One of my "antennae" has always been that an unfulfilled search could be an opportunity.
I.e many years ago (has to be over 12 years ago now!) I registered the name of a generic pharmaceutical, on a whim, when I saw the news that the patent protection had not been extended and that meant generics could start operating.
I forgot about the domain until a year later I started getting the odd email inquiry from people asking out of the blue, if they could purchase said generic pharmaceutical from my "website" (which didn't even exist!)
So I started looking around and found while the generic was legal and being manufactured, there were practically no places online where you could buy this stuff. I finally found an obscure online pharmacy in Australia and made a deal with them to drop ship on my orders. I put up the crappiest website imaginable but lo and behold, it converted. They even processed the payments for me and once a month wired my commissions to an online bank account based out of Eastern Europe.
It brought in a steady $500+ / month in passive income and eventually I figured I either had to take it up a notch or fold it, I was starting to get customer support issues, etc. So I sold it.
Here's where it gets interesting. The guy who bought it from me, over the space of 3 years or so, turned it into a $6 Million / year business! He really took it to the next level, while I was just sitting around in my underwear in my spare time emailing people and setting up drop ship deals, this guy was getting on planes, flying to India, flying to Pakistan, visiting the facilities where they were making the stuff, etc. Flying to Tuvalu to setup his banking, everything. He had a background in the industry so he knew exactly what to do and boy did he do it.
To me, it was just a novel "domaining play" where I turned hand-registered domain ($10/year) into a $6000/year income stream. Done, add it to the pile, move onto the next one. But this guy, well he just wanted something to springboard with, he had bigger ideas and all it took was the mindshift from mine to his to really take it to the next level.
Sorry for the tangent, however that episode taught me two things: unsuccessful searches can be pointing at opportunities, and there is nothing stopping a small enterprise from becoming a much larger one.
(This is along the same lines as logic who posted twinitor.com, basically you are scanning for problems that haven't been solved yet)
I created a type of process map out of this at the time that simply went like this:
1) discover the need
2) solve the problem
3) create the prototype / proof of concept
4) launch it and if it works
5) turn up the gain
In this case step 5 was carried out by somebody else (with a vengeance!)
I still talk to him from time to time as he's a longtime customer of my main business.
I.e many years ago (has to be over 12 years ago now!) I registered the name of a generic pharmaceutical, on a whim, when I saw the news that the patent protection had not been extended and that meant generics could start operating.
I forgot about the domain until a year later I started getting the odd email inquiry from people asking out of the blue, if they could purchase said generic pharmaceutical from my "website" (which didn't even exist!)
So I started looking around and found while the generic was legal and being manufactured, there were practically no places online where you could buy this stuff. I finally found an obscure online pharmacy in Australia and made a deal with them to drop ship on my orders. I put up the crappiest website imaginable but lo and behold, it converted. They even processed the payments for me and once a month wired my commissions to an online bank account based out of Eastern Europe.
It brought in a steady $500+ / month in passive income and eventually I figured I either had to take it up a notch or fold it, I was starting to get customer support issues, etc. So I sold it.
Here's where it gets interesting. The guy who bought it from me, over the space of 3 years or so, turned it into a $6 Million / year business! He really took it to the next level, while I was just sitting around in my underwear in my spare time emailing people and setting up drop ship deals, this guy was getting on planes, flying to India, flying to Pakistan, visiting the facilities where they were making the stuff, etc. Flying to Tuvalu to setup his banking, everything. He had a background in the industry so he knew exactly what to do and boy did he do it.
To me, it was just a novel "domaining play" where I turned hand-registered domain ($10/year) into a $6000/year income stream. Done, add it to the pile, move onto the next one. But this guy, well he just wanted something to springboard with, he had bigger ideas and all it took was the mindshift from mine to his to really take it to the next level.
Sorry for the tangent, however that episode taught me two things: unsuccessful searches can be pointing at opportunities, and there is nothing stopping a small enterprise from becoming a much larger one.
(This is along the same lines as logic who posted twinitor.com, basically you are scanning for problems that haven't been solved yet)
I created a type of process map out of this at the time that simply went like this:
1) discover the need
2) solve the problem
3) create the prototype / proof of concept
4) launch it and if it works
5) turn up the gain
In this case step 5 was carried out by somebody else (with a vengeance!)
I still talk to him from time to time as he's a longtime customer of my main business.
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