One constant, in both good and bad economic times, is that small businesses come and go with some regularity. Retirement, sickness, relocation, change of career, financial problems, bad business decisions, partnership splits, divorce….all factors that can lead to a business shutting down. In a recession, the number of businesses closing shop grows exponentially.

One thing I have noticed is that most small business owners keep tabs on their competitors. Even in large cities, the number of companies offering a similar service is manageable. Potential clients are a great source of Intel about competitors because most clients touch base with a handful of competitors, before making a final purchase decision. During a meeting with a prospective client, you might overhear a comment that one of your competitors is not accepting new clients because they are going retire.

If one of your competitors is going out of business, I would try to buy their domain name. While contacting a competitor and inquiring about a domain name can be awkward, there is a way of discretely procuring domains without picking up the phone. If a domain isn’t renewed, chances are that it will show up on sites like Snapnames.com and Namejet.com. These sites allow people to catch domains before they drop off the active roles and expire. Normally, you can pay between $50 and $100 and pick up your former competitor’s domain name.

Why it is important to acquire domains from former competitors? Well, there is a good chance that your competitor has spent significant resources trying to drive traffic to their site. If you own the domain, you can take advantage of their hard word. As long as an active site is maintained, the old back links will continue, providing a continual stream of traffic to your business.

Another advantage is that you can take advantage of their SEO placement. If the competitor has a higher rank on Google, Yahoo, or Bing for preferred hyper local keywords – then you can take over their position in the results by building a landing page that links users to your primary website. You can also use a request more information form to convert users into leads – enabling you to call the prospective client and introduce your product or service.

So next time you hear that a competitor is going out of business, check the expiration date on their domain names. After their domain expires, perform periodic searches on Snapnames.com and Namejet.com to see if you can get your hands on this valuable asset before it is lost forever in the vastness of cyberspace.