Super Niche Social Networks

The popularity of social networking has created the mass awareness to open the door for a new opportunity in social networking; The Super Niche. A super niche goes beyond the topic niches such as an SN for sports, cars, or fashion and has even a more narrow focus. A super niche goes after a very small, but highly profitable crowd.

Sermo.com, an online community for doctors is an example of this. From their site:

“…physicians aggregate observations from their daily practice and then - rapidly and in large numbers - challenge or corroborate each others opinions, accelerating the emergence of trends and new insights on medications, devices and treatments.”

This audience is small, but has high potential for monetizing. Apparently Longshore Ventures agrees with an announcement that they have pumped $3 million into Sermo in a first round of funding. Sermo is currently free to join with about 2000 active members. Sermo charges investors and other interested groups for access to the community’s knowledge.

I think there is a lot of opportunity for super niche social networks in small, “high class” groups such as doctors. How about an SN for Investment Bankers, High End Consultants, Lawyers, or C level execs? All are groups that companies are willing to pay a lot of money to access. In addition, with the right feature set, I believe these are the types of crowds that would be willing to pay for a membership.

For those of you thinking of starting a super niche, here are three things that I think are vital to success:

1. You MUST provide a set of features unique enough to create high value for your audience. This includes making your audience smarter, more popular, or more importantly…richer. The purpose of the SN should help solve or enhance a real world situation that takes place among your target audience.
The “Myspace of…” approach doesn’t work elsewhere, and it definitely won’t work for a super niche.

2. A super niche will require proper seeding of content and users. This usually means you need special access to your target audience. For example, Daniel Palestrant, founder of Sermo, probably had access to a lot of doctors due to his professional background. Just because you build it, does NOT mean they will come.

3. There needs to be a certain level of verification. For example, Sermo verifies you are a physician by comparing your information to records of licensed physicians. Allowing anyone to register would severly compromise the quality of content and therefore the community. A super niche audience will have high expectations…make sure you are prepared to meet them.

[tags]Social Networking, Social Network, Social Media, Sermo, Sermo.com Niche Social Network, Vertical Social Network, Social Network Doctors, Brian Balfour[/tags]