This is the final post in my “Competitive Niches” series. Be sure to check out Part 1,  Part 2,  Part 3 and Part 4 if you haven’t already!

#5 – Look for the niche within a niche

Some affiliates fail because they think of a niche as a single entity. So if you ask them what niche they’re in, they’ll say “weight loss” and then they wonder why they don’t seem to be getting any traction. The sites that thrive in these competitive niches are the ones who have discovered niches within the niche.

For example, some successful affiliates have targeted a specific subset of weight loss customers, such as people looking for high protein diets. When you start researching this sub-niche you start to discover a lot of different products you can promote, and it can be enough to support your Internet marketing business.

So remember, you don’t need to take on the whole niche. Just find a healthy niche within the niche and you’ll have your sales without the excessive competition that comes with being too generic.

For example, some weight loss sub-niches you could try include:

• High protein diets
• Bride diets
• Belly fat diets
• Low carb diets

We’re barely scratching the surface here, but something you’ll find with competitive niches is that they fragment really well, allowing you to easily find a sub-niche you can quite happily take on.

Have you been scared off taking on a competitive niche? What would make it easier? Do you think taking on competitive niches is a waste of time? Please leave a comment with your thoughts!

About the author

Simon Slade is the CEO of Affilorama, an affiliate marketing training portal that offers free video training, education, and affiliate tools to both beginning and advanced affiliate marketers. You can follow them on Twitter.

Take a look at these related posts:

1. Competitive Niches: 5 Ways to Beat the Big Guns- Part 3
2. Competitive Niches: 5 Ways to Beat the Big Guns- Part 1
3. Competitive Niches: 5 Ways to Beat the Big Guns- Part 4

ClickBank VP Dush Ramachandran

Broomfield, Colo. – (August 6, 2009) – Dush Ramachandran, vice president of sales, marketing  and business development for ClickBank, a major online retail outlet, will share advice and industry insight on microniche marketing at Affiliate Summit East Aug. 9-11 in New York City.

ClickBank is widely considered to be an international leader in affiliate marketing with more than 100,000 active affiliate marketers working with the company to market its products and drive sales to a level of more than 26,000 transactions per day.

Ramachandran’s presentation is titled “Microniches – the Way to Mega Profits.” It will be available to only platinum and gold pass holders at Affiliate Summit East, which is now sold out with more than 2,000 affiliate marketers registered to attend.

“Using real-life case studies, I’ll demonstrate how affiliate marketers can promote products in a wide variety of small and focused niches, where there is little competition and marketing and advertising costs are inexpensive,” Ramachandran said.

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ClickBank also will unveil its newly designed trade show booth at Affiliate Summit East. The booth features a sleek new look, two oversized flat screen monitors, Astroturf flooring and an electronic ticker that displays ClickBank client payouts in real-time.

Ramachandran serves on the advisory board of Affiliate Summit and Affilicon, the international counterpart to Affiliate Summit, and helps plan content for both organizations’ affiliate marketing conferences. The conferences are widely considered a key source for affiliate marketing thought leadership and industry expertise.

Ramachandran joined ClickBank in 2005. He is responsible for ClickBank’s sales and marketing activities and alliances with affiliate and vendor organizations worldwide. Ramachandran has held executive leadership positions with domestic and international firms such as Requisite Technology, Conceptual Technologies, Computervision Corp., Prime Computer, Inc. and Datapoint Corp. He holds a bachelor’s degree in physics from St. Joseph’s College, Bangalore University, and an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management.

Take a look at these related posts:

1. ClickBank Executive Dush Ramachandran on Affiliate Boards
2. Meet ClickBank at Affiliate Summit East
3. Affiliate Summit East 2010 Recap