I’ve always been fascinated by creative and fun domain names. In fact, I’ve been building Web businesses off of domain names for over 10-years. It’s fun, and rewarding and profitable. And the beauty of it is that anyone can do it.

Stumble this please?

I recently finished my latest eBook called ‘The $7.95 Marketing Plan – Build your brand for less than the price of a pizza’. It’s totally free to download and distribute, so there’s no excuse for you to not check it out. Take the quick read and learn how I’ve used domain names to build profits, publicity and more over a 10-year career. It really is that easy if you understand the secret recipe.

What’s the secret recipe? Well, just go read the free eBook and find out.

The $7.95 Marketing Plan

Almost everyone has heard a tale of someone getting rich by selling an Internet domain name for a staggering price. But few understand the secretive world of domain investing, a game that a growing number of people are playing around the globe. The Domain Game chronicles the exploits of leading domain investors and explains how this mysterious market works.

The Domain Game

I’m a domain junkie. I only have about 150 of them, and I’ve been letting some of them expire, but I still keep buying new ones that I like.

But do any of them have value? Dunno. It’s time to find out.

In February at the Affiliate Summit, there’s going to be another Moniker domain auction. I was at the last one, and it was a neat event. They served champagne which was a nice touch. Pretty cool to see how the silent bidders on the phone on the side of the room called in their bids.

Anyway, if you’re sitting on any domains you think are worth anything, now is your change to submit them to see if you can sell them. Check this post out for details. There’s an email in that post that you can submit your domains to.

Here’s some of the domains that sold at the last one.

The previous Live and Online Domain Auctions at Affiliate Summit saw more than 150 domains change hands. Top sales included:

Passover.com $100,000
Pay.mobi $50,000
FileCabinet.com $47,060
BadBoys.com $45,000
PrescriptionMedication.com $40,000
AffiliateDirectory.com $30,000
Sitcoms.com $25,000
Itineraries.com $22,000
MiamiSingles.com $12,950
555.mobi $11,770
Rooms.mobi $11,770
SavingsBanks.com $8,830
Omelettes.com $8,240
Semester.com $8,000
HawaiiHelicopters.com $7,650
Tomorrow.net $7,127
Dividend.net $6,000
CruiseInformation.com $5,500
GolfInformation.com $4,500
OffShoreBetting.com $4,500

I’d pay $300 million for Business.com if I had it.

But… Wired has a good point.

When I found out that Kevin Rose originally wanted Dig.com but settled for Digg.com instead, I remember thinking that sometimes a domain can be “too” perfect. I like “digg” much better than “dig.” I lost my domain puritanism for good when I watched BoingBoing.net hit number one on Technorati despite the unsexy dot net domain. Business.com will never be worth $400 million, but it would be entertaining to see it sell for such an insane price.

Did you know that Google creators originally were going to get something like Goggle (I think), and they typed Google by accident in the search box?

$300 million seems steep, but so did $7.5 million back in 99 when they bought it. What would/could it be worth in 5 more years?

A while back I told you about how I accidentally let my fat blogging domain name expire. HelpJimGetSlim.com. Well, guess what? I didn’t get it back and it’s going to cost me $250 if I still want it.

Turns out some evil domain snatching company called Credonic.com grabbed my domain about a day before I grabbed it and is now trying to resell it to me for $250!

I emailed them nicely and asked for it back, even offering to pay them registrar fees. They said “no, it costs $250″.

I then asked them again, very nicely and pleaded with them to please give it back to me. They replied “no, it costs $250″.

At that point I sent over a nasty email and felt better, then worse. I realized that it was my fault that I forget to renew it, not theirs.

Moral? Renew your domains.

Businesses exist that register expired names just so they can get you to pay up for your mistakes. Does that suck? Yes, but it’s a business they run, and it’s legal.

I’m not buying it back for $250, no. But can you imagine if you lost a real domain? Like your most important domain? You’d pay, believe me, and they wouldn’t charge you $250 either.

Take my domain names, please. I own about 150 or so domain names, most of which I don’t or ever will use. But I keep buying them as I “hope” to one day make them a good home. So why not give them away to someone with a good idea who can use them?

Here’s the deal. Every once in a while I’m going to give away one of my domain names to one of my readers who can come up with the best business model or website idea for that domain name. No, you don’t have to write an entire business model, but I will expect you to have a killer idea that is worthy of the domain (a few paragraphs will do).

The rules are you can either leave your idea for the domain in the comments for the public to view, or you can email me your idea and I will do a follow-up post in a few weeks showing each idea anonymously and my readers can vote on which one is the best.

The winning idea gets the domain in question transferred to them free of charge.

Interested? Let’s kick off this contest with one of my all-time favorite domains I’ve never used.

NicheROI.com

Take my domain, please.