How do I validate an idea in my marketplace for the industry?

That one question entails several separate answers. .TRAVEL is little used and practically unknown to the general public, even though it has been around for 7 or 8 years. Partly that's because the .TRAVEL registry mandates a special application process that confines use of the extension to particular kinds of entities. Have you ever visited a .TRAVEL website? Most people have never seen one. And so, with negligible public adoption of .TRAVEL, you'd find yourself almost entirely alone explaining your name / web address over and over again. Names that require long explanations are cumbersome and forgettable. There's an added burden with vanity extensions such as .TRAVEL. Suppose you name your company or website "Exotic Travel". If you use Exotic.Travel because ExoticTravel.com is too expensive or else in use already, then you will either face a competitor who uses ExoticTravel.com or else you will need to purchase and maintain both domains. Owning a vanity extension without a matching .COM is almost always a bad idea. Some major websites have learned that the hard way -- often paying 5 or 6 figures to acquire the .COM domain they hoped to circumvent. I'm not a .COM purist. In fact, I'm fond of some domains in vanity extensions. But they should be used as a pair with the .COM most of the time. .ORG can be ideal for certain kinds of projects. But it's impossible for me to give an answer without knowing the name in question. If .ORG is part of the brand identity -- meaning that you're proud to display the .ORG -- then it can work. Nonprofits are especially well suited to .ORG for this reason, as are some other websites. However, if using the .ORG is merely a cheap knockoff of your first-choice domain, then people will perceive it rightly as just a cheap knockoff. We'd have to discuss the name specifically for me to give any meaningful feedback, though. Of course, you began by saying "there are no quality .COMs available". Frankly, that's probably not true. Availability comes in all shapes and sizes. It's certainly the case that most of the good .COM domains already belong to somebody. After all, the internet has been around for a few decades. Just as with the North American continent, every vacant lot has an owner by now. But many good .COMs, though owned, are nevertheless not in use -- and therefore available, depending on your budget. It's dangerous to settle for the first .COM you find that's available for $10. Almost by definition, those are precisely the domains that have interested nobody alive at all for 20+ years. However, I've been exploring the name space every single day full time for some years now -- often for myself but frequently for clients. And a small percentage of good domains do remain available. However, it takes experience to find them and tell the difference between fool's gold and the genuine article. With my last naming client, I'd say that less than 1% of my name ideas were unregistered. That's a long answer. Since it's now 1:17 a.m., I'd better cut things off at this point!

Hi, I've got years of experience in sales and small business management. While not travel-focused, I may be able to help. Why are you so focused on a direct-sales approach? I know travel agents that frequently sell adventure travel products for operators. Have you properly analyzed all the sales channels available to you? Agents have relationships with frequent adventurers who rely on their input when making travel decisions. If agents aren't part of your sales efforts, is it because your margins aren't correct? Are you trying to fix a sales problem with a marketing solution? Let me know if you'd like to book a call. Dave.

As former CMO of Expedia I can tell you that being focused will trump any theoretical upside of having different names. To this day there's a struggle to build daylight in meaning between Hotels.com and Expedia's core hotel business - and there have literally been billions spent on trying to do that over the years. Get clear on who you're for, the problem you solve, what insight you are building against and your positioning against that. There's enough work there on its' own - believe me. Good luck.

Before you spend $ or time marketing your service / website, ensure that your brand itself is quite strong. For example, if your name or domain is awkward, ambiguous, or off-putting, then every dollar and hour you spend promoting your brand will work less efficiently in your favor than if you were spending the same amount of money and time marketing something more robust and attractive.

I'd love to hear more. I'm a travel professional with 9 yrs in the industry.