Time Capsule: MP3.com Bought for $1,000 for 10,000 Visitors a Day

Entrepreneur paid $1000 for MP3.com domain name, got 10,000 unique visitors in the first day.

For an interesting domain name story, check out TWiST #42 with Michael Robertson, founder of what became MP3.com.

In minutes 54:00 to 58:00 of the show, Robertson discusses how he bought the domain name MP3.com for $1,000 back in 1997. The owner of the domain had registered it because his Internic handle was ‘MP3′, and he didn’t know anything about what an MP3 was. But Robertson still thought the $1,000 was a risk, and his wife wasn’t happy.

Robertson had been marketing file search engines web site for a while with limited results, but acquiring the domain name MP3.com changed everything.

“I turn it [the domain] on,” Robertson explains. “The first day, 10,000 unique visitors. All I did was turn it on.”

That’s the beauty of direct navigation. Robertson had been marketing his web site like crazy with limited results. Then he spends $1,000 for a domain name, doesn’t publicize it at all, and gets 10,000 uniques on the first day.

It’s well worth listening to his story. Zoom forward to about 54 minutes for the domain story.

[Hat tip Bret Fausett @bretfausett].

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