7 Tips on Picking a Freelance Niche

by Mariam Ayodeji

Are you just venturing into freelancing or you have started the journey of freelancing already? Then, I am sure you have heard of niches. People talk about them all the time; what niche should I pick? What are the best niches out there for a freelancer, and whether you even need a freelance niche?

If you are a freelancer or you are thinking of venturing into freelancing and you have been finding it difficult to pick a niche then we are here to give you 7 tips you can make use of when you want to pick a freelance niche.

First, let’s talk about what a freelance niche is and why it is important for a freelancer.

What is a freelance niche?

Before we go into the tips on how you can pick a freelance niche, you should know what exactly is a niche. Picking a freelance niche means you have focused your work on a particular skill.

By focusing your freelance work on a particular process or corner, it means you have to stick to gigs that are around your field.

Do you need a freelance niche?

Before you start going about venturing into freelancing, you should ask yourself if you need a freelance niche really or you can do with just being a generalist.

Though you might be lucky at first working within the general skill area, one of the fundamentals of your work as a freelancer is you choose a niche because niches assist you in strategically growing your careers.

Your focus on a niche is what will make you an expert in your field rather than working as a general freelancer.

What are the benefits of picking a freelance niche? 

The thing about niches is they can be what you want them to be. You can create your niche as well. Also, it will make you have full control over your career. Listed below are part of the benefits of picking a freelance niche;

• You will win more freelance projects compared to general freelancing.
• You can justify higher rates when you have a niche
• Clients will likely return as customers and also bring new tasks to you

Now, let’s check out these 7 tips on picking a freelance niche

Evaluate your skills and passion

This looks simple and basic but it makes a very huge difference. Don’t pick a niche because you are just kind of interested, for you to be sustainable in whatever you pick, it has to be something that you are passionate about.

You should first ask yourself, is this something I love to do, or something you do even if you aren’t receiving payment for it?

You should also think about the areas you have special skills in or experience. You should ask yourself also what are people telling me I am good at? What’s my training or education level? What special skills have I developed through my work?

Finding out all these will make you spot your niche

Look for what you love to do

As a freelancer, one of the benefits is that you can control the work you do. You shouldn’t have the idea that you can’t love what you are doing because as a freelancer you should love what you are doing.

For example, think about the kinds of projects which made you feel happy and more confident in the past. For a good niche, you have to love what you do and stay happy with it.

Check if there’s a market available for your niche

It’s not enough you have a passion for a niche, you need to also know if there’s a need for it. If not that, your work will just be stagnant and won’t grow into a lucrative skill.

One way you can figure out if your niche is needed is by doing some keyword searches. You can make use of a Google Keyword Planner for this.

Type some keywords which are related to your niche and see the phrases and words it suggests. You can also have the suggestions narrowed by competition level, suggested bid, and monthly search volume.

You should stick to 1k to 10k per month on search volume. Anything less than this means your niche doesn’t have much market and if it’s more than this, it will also be hard to rank high in google search.

Going through the low-medium competition will tell you how competitive your niche is and for suggested bids, bids that are higher means people pay more for that niche.

Have your niche narrowed down

Before you go further, you have to narrow down your niche. For example, you found out that freelance writing niche is popular, but you want to see how you can narrow more focus on your niche.

You can do this by visiting Facebook groups, related forums, or Reddit. Making use of a tool like Redditlist will help you see sub-niches or subtopics you can likely pursue. Just type your main keywords and scroll through to see if any looks appealing to you.

Check out your niche competition yourself

It’s important to search for keywords but also you should see for yourself what the competition for your niche looks like.

If you want to check this out, google some of your niche keywords and see the search results. There are three things you will find after you have googled your niche; there are plenty of people ranking in that niche, which means you have to search for another niche.

If there are no people in that niche but you have to be careful here. It might mean people have discovered that niche and there is no market for it, the third one few people are on the niche, which is a good sign and that niche is worth pursuing.

Consider lucrative revenue streams

If you are out there representing your brand as a freelancer, which means you have to think like a business owner sometimes.

This is how you can do this; when you are trying to narrow down on your niche, you should consider the most lucrative revenue streams that won’t take time too much.

Have your niche tested

Now that you have narrowed down your niche and you have done market research, then it’s time to test the niche to know if you are on the right track.

You can test your niche by creating a landing page that promotes your niche. You can make use of a tool like Leadpages for this.

After having your niche tested, you can then decide to stick it and develop it more.