Nidalee is a pretty skirmish-oriented champion right now, a lot of her advantage comes from this and her early game power (which was largely a result of an insanely fast clear, though Riot is nerfing this to be more in line with most junglers). She struggles in teamfights generally unless they're more drawn out. I think she's a more situational pick because she doesn't offer what a traditional jungler would offer (CC, tankiness, peel, etc), and she's more reliant on snowballing than most other junglers, imo. She's honestly my favorite champion but I'm not a big fan of her in the jungle, unless you're playing AD Nidalee (most people are playing her AP right now; I usually play her AP as well, but only in mid lane)
In terms of actually clearing the jungle, you have to use your hunt passive root and your ranged form to mitigate early damage, while at the same time using the hunt passive for the enhanced effects in your cougar form (increased damage on Q, reset on W). Don't know where she'll stand after the nerfs since a lot of the reason people even played Nid in jungle was because she could clear so much faster and provide a lot of early pressure, but since her clear is being nerfed, she'll likely still be playable but not as "in-the-meta" as she is now.
I'd recommend going into a custom game and making sure you know how to clear jungle with Nidalee before trying to take it into an actual game, since it can be a little tricky. People have posted videos on it, just google it.