There are typically certain niche industries in the search space that are controlled primarily by SEOs with "special skills." Ian McAnerin has an excellent post on this at Search Engine Watch Forums. He gave this analogy; "if you were a normal home contractor and have the standard hammer, saw, etc toolkit, you could be very comfortable taking on a home reno, or even building a house. Pushing yourself, you could probably try to take on a small office."
For someone already in these niche spaces, they have the knowledge, skills and, most importantly, network and infrastructure to move into similar spaces. So what are some of these niche areas that are so competitive? According to Ian;
- Online Pharmacy
- Gambling
- Mortgages and Loans
- Legal Sites
- Porn/Adult
- Dating/Personals
- Modeling
- Website Hosting
- SEO
- Gifts and Gift Baskets
- Real Estate
- Affiliates
- Cheat codes/Warez
- Travel
On the other hand, some SEOs may not feel comfortable working on some of the niche areas listed above.
Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

Comments:
SearcH EngineS WeB
12/13/2006 02:05 pm
http://www.rankpulse.com/browse.htm?sort=score Here is a ranking archive what many consider 1000 of the top competative terms on Google that are very difficult to break into
Michael Martinez
12/13/2006 03:12 pm
What? Neither list mentions "mesothelioma"? I'm shocked! And where is "pizza"?
Barry Schwartz
12/13/2006 03:17 pm
Michael, he did mention Legal Sites, which I would think includes "mesothelioma." Isn't "pizza" more of a localized search?
Marc Macalua
12/13/2006 04:43 pm
Don't forget Paris Hilton...oh wait he did mention modeling and adult right?
cvos
12/14/2006 03:21 am
generally the most competitive websites have the highest cost in PPC advertising. Find the biggest spenders and you have the stiffest competition. Here are the results of a mortgage broker, spending the equivalent of a Hummer SUV each day. http://www.netpaths.net/blog/