Hi, I'm interested in buying a few established websites and wonder how much I should pay for them. Should I look to pay 6 months of the revenue, or closer to 12/18 etc.? Thanks in advance, Will
Probably the right forum. It's hard to say with traffic stats, although for me personally, I wouldn't pay more than 5 or so months worth. If it's making that small of an amount, then it's always possible that it turns the other way and make you nothing. But then you know it's got a clean slate to build upon and make more
Thanks for the advice I didn't actually mean that the x was a single figure, I meant it could represent any value... even hundreds Apologies for the confusion, and thanks
I don't think anyone can put a real value on a site, it's only worth what someone's willing to pay, and not everyone will be purchasing the said site for the same reason. Personally i'm looking for sites to buy as a revenue stream, there's hundreds of factors but there's a few that need looking at closely. Theme - Is the site about something that's going to happen, for instance, a movie release or the Olympics, if so, the fact it makes $500 a month now is irrelevant, because once the Olympics has gone, it will be making 10% of that figure if your lucky. Potential - A site might have earnings of say $50 a month, and have really high traffic, so could something else be added such as adsense, making the site a $75-100 per month earner? Of course, this is potential, so i wouldn't pay as much for potential as i would actual earnings, but thats just me. Age - I like aged websites, with steady income and traffic, if it's a new site and it's making $2-300 per month and the owner want's $600, why? why would you sell so cheap, it's make me think they have gone on a 2-3 month promo, buying traffic, asking people to click, pulling the wool over your eyes basically. Time and Effort - What's a blog worth that takes you 2 hours per week to update compared to a site that takes you 1 hour per month? Things that put me off: An incomplete listing. A seller who doesn't answer my questions. Previous sale of the site falling through. Underpriced listing. Remember if it's to good to be true, it probably is, i've been searching for weeks, posted numerous WTB ads and i've found two sites that i'm going to pursue further, of course, that's not to say there any good. I'm not saying this is correct way to buy a site, but adapting this word doc, to your needs and noting down the specifics, will give you a better idea of if it's within your criteria. URL: List Price: Return (Based on monthly av)Monthly Average Income divided by the List/sale price) Website Summary: Is the site fully functional:Lots of movie sites i've looked at have hundreds of broken link Date Established:important for me Installations or Scripts required:Some sites have extra costs that need to be taken into account Income Total: Income Monthly Average: Income Monthly Breakdown: Income Source Monthly Breakdown: Hosting cost: Advertising spend:Very important, a $500 per month site, can soon become a $250 per month site. Traffic Monthly Breakdown: Page Rank: Alexa Ranking: Inbound Links: Back Links: Listed for sale here also: Sellers Digital Point Feedback: Summary of potential revenue: Maintenance Required: Notes: Bottom line, there's know way to value a site, but for me i work anywhere between 6-12 months revenue for now.
Wow, thank you sooo much, amazing post! I'll take all of this on board, I wish I could give you reputation, but for some reason it won't let me thanks a lot
Reputation? I tried to view your Sedo listings but it wouldn't let me, so drop me a PM on that note. Are you trying to get an idea of how much to sell off your sites for, or are you trying to build an income up.
Standard is Total Average Monthly Revenue x 18 (18 months worth) However, it's only the standard and could change severely.
Your reputation is your lovely green square next to your post count and tells you how helpful you are basically I'm actualy trying to buy some sites here, the listings in my sig are irrelevant. Strange that you can't see them, I'll take a look at them...
Depending on the site, this can vary. For a niche content site, you should look to pay around 10 - 15x revenue, depending on how long it's been earning. For other sites like proxies and image hosts this can be much less.
From my experience in buying and selling sites you will usually pay 12 months rev for smaller sites. e.g making up to $4,000 per year. Bigger sites you will pay 2 or even 3+ years revenue.
I don't think there's a particular "standard" anymore but a lot of people throw around the idea of 10x monthly revenue like it's fact. I think everything Grant said was just about spot on. If you're looking to buy some legitimate sites, with established traffic and revenue, this forum probably isn't your best bet. A lot of the sites for sale here are either brand new or flash-in-the-pan sites that have no real staying power.
Definately right there. I've checked internet wide and there is no standard - although the most commonly used phrase does seem to be ' 10 x revenue' For me i've found two, and i'll be making offers on both, at the end of the day, what do you want them for? I'll be making offers on both because i believe them to be in my criteria and i'm not going to choose one or the other because theres $100, they fit my criteria, they earn money, buy them Whats the reason for the site, this is a big motivational factor to whatsite to buy and how much - Do you want Income, or Income and a Hobby? If it's income then do the workings out, if it stacks, buy it, don't loose out on a legit site because the seller wants 11 months rev, and you want to pay 9.5, however, don't go over the top, untill i'm more established in the field, i won't be paying a penny over 12 months rev. Even at 12 months, a website is a wicked investment, if you can maintain the earnings for the 12 months, and therefore, pay off the website, everything you earn for life after that, is free.
Yeah. I'm after pure income to be honest with you, but I would like a bit of a challenge to increase the amount of revenue earned. Thanks for the comments about the quality of sites displayed on this forum, I'll keep that in mind, and I'll try not to make any rushed decisions
Here is how I would Some months earnings (10-24) + Some for PR like say $50 for PR4 or so + Some for Domain Name like how good it is + Some for content
It's not even the quality of this forum but the stuff people are trying to pass off all over the place. SitePoint is just about as bad anymore. A lot of people are caught up in the "site flipping" method of making fast cash. It's my opinion that those sites should be bought at half the going multiple, say 5x monthly revenue, because there's no history or tradition of long term earnings. There are at least two blogs for sale right now, in the BST forum here, that are asking for high $XXX to low $X,XXX based on the fact that they booked a few affiliate sales the first two months they were running. No one in their right mind should fall for those sites. It takes about five seconds to make an affiliate sale on your own behalf, claim it as revenue on your blog, and then try to flip that blog to someone else. Buyer beware around here.
One last comment then I'll stop bombarding your thread here, Ginger. Buying and selling sites for PageRank is something I have some experience with. Depending on the niche, a PR 4 site can make you $100-$150/month on link sales alone. Anything lower than a PR of 3 is a bit of a tough sell... So my scale for buying sites with no revenue but establish PR is as follows: PR 1: $25 - $35 PR 2: $35 - $50 PR 3: $50 - $75 PR 4: $75 - $150 That's just a starting point though. There's a lot of other things to consider: niche (like I said), quality of the domain, etc. etc. The reason my prices don't follow any kind of multiple is because in link sales time is precious. If you go overboard, your site will lose PR on the next update and kill your earnings. The window of opportunity is so much shorter with link sales that you can't justify paying a lot for a high PR site.
Bjp, no problem, it's really interesting reading. Thanks for the PR guide, very helpful. I'll definately look into PR in a much greater detail now, dig up so old forum posts for some information etc... I don't want to annoy anyone by going off topic so could you drop me a PM with a little extra info on these link sales please? Sounds like there isn't a definitive answer to this topic, price is tailored to each individual circumstance.
BJP is right, there's no set place to buy a site either, i've looked everywhere, and they seem to be filled with the same rubbish. I'm after it for pure income on a long term basis so thats why it being established is important to me, if its not, then the sale price needs to reflect that and the seller would be lucky to see me part with 5-6 months revenue. It's a numbers game, if you look at 100 and get 1, your doing ok - better than me so far anyway!
I'm not sure about websites but businesses are usually bought for around 8-15 times the yearly profit. The value betweenv 8-15 is negotiated between the buyer and seller and depends on the business. I usualy work with 10 times as it's a nice rounded and easy to calculate figure.