Quite a while back, I wrote an article and posted it here about The Long Tail and how it applies to web designers. I came across an article entitled, 5 Powerful Website Niches that are Here to Stay. I think this article is a great example of 5 niches that web designers can take advantage of as far as soliciting potential customers. In your local market, my suggestion would be to target businesses in these 5 industries and see what you may be able to do for them and their websites (or lack thereof).
Just some food for thought…
