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I was walking around the last Traffic conference and something really struck me about the majority of the attendees, they were weird or at the best quirky. I don't mean this in a negative sense but in a positive one.
 I think that to be in this industry you have to be at least a little strange after all we're the ones that saw and pursued the opportunity that others laughed at. Guess who's laughing now? The last laugh is always the best laugh!
These thoughts caused me to reflect on my own experience of starting out in domains. My wife and I didn't have two cents to scratch together but somehow we'd manage to save up $100 to go out for dinner the following week. I'll never forget the night I spent that $100 on my first domain and then explaining to my wife that it was a going to be a great investment. I said it with the confidence that I didn't feel as yet! Let me assure you that it's moments like this that you're extremely appreciative of an understanding wife.
The next day the domain earned 50 cents from this thing called domain parking! I couldn't believe it! I was rich beyond my wildest dreams. I immediately went and played the best computer game I've ever played, Microsoft Excel cashflow modeling and worked out that I was going to be amazingly rich! I got so excited that I called my brother who brought me down to earth by letting me know that I couldn't even buy a can of Coke with the money I'd earned. Go get a real job was his answer.
Undeterred (after all I'd seen the cashflows) I managed to scrape together a little bit more cash and began registering more domains. Slowly but surely the revenue numbers began to climb, $5 per day, $20 per day etc. At about $100 per day the detractors went silent while I just kept on registering domain after domain.
At $250 per day I began to get calls from "long lost friends" asking about how to get into the business. I'm serious here. I got calls from people that I hadn't seen for about 10 years asking me how to get into domaining! The funniest thing about these people was they couldn't understand why I wouldn't just hand them lists of domains to register. I felt like telling them the children's story about "the little red hen that baked a loaf of bread but all the other animals wanted to eat it without doing any of the work".
It was about this time that my brother started purchasing his own domains. It seemed to me that he wanted to buy some cans of Coke! I later bought out his portfolio.
I think that the key that domainers all see and have now experienced is something that my wife describes as clockwork. Each day we are earning money like clockwork. Each month we get paid like clockwork and the best part about it is that the incremental effort to earn the money from the traffic is negligible.
 Last year I took my wife and three kids to the USA for a 6 months holiday. As we traveled from LA to Seattle, to Vegas, Orlando and PEI I worked on domains courtesy of a wireless Internet connection. It was the most amazing holiday that I've ever had and it was all possible due to the wonderful industry that we're all in. What other job could possibly give you the time off and the ability to do and experience what I did with my family?
Yes, like you I'm a bit weird, I end up staring at three screens all day, getting excited about numbers and talking with people from all over the world like they were next door. I've even learnt the tribal language of PPC, EPC, CTR, RPM, parking, hijacking and traffic and I spend altogether too much time typing LOL chatting to good friends.
It's a strange industry that we're all in and it's run by strange people who saw the incredible opportunity that so many others missed. If strange means enjoying the life that I now have then "bring it on". So....what's your domaining story?
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