Why Niches Are Important for E-commerce

In our last blog, we spoke about the popular niches in ad buying for the coming year. If you aren’t familiar with niches and what they mean, here is a deeper dive into niches and their significance in e-commerce. 

Niches are often divided into these categories:

• Pricing — from premium, luxury items to affordable, dollar-store brands
• Demographic — by personal characteristics like age, gender, income, etc.
• Psychographics — similar to demographics, but with mindsets: moral principles, religious beliefs, attitudes, etc.
• Geographic — by location, particularly important for weather- or climate-related products

Why Are Niches Important for E-commerce?

The market is more competitive than ever, thanks to online shopping and digital marketing. There are endless avenues for you to stumble upon a store or product, whether that be on your social feed or while you’re casually perusing the internet. If you’re a smaller-sized company, you don’t have the resources to fend off rivals for every single market group. A smarter choice is to pick a specific market group (an ecommerce niche) and invest your resources there. If you succeed with one niche, you can always expand into other niches later and build your brand market by market.

Niche customers tend to shop in similar patterns, making it easier to predict and plan which products to sell and how to market them. In general, the more you understand your shoppers, the more you can optimize your sales strategies. 

Pros of Selling Niche Products

• Simpler brand management — with a more targeted range of products, you have less listings and maybe even less channels, making your entire brand easier to manage.
• More effective content — it’s easier to create valuable content when you cater it to the preferences of a single group, rather than trying to please everyone at once.
• Precision online marketing — you can more precisely use SEO keywords and web design features to target specific group behavior rather than general group behavior.
• Less expensive campaigning — targeting less markets means less ads, less diverse content, and less market research.

Cons of Selling Niche Products

• Requires understanding of target groups — niche marketing demands an intimate understanding of your niche customers, which is why we recommend targeting a niche you already personally understand.
• Limiting at first — choosing one niche means ignoring all others (but you can always expand later when your business is stable enough).
• Hit or miss — it’s hard to hedge your bets with niche marketing, so your early campaigns may be either hit or miss.

How to Find Your Perfect Niche for E-commerce

One of the most important business decisions an e-commerce owner has to make is which niches to target. It involves not only choosing niches you’re personally passionate about, but also profitable niches whose market can support your company. You have to consider factors like market demand, niche customer shopping habits, and the availability of products. 

If you ever need advice or guidance regarding niches, we encourage you to schedule a free consultation call with us!