How broad or narrow should my niche be?

[deepanshubaisoy]

I am not able to determine how narrow I should be going with my niche.
for eg.
Any animal> particular type of animals (eg. reptiles) > a particular animal (eg. dog)> one breed of dog
where should I stop?
From what I understand, writing more articles about one topic will build topical relevance and help me rank better. But how closely related should those topics be?

 

[bernard]

It would be a good idea to start with a small niche, but choose a domain name, so that you can expand later on.

Using pets as an example, you could choose to write about Skinks, which are popular noob reptiles.

And that wouldn't be niche enough, but "Blue tongued skinks" might be.

So you want to begin with blue tongued skinks and really become an authority there and then you move to other skinks. Then when you've got all skinks covered, you tackle other lizards and when you've got lizards covered, you can go look at snakes.

See what I mean? You begin small and niched, but within a larger niche, where you can naturally scale.

Choosing a domain name then.

You don't want to jump right in and call it "ReptileHQ.com" because you only write about skinks and such a domain name is sort of lame.

Here's where you need to think. Don't choose Bluetonguedskinks.com, because you can't grow with that.

Depending on the size of the niche, you could choose a domain name that branded as skinky but not exclusively maybe SkinksandLizards.com

That would limit you again to skinks and lizards, which would be a larger niche, but not all reptiles.

So if you wanted to eventually cover all lizards, you need to think about that.

What about MyFirstReptile.com or LizardsandMe.com or BlueTongueReptiles.com

As you can tell, you choose a domain name that allows you to grow, but also to brand yourself as a very specific small niche.

 

[zelch]

Definitely worth it to keep your domain name broad within the niche. I've personally had to pivot the focus of a domain name to a related niche and was glad it wasn't super specific.

 

[Hristo]

I believe @bernard gave quite comprehensive answer to your question.

I will add something else, just to have another point of view - there are sites that target super narrow niches with low volume, but due to the low competition they dominate the SERP easily and still they get nice amount of traffic and monthly commissions.

However this needs very deep analysis of the niche, affiliate programs, competition and more.

Probably I would go for a broader option.