Hello
When I am reading threads on webmaster forums I often see threads about which niche is best for AdSense and about which topic should I create a website.
What I have learned in my 12 years of web development and community building is that only those projects of mine succeeded for which I am passionate about.
Granted I never really tried to create a website about a topic that I don’t know much about solely because it was a high paying niche.
But I have several websites about topics I know a lot about but I am not that passionate about. These websites don’t really grow.
But the once that I really like these are the once I am finding myself working on constantly or at least with much more consistency then those I don’t like that much.
This reflects to the success of those websites.
So if you plan your next website make it about something you care about.
Something that you want to continually write content for or at least make a continually effort to grow your community around this topic. Don’t care much about how much the niche pays you.
If a site gets big enough you can earn a lot of money in any niche.
Granted some niches pay much less then others but if it is the one that you are most passionate about then simply don’t care and start a project anyway.
What are your thoughts on this?
How do you come up with ideas for websites?
But if I am doing a site by myself, I would go this way:
not something I'm passionate about, because it is too restrictive. I want something that has mass appeal even if nobody is really passionate about it, but can touch everyone. Your health forum is a good example, everyone at one point or another look up on internet for symptoms even if they don't care about health, when they have something they start to worry. Well, without being in such an urgency, there are other topics which can touch anyone at some point and even regularly in the year. Also I would look at topics that are either not time related or which come back every year in a cycle, like xmas, motherday, etc.
Then when I have a topic with mass appeal I do a quick check in adwords keyword tool to check that the CPC is not too low, for instance flash games is really bad and should not be chosen. But if the CPC seems correct. I then check online competition between webmasters, on google. If the competition seems to me low or even intermediate, then I can go for it. I don't expect the site to take off before 1-3 months of promotion. But after that, with content submitted regularly, it can only go better and better, and after one year maximum you start to really get a good income out of it with then minimal maintenance.
That's the general idea I apply now.
My most successful sites have been sites which I've really enjoyed creating and writing for.
That said, I also enjoy creating small niche sites in a short space of time, with a burst of energy over 1-2 weeks, and then spending some weeks/months building good quality links to them.
Overwhelming, i would love my site to drive such traffic of 500 000 000 in a single morning, e.g fb.
Never really tried Facebook however my audience is mostly not the audience using Facebook anyway :)