Hey Smash, don't forget to put things in perspective... Overture tracks SEARCHES via the Yahoo Network only.
So there are several things to understand about what you just said.
1 - Do YOU search WITH ext when you search for something? Say you're looking for Apple Pie, do you type "applepie.com" in the search bar? Do youy even type "applepie" without the space? Or do you type "apple pie"?
Seeing a term searched WITH extension gives you an "idiot" factor that can't tell a search box from the address bar.
So weight that accordingly.
2 - OVT scores/results DO NOT include Google Search numbers. People overwhelmingly use Google to search as opposed to Yahoo... but what are the differences? Some people say not much, others say 10 times more for Google than Yahoo. I've seen other members of this forum use Google's API program to prove that Google gets as much as 1000% or MORE search traffic in many cases.
3 - OVT doesn't segragate typo's or hyphens. So consider that they may, or may not, be part of your search results.
4 - OVT allows FRAUD. If you are really vested in manipulating your results, you can search your own domain, with ext over and over again and run the OVT numbers UP. It is fraud as far as I'm concerned and I'm not convinced that a ton of people are not avoiding this practice. I wonder sometimes how, when I see a domain for sale on a forum, that that domain has a huge, magical number of searches with ext. Perhaps fraud? I don't know. But the fact that it can be done causes me NOT to trust the OVT scores.
Seriously, the only REAL thing I use OVT for is to see if a term or word is searched AT ALL and what other search phrases may come up with it. Then, I can use the top few or highest searched terms for my META Tags on my website or for Search Engine Optimization, keywork link structuring or other methods for getting my related site's page rank up.
That's about it.
MORE THAN NOT, you will see OVT scores used to talk you DOWN in the value of a domain... not to give it value.
So, if you want to know why or if a domain is worth $5000 bucks, you look at the TRAFFIC VOLUME the domain is getting and how that converts to DOLLARS. If in 3 - 5 years that domains stands to earn MORE than $5000, then it's probably a good buy. If it stands to only make a few hundred, then adjust your offer accordingly.
Other factors like Branding, market share/surge, retail opportunity and the price/profit of the goods sold through the domain, etc. all manipulate the price as well.
OVT is a tool... and a pretty weak one at that. If you buy or sell domains based on OVT, you WILL cost yourself Money. In a big way.
Best of luck to ya.
GoPC