What was the last digital product you purchased?

This is a question that was recently presented to me. It seems like a fairly easy question to answer, but for some reason after racking my brain I couldn’t think of a single response.

Then it dawned on me.

That last book I purchased on Kindle? The app I paid a monthly membership for? The music track I bought for my latest video? They were all digital products.

A huge chunk of my monthly spending is allocated to digital products, and only now do I realize how prevalent they are to me. 

It’s the best time to start selling digital products.

Why? Because the market is massive. The profit margin is large and the investment is small. The best part? Since the product is digital and usually requires a download instead of shipping, there’s no waiting for the product to arrive. Consumers can enjoy their purchases instantly.

Maybe you aren’t convinced that digital products are worth investing in, but I am. Which is why over the next seven weeks I will be creating my own digital product in a space that I love.

BRINGING DIGITAL PRODUCTS OUTDOORS

If you’ve been following my work for a while, then you know by now that I am an avid hiker and content creator. For a long time, it has been my passion to combine the two. Now, I see an opportunity to create a digital product that could help the hiking community.

When coming up with ideas for my product, I conducted research to help me understand the market, competition, and my intended audience. This research ended up showing me the importance in “niching down”.

THE IMPORTANCE OF NICHES

We established earlier that the digital product market is massive. While this is great news for those of us creating products, it also means our products may go unnoticed. Targeting a niche market lowers competition, reduces marketing costs, increases loyalty, and reaches an audience that is passionate.

For my own product, I knew I wanted to create a digital hiking journal. “Hiking” was a broad niche that would target a large audience making it harder to market. Instead, I decided to focus on a specific region like the Northeast. I could join the oversaturated hiking journal market, or I could find a unique market and hyperfocus on the 4,000 foot mountains in NH and NY.

After researching and perusing hiking communities, the product I want to create doesn’t exist and there is a need for it. While I would still like to conduct interviews and more research, I feel confident in narrowing down my niche.

WHAT’S NEXT?

Over the next seven weeks I will continue to learn about the digital market as I begin building my own outdoor inspired product. I hope others will see the value in bringing more digital products to the outdoor space. In the meantime, you’ll just have to follow along!