Part 3 - Market Research and Niche Selection

1. Identify Your Interests and Passions

The first step is to identify what you're passionate about. This could be anything from cooking to technology to fitness.

Here is an initial ChatGPT prompt to start brainstorming topics

As a brainstorming assistant, generate a list of potential blog niches based on my interests in [insert interests here].

The goal is to come up with unique and engaging niches that combine these interests. Combine interests where they naturally intersect but do not force combination. Please avoid overly wide niches.

Plug in interests, your work area, skills, hobbies. Anything that is important to you.

It’s important that we start from a basis of what you actually want to write about if we want to create a unique and genuinely interesting blog.

Yes, we’ll be using AI to help with writing later but we need the personal touch from working with a topic we want to write about and have the authority to write about.

Prompt Output 💬

2. Conduct Keyword Research

Once you've identified your niche, it's time to conduct keyword research. This will help you understand what potential readers in your niche are searching for.

Keywords are basically how people use Google - their search terms.

You can use tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Ahrefs, or you can ask ChatGPT to get started.

As a SEO assistant, suggest a list of potential keywords for a blog focused on [topic]. The task involves identifying high-volume, low-competition keywords. 

The goal is to find keywords that can drive organic traffic to the blog. Please avoid extremely competitive keywords.

For topic take the topic you’ve decided upon from the first step. Or plug in the whole answer that ChatGPT gave you (with title, description etc.) to get even more detail.

Prompt Output 💬

Pro Prompts ⭐️

• For better results use the ChatGPT plugin SERPstat SEO tool to use live data. Requires paid ChatGPT plan

• Alternatively take your keywords to Google Ads Keyword planner to get precise keyword volume and competition. Free tool.

• Also plug your topic into Answer the Public to start to widen your keywords and see the sort of blog topics you could be writing.

3. Analyze Your Competition

Understanding your competition is crucial. Look at the top blogs in your chosen niche. What are they doing well? What can you do better or differently?

ChatGPT can help with this

As a competitive analysis assistant, provide an analysis of the top three blogs in the [topic] niche. The task involves identifying their strengths, weaknesses, and unique selling points.

The goal is to understand what they're doing well and where there are opportunities for differentiation.

Please avoid personal opinions and stick to objective analysis. Present results in a table.

Prompt Output 💬

Using [entrepreneurship and fitness] as the niche

4. Validate Your Niche

Finally, you need to validate your chosen niche. Is there an audience for your topic? Are there affiliate programs available?

ChatGPT can assist with this validation

As a market research assistant, validate the potential of the entrepreneurship and fitness niche. The task involves identifying the size of the audience, potential for monetisation, and availability of affiliate programs.

The goal is to ensure there's a viable market for this blog. Please avoid assumptions and use data-driven insights.

Prompt Output 💬

Pulling it together

These four prompts will get your started with defining what exactly your blog is going to be about.

We started with your skills and interests, combined this with keyword research to convert into “Google speak” then checked competition and business viability.

If the results from ChatGPT aren’t encouraging (especially in prompt 4!) go back and tweak your variables until you land on something more promising.