Part 4 : Niche markets and the future

Do you have any advice for those small business folks who have a niche Web idea, let's say it might be "World of Knitting" or something like that? What is the best piece of advice you can give them starting out in regard to garnering and maintaining customers and establishing their site as the leader?
I think the niche markets offer the greatest opportunities because the "big money" companies are ignoring most of these markets. To be successful, first create a community that is the "must" site to visit with the most updated information about that market. Second, develop your income stream from those in your marketplace. Don't rely on the advertising networks to generate income for you from their typical advertisers who probably have no special interest in your niche.

Develop your own sales program and sales force and sell your strength to those companies who are highly interested in your specific market. In most cases these companies have a difficult time finding ways to target their advertising and at the same time your site visitors have a high degree of interest in their product information.

What is the future of "the World of Fishing" - what "waters" does it aspire to tackle in the next five years?
During the last year and half we have developed our eStore system for the retailers and our Marine Dealer Showroom system for the boat dealers that allows each individual store to input their own inventory information by using a fill-in-the-blank procedure. We are now positioned to really expand the number of businesses becoming part of our community and using our systems to market their products. We are taking the steps to obtain capital that will help us expand in an orderly fashion. During the next five years we look forward to becoming the "Web solution" for many companies by ePowering a sizable percentage of the more than 50,000 businesses within the fishing industry.

Finally, do you enjoy fishing and do you think it's important for a site that is catering to a "beloved sport or product" that the webmasters love what the site is selling?
It is important to have a high degree of interest in your specialty, but don't get fooled into thinking that you will always get to spend more time doing what you like. Still, it takes more that just an interest. You need to understand the market, who the players are and what they need. If you don't have a sense of the business of your marketplace, you can have a great site but it won't produce any income.