It's difficult to go looking for niches without guidance or some direction on what to look for. And when you do find the online ones, you may find that it's hard to shake the incumbents loose because (a) the niche is tiny and (b) the market is already satisfied with the current producers.
The niches I have found always come by accident: "hey, we notice you have this product that's close to what we need. Can you build us a version that does xxx" where xxx is some trivial change that results in a product I can sell to others in that niche. Or "we know this has to be possible and it shouldn't be difficult, but we don't have the skills do it. We'll buy xx units if you can build it for us."
The second-order problem is that often even if you know the need exists and you have a customer, without good knowledge of the domain, it can be hard to figure out how to reach other customers (they may not be online much) and make more sales.
I had a site that would consistently rank in the top 5-10 for google queries, yet I had fewer than 10 hits/day for those queries.
Another issue I've come across is that when you're approached by someone with a specific need, it can be hard to decide if you've found a new niche or just a custom design for one customer.
None of this is to suggest that you shouldn't try, but that it can be harder than it seems at first glance.
>It's difficult to go looking for niches without guidance or some direction on what to look for. And when you do find the online ones, you may find that it's hard to shake the incumbents loose because (a) the niche is tiny and (b) the market is already satisfied with the current producers.
Still much much easier than finding a 1 in million unicorn idea and getting VC and getting users.
Judging from number of successful companies in both categories, it's several orders of magnitude easier (which is obvious).
The niches I have found always come by accident: "hey, we notice you have this product that's close to what we need. Can you build us a version that does xxx" where xxx is some trivial change that results in a product I can sell to others in that niche. Or "we know this has to be possible and it shouldn't be difficult, but we don't have the skills do it. We'll buy xx units if you can build it for us."
The second-order problem is that often even if you know the need exists and you have a customer, without good knowledge of the domain, it can be hard to figure out how to reach other customers (they may not be online much) and make more sales.
I had a site that would consistently rank in the top 5-10 for google queries, yet I had fewer than 10 hits/day for those queries.
Another issue I've come across is that when you're approached by someone with a specific need, it can be hard to decide if you've found a new niche or just a custom design for one customer.
None of this is to suggest that you shouldn't try, but that it can be harder than it seems at first glance.