The global recession has served to convince an ever growing number of people that their personal financial health cannot be maintained by traditional employment opportunities and consequently many people are searching online for home based business opportunities instead.

In spite of the amount of hype all over the Internet or in your email box on a daily basis, creating an online business is not as simple and immediately lucrative that you might think it is. It also isn't as difficult as some promote in order to sell their products telling you how to set up your own business at home.

At first glance, internet marketing seems very complicated with a strange language all of its own. But, as with any new process or business, all you need to do is take one step at a time and build your online business from the bottom up.

Let's look at the first basic step you need to take: finding a lucrative niche for your home business.

The first thing you have to recognize and understand completely is that almost all Internet businesses are either selling information or providing solutions to everyday problems. Even the street-level, big name commercial businesses, like Colgate, Pepsi or Wal-Mart are online providing solutions to tooth decay, satisfying your thirst or offering more bang for your buck.

The one very special thing the Internet has done for those wanting to start a home based business is that it levelled the playing field for all. Deep pockets no longer guarantee instant success or any success at all, for that matter.

Your online business success starts with selecting the right niche, you are looking for people who will spend money on information to help solve their problems. You can find niches related to your interests or expertise with basic searches on Google for real interest and simple keyword searches on any of several free keyword tools.

One way to determine real interest in a niche is to do a Google search on your subjects and note the number of results returned by Google. Huge numbers of results mean two things: large interest and lots of competition. When searching Google look out for the sponsored ads that appear at the top and the right of your search results. No Ads = No Interest = No Sales. Those ads are pay-per-click and the marketers paying for each click would not do that if there was no real interest in the subject you are considering for your new business.

Another way to find lucrative niches is to use any of the free keyword tools you can find with a simple Google search. When your keywords have a high number of searches, you can be assured that there is interest out there.

Keywords are terms you use in your sales copy and articles to get listed higher in the Google search engine results. Indeed, this article features "home based business" as a key phrase. There are lots of online resources such as videos and ebooks to show you how to choose and use keywords.

Once you have a topic with a strong possibility of making some income, you have taken the first step toward your own home based business.