The golden age of niche sites is over

Something that resonated with me recently was the owner of Birdzilla sharing that he was on plan D (see this interview).

Birdzilla wasn’t his original plan. It wasn’t plan B. Or even plan C. It was plan D.

Considering how much Google has changed in the last year - and the fact that the golden age of “niche sites” is over - it’s vital to have a plan B (or even D!).

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There are many great business models besides content sites.

• Ecommerce is still alive and well. And yes, it relies on Google, but right now Google seems to love ecommerce stores. People are even setting up ecommerce stores with the primary intent of ranking for “best of” keywords, and it’s working!

• Email newsletters - immune to algorithm updates, and while there’s the risk they end up in spam, it’s quite rare if you focus on quality. I shared this as a good alternative to traditional content site publishing in a tweet yesterday:

• Digital products, which you can promote on social media. This is what Sammie Ellard-King does (he made $55K in 100 days):

• SaaS tools - if you know how to code (or how to use no-code platforms like Bubble), you can make a TON from simple software tools. Like this guy who had his first customer on February 1st, and is now at $30K MRR (monthly recurring revenue):

• Local SEO (or rank and rent) - ranking a local business is generally much easier than ranking a niche site. And the recent algorithm updates didn’t affect local SEO. If you’ve ranked niche sites in the past, you can absolutely rank local businesses (there are some things you’ll have to learn if you’ve never done it before, but it’s not difficult).

  As far as rank and rent goes, this post from Glen Allsopp is very inspirational and still surprisingly not outdated all these years later.

• Content sites - but without relying on Google. There are so many fantastic traffic sources that are much more blogger-friendly than Google. By focusing on these platforms instead, you can still be very successful with the traditional “niche site” model.

• Directories and job boards - these may sound “boring”, but they can be incredibly profitable. And you don’t need to build in an already popular industry like “remote work” or AI. A great example of a very niched-down job board is RanchWork.com (which made ~$399K in the last 10 years).

  A very niched-down directory example is JobBoardSearch (a directory of job boards!) which made $7K last month. Who’d of thought such an idea could be so successful!?

There are so many more great ideas out there. What I shared is just the tip of the iceberg.

As for me, I’m working on a few “plan B” businesses - including Site Stats Database, this newsletter, and a yet-announced project.

Word of caution: don’t get sucked into shiny object syndrome. There are only so many hours in the day. I think it’s a good idea to have one “main” project that takes the majority of your attention, and if you can handle it, a few projects on the side. Honestly, I’m still trying to nail down the right balance after many years working for myself.

I’ll end with this:

If you currently rely on a single platform like Google for your livelihood, it’s time to come up with a plan B, C, and D. And while you’re at it, diversify your traffic sources.

Thanks for reading,

Ian

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