub-niches to be explored and can definitely be very profitable. That’s because there will always be people who are desperate for solutions to their problems and willing to pay for them.
To be honest, most prospects in these evergreen markets are looking for a ‘magic bullet’ or ‘magic pill’ and not really willing to put the effort into loosing weight, building an online business or improving their confidence so they can meet the opposite sex for example.
So when they inevitably fail (even though they didn’t really try), you can continue offering them other related products that they can fail with all over again. And there’s no end of affiliate products you can promote including both digital and physical either.
What are non-evergreen niches?
Niches that are not evergreen would include seasonal and periodic market or business models affected by continuous change in the economy.
Examples of a niche that is not evergreen would be:
The Golf Niche. It’s not considered to be evergreen as few sales take place outside the summer months when the game is played. The exception being a short and sporadic spike measured during the Christmas gift-giving season.
Sales statistics show that most people don’t even think about anything golf related except during the season when they actually play the game, and this is true of many sports related niches.
The Air Travel Niche. Profits are generally higher in periods of economic prosperity and expansion, and lower in periods of economic downturn.
When the economy is good, people have more disposable income and are more willing to take vacations and make use of air travel.
However, during bad economic times, people are much more cautious about spending. As a result, they tend to take more vacations closer to home (if they go at all) and avoid expensive air travel.
The next example might surprise you
The Technology Niche. While it’s true that many people buy themselves, and their loved ones, big ticket tech items during the holiday season every year (like HDTVs and X-Boxes), it cannot really be said that the “Technology Niche” is seasonal.
However, it is NOT an evergreen niche either.
Why? Because the technology niche is continually changing.
What makes up the technology niche today will be completely different tomorrow, and what it once was in the past, it won’t be again!
Even though evergreen niches are also constantly evolving, what makes the Technology Niche so different is that it has the ability to change drastically overnight in directions we have never imagined.
Both evergreen and non-evergreen markets can be profitable, but only evergreen markets are sustainable. Evergreen markets are the clear choice for making affiliate commissions because you can create a base of evergreen content and make money by finding many different kinds of products throughout the year to promote, that matches the evergreen content you have created.
Final thoughts
Big evergreen markets like health, wealth and lifestyle will never go out of demand! People will ALWAYS have problems they want solved NOW. Rather than taking the time to work hard at it, they prefer to find a product or service that will perform ‘magic’ for them.
There is no ‘most profitable’ niche for affiliate marketers (or any other). If you want to get involved with a big money niche, then you can start by picking a niche from within one of these 3 evergreen markets.
You can also consider making your website portfolio diverse by including a mixture of evergreen niches and other niches. When you do this, you can profit from short term niches while building a long term business with evergreen niche markets.
What niche markets do you like or are involved in? Have you already started with an evergreen niche or some other niche market? Maybe you haven’t decided yet and still need more time to decide? I would appreciate any questions or feedback you have about evergreen niches. 🙂
