Rick Latona’s team has updated the TRAFFIC Amsterdam conference schedule to reflect the feedback of conference attendees. Instead of the planned 3 auctions, the conference will hold just one major auction. The feedback was that attendees wanted more time for meetings, panels, and networking, and that’s what they’re (we’re) getting. Auctions can be fun, but the heart of every domain show is the networking, and it’s good to see that there will be plenty of it!

I also received word that the conference hasn’t sold out yet, and the early bird pricing of $1,495 has been extended. There is a $395 conference pass, which is good for everything but the evening events. While this is a good deal, I always find the best part of the show is the networking that happens in the evening. People frequently make private meetings during the day, which is especially true for a conference like this where people only have one opportunity a year to meet with partners and clients, so the night time is the best time to network.

I am psyched about attending the show, and I am looking forward to meeting other attendees.

I found a tool that I’ve been using to harvest unregistered domain names and I wanted to share this with you. Vurr is a tool that is similar to what Overture was, but it relies on a static set of data. From the Vurr website:

“This is a free alternative to Overture and equivalent tools. Search data is from 48.6 million searches by 657,426 distinct users and comprises 97 million keywords. Data was collected by AOL on a random sample of US users from March 1, 2006 through May 31, 2006. In the interest of privacy, search information is only available in aggregate and numeric queries dropped.”

Because the data isn’t exactly “new” it isn’t the best tool to search for trends or more currently used keywords. For example, the keyword search for “twitter” returned no results. However, I do think it’s good for long tail domain searches, especially with people dropping more names than usual due to the economy.

To find domain names, I enter specific search terms, such as “mortgage,” “refinancing,” “soccer,” “mobile” etc. I then take the results, along with the actual # of searches, and I use an Excel sheet to remove the numbers, leaving me with rows of keyword phrases. I then use the Godaddy bulk domain search tool to find the .com names that are available to register.

Once I get the results, I break up the domain name back into it’s search terms, and I search Google for the “quoted phrase” to see how many results there are, how many advertisers there are, and I get a feeling for the competitiveness of the keyword and value of the product or service.

If I think a particular domain name would have commercial value to an end user and is a term that people are looking to find, I will generally buy it. The key thing is that the phrase, as listed, is a searched term and has meaning. Even if the phrase is in a niche industry or field, if it could have commercial value, I am willing to take a chance.