Over the past few years one of the most popular terms in the online marketing industry is “Niche Marketing.” While the concept is easy to understand, figuring out how to make it work for you is often quite another story. Interestingly enough, “Niche Marketing” has become a popular niche in Internet Marketing.

Which leads us to the obvious question, “If Niche Marketing is so effective, what can I do to get my piece of the (profit) pie?” If you were to break down the criteria to help you determine whether or not a specific niche (or target market) might be a successful one for you to focus on, you will discover at least five items to take into consideration.

First of all when conducting a search to find a niche to market to successfully, you need to determine just how large of a potential customer base is available for that niche. While it may be a specialized niche, if it is comprised of too few people, your potential for success with it is extremely limited at best. For example, left-handed golfers might be a good niche to pursue. However, left-handed golfers that use a certain brand of golf club are probably too small of a niche to market to effectively.

Once you’ve found a niche that meets the first item on the list, it’s important to determine how much competition there is for the product that you wish to sell to this market. This is especially true if you are marketing an item that is easily available to others who may wish to target the same market. Then, you must find a way to differentiate both your product and yourself in order to effectively market your product to this audience.

Next, you need to be certain that you are not targeting either a stagnant or shrinking market. On the contrary, you want to find and market to a specific segment that is continually growing. The topic or theme for the niche market must be something that more and more people are becoming interested in. You will need fresh prospects to market to, as well as a market that is active.

Another important item to consider is whether or not your target market is reachable. In other words, you need to determine if there existing means of communicating with your target audience, such as newsletters, forums, blogs, and even offline publications. Without these pre-established communication links within the target market, you will have a difficult time reaching them with your message and product.

Finally, you must determine if the people in the niche you’re targeting have disposable income—and are willing to spend it on information, products and services related to their area of interest. Another to say this is to find a market that has money to pay for items related to the specific niche topic, and that is passionate about that niche. For instance, horse breeders are a niche that would meet this criterion.