Hi, I want to buy a domain name and forward it to the vendors sales page to see if the niche I am considering is worth pursuing. The problem I am facing is I can't find information on how to do the testing. In particular, how many articles do I write, do I base all these articles on the same keyword and if so how do I do it? Thanks
This is hard to answer. You either need time or cash available to you. Plus there is no "easy" way to test. For example the niche might be good but the product is crap, so all your forwarding does is show you the product does not convert. Want to really test a market? Create more of a blog/squeeze page. See how many visitors you get and survey the visitors. Ask them what they want to know, how long they have had this problem, the good ol "what is the ONE major thing" question, then give price estimates "would you pay 10, 20, 50 to get this answer?" although thats more of a guideline. Reailty is people will pay crazy amounts of money for the answer to a pressing question. Back to testing. After the survey or after they sign up to your mailing list then send them to 1 of 3 vendors. Make sure the offers rotate through so you can see what is actually selling. Get traffic from either keyword specific (such as articles/ppc based on the products in the niche) or niche specific (such as "how to's, guides, and general information) do this for about a month and then check your results. Look at the amount of money you spent or time you spent vs how much of a return (return includes how many people joined your mailing list) but dont forget a lot of factors come in to this. Best way to "test" a niche. Is look at the products out there, are there a lot of them? Are there groups in google and yahoo and general forum boards dedicated ot it? are there magazines about the topic? how many magazines and what types of offers are in those magazines? Is this something people are crazy about? (such as golf, guns and ammo, stuff like that) or is it a hobby of a lifestyle? (such as weight loss, muscle gain, attraction). It's always a good idea to stay in evergreen markets. (markets that have been and will be around forever, health, wealth, and love (relationships) If your sub-niche falls under one of those big three then its just a matter of finding out if there are people buying it. Hope that helps! (easy answer is, there is no easy answer to your question). As far as how many articles? Just keep writing them, never stop. You put out 3 a day thats 150 a month. Not bad, but you would want at least 300 articles to see some kind of constant flow. So 2 months worth of articles.
By forwarding traffic to a vendor by domain forwarding you are really testing the "product" rather than the "niche". However it is useful for that purpose. As EXV said if you use articles you are going to need to write a fair amount. Hundreds in fact to get any kind of meaningful sample. The first 500 people you send may not buy and then you get 5 sales in a row. It can happen.