I spent most of the day last Sunday working on some pretty annoying little jobs and fix-ups that have been long overdue. Although I’ve been motivated lately thanks to a serious kick in the pants, the work was pretty dull and my mind was wandering to more interesting things like the Travel Blog Exchange 2009 that was taking place in Chicago that day. I couldn’t get their live video feed to work so I resorted to following the updates on Twitter where loads of people were keeping everyone informed.
Nomadic Matt spoke as part of a panel of guests and people were Tweeting some of the things he had to say. One of the main things he said that struck a chord with me was the idea of being the expert in your chosen niche – of owning it. Be the best in whatever field you choose and people (including advertisers) will search you out, rather than the other way around. It was a nice reminder because this is a goal I had originally had but have since lost sight of.
My intention several years ago when I started my working holidays website was to position myself as an expert in this area. I wanted my site to be a one-stop location for information on all of the visa possiblities for eligible people from English-speaking countries. I had planned to know the stuff inside out, keep on top of updates and be the go-to place for young people looking to work abroad.
Well plans are a great thing but the hard part is seeing them through. I haven’t updated that site since I created it a few years ago. Working holiday visa rules are changing all the time and keeping on top of things will take a committment from me beyond what I have given so far. I also think that it is difficult to position yourself as an expert with a static site. People want to see a face behind the advice. They want to interact and, while I have helped many people by email, I think posting replies to comments is a much better way to engage people.
I think I have a great opportunity to take a running at really owning this niche. My site is ranked number one across Google from several countries for ‘working holidays’ and on top of tha tI get loads of more specific long-tail searches from people looking for specific country information. I also have a bit of experience in this area having travelled twice on the official working holiday visa to New Zealand and Australia. I have also worked in Scotland, Ireland and England on my British passport. Throw in a bit of experience living in a popular destination for English teachers like Beijing and some time spent WWOOFing and I think I’ve got a pretty well-rounded set of experiences to draw from.
This is a pretty lucrative niche and there are plenty of companies out there trying to help the working traveller get a visa, arrange their first few nights, sell information packs, sell memberships to working holiday job boards and much more. So far I have only tapped into Adsense and that’s just plain crazy. Madness!
Positioning myself as an expert in this niche by adding a blog, keeping the site updated and getting myself out there using social media is something I will be working on once I get back to Canada in a couple of weeks and it will be a major part of my ‘I need to start treating this like a business‘ plan. It will be a huge challenge but I think I am already in a very good position with the site I have and I’m looking forward to seeing where I can go with this.
Do you guys think it’s possible these days to ‘own a niche’ given all of the information out there already? Do you think adding a face to a static website is something that adds value for the everyday reader?
Leave a Reply