Domain News reports on a Wall Street Journal article (subscription only) about the success of .mobi domains for small businesses.

One hotelier said he gets 30 to 40 new calls a month from his site http://www.kilburnie.mobi, which is probably a positive return on the investment.

.mobi is one of the most interesting sTLD’s to get released in my opinion. The domains can only be used for sites that have mobile accessibility. The mobile web is a massively growing sector though, as people’s mobile technology improves then they get more used to having web services through that device.

As the article states, big business tends to redirect users on their main TLD (.com etc.) depending on whether the request has come from a mobile phone. There is space now for small businesses to cash in on the interest in the .mobi niche and provide early bird services.

The lack of sites at the moment is most likely due to the lack of understanding in creating mobile sites by the mainstream web design/development industry. Mobile sites use Web Mark-Up Language (WML), which will seem very familiar to anyone working with standard web pages. There are some excellent tutorials for novices on the internet though, I’ve linked to a few of them below.

Mobile Site Tutorials
FreeWebmasterHelp: WML/WAP Tutorial
W3Schools: WAP Intro
WapTutor

If you’re looking to register a .mobi domain, then click here to check availability.