Lord of The Rings MMORPG - 20k Uniques p/m - 1,438 Uniques p/d...

Hi All,

If I find the right offer I am considering letting http://www.lotrmmorpg.com go to someone who can give the site the attention it needs. This site is a Lord of The Rings MMORPG (Shadows of Angmar) fan site. Here are statistics for April 2007 till today...

Day Number of visits Pages Hits Bandwidth
01 Apr 2007 1232 5338 68933 1.44 GB
02 Apr 2007 1307 5656 69973 1.37 GB
03 Apr 2007 1413 6443 76034 1.61 GB
04 Apr 2007 1563 7136 99977 1.90 GB
05 Apr 2007 1295 5554 66009 1.36 GB
06 Apr 2007 1531 6047 88870 1.77 GB
07 Apr 2007 1693 7833 99306 1.88 GB
08 Apr 2007 1806 7708 108029 2.06 GB
09 Apr 2007 1747 7959 108097 1.86 GB
10 Apr 2007 1782 7836 107372 2.01 GB
11 Apr 2007 453 1660 8094 79.03 MB

You can download full statistics since Jan 07 here.

Right now the only other site with better search engine positioning in Google, Yahoo and MSN is the official website for the game itself. Last month the site received 19,697 unique visitors and 31,911 total visitors.

It is currently averaging 1,438 visitors per day in April 07 so is set to hit the 40,000 unique visitor mark this month. Please download the complete stats file above to check referrals, keyword terms and the whole shebang.

The game itself is of course the first official MMORPG for the Lord of the Rings. If you were a fan of the WOW (World of Warcraft) MMORPG you will know how popular this game is going to become. The game itself is due to be released in just under two weeks at which time traffic to the site is likely to expand even further.

You can assume no income for this website. It is being offered as is.

I purchased this site off a member here back in August last year with the intention of working it however due to many other project commitments ended up letting it slide which is a shame on my part. Nothing has changed at all however I have reset the forums due to overwhelming spam (I hadn't checked the forums for several months) and just yesterday uploaded a new home page to capture leads.

You can view the original home page of the website here...

http://www.lotrmmorpg.com/index2.htm

You can view the discussion forums here...

http://www.lotrmmorpg.com/forum/

...the forums have 4,387 registered users. We did have several thousand posts related to the game but these were removed in order to remove the spam. It was located amongst existing posts and new posts entirely so the best option was to simply reset the forums and start again. All members have been mailed to let the know and the forums should start to pick back up again over the next day or two.

A new owner would seriously need to address the forum spam issues by either changing to a new forum software and or plugging the PHPBB forums with all relevant anti-spam mods. There are a few moderators in the forums who have since been established and agreed to help moderate the forums on a voluntary basis. I'm sure many more from the existing user base can also be found to help with the process.

The new home page is a basic lead capture page which I uploaded yesterday to see what sort of leads can be generated...

http://www.lotrmmorpg.com

...and it has generated 58 subscribers in the past 12 hours. I would estimate with some tweaking you could take this to 100-200 new subscribers per day. There is actually no newsletter at this point, this was simply a means to capture leads for future follow up.

Again, no income has been generated from the website. The old owners YPN ads are still on the website so I have no idea how much these are generating. This is how much attention I paid to the website.

This is not an auction but a "make me an offer" sale.

Offers need to be in the $x,xxx range.

Please feel free to post any questions you may have and I will be glad to answer them...

Best...

Duncan Carver

PS: Why is this not an auction?

If I do not find the right offer I will be retaining the site. It has tremendous potential to make some serious revenue and with a little development work become the leading fan site for this game. Not to mention the serious traffic it will generate (and is already generating). I am simply weighing up the pros and cons of employing someone to work the website for me (and the time required on my behalf to manage this) with the alternative of simply letting it go to a new owner.

 

This offer is still open if there are any interested parties here. Please feel free to ask any questions you may have.

Best...

Duncan

 

why dont you make any revenue from the site?

 

Hi Jalal,

As I mentioned above, I have never had the time to work the site. The YPN ads you see on the old index page are that of the original owners. I have not done anything with the site (except that mentioned above of placing a lead capture form on the home page a few days ago to see how many leads could be generated). I simply purchased it, placed it on our dedicated server with the intention of reworking it but due to other projects this fell completely by the way side.

The site obviously needs to be redesigned strategically for better ad placement and to remove some of the clutter (not my design) but with the volume of steadily increasing traffic the site is receiving, it would be hard not to generate steady income from AdSense of YPN alone.

Again, it's simply a time factor for me. If someone has the time and/or resources to put into this site, I thought I would offer it up now before the game is actually released beyond beta stage and becomes main stream.

Best...

Duncan

 

In response to a PM that just arrived. I am not looking to sell just the database of users. This site to be sold as is as a complete site with everything included. Selling just the userbase would devalue the site itself when sold and as such will only be given to the finalized purchaser.

Best...

Duncan Carver

 

Just a quick update. The mailing list placed on the front end now has 523 subscribers / leads. With some proper site tweaking and traffic funneling by someone with the know how this site should easily be able to close 200+ new leads per day with current traffic volumes.

Best...

Duncan

 

heya duncancarver,

I was thinking you should email some of the lord of the rings online gold selling sites and ask them would they like to buy

 

There aren't actually that many of them at this point given how new the game is, which gives this site a perfect marketing angle to generate revenue via that stream. I have just invited the 30,000+ newsletter readers I have to check out this thread so will see what happens there.

Best...

Duncan

 

Can you PM your asking price. I am interested.

 

Hi Weilim,

Current highest offer is $2,250.

Best...

Duncan

 

I am willing to bid $2400

 

Noted and thanks for your offer Weilim.

As mentioned in the PM I am going to let this run for a few days and am not setting any immediate time restrictions nor BIN.

If I am unavailable tomorrow to answer questions please understand it's a public holiday here in New Zealand (ANZAC Day) which I plan to chill out on and have a beer down at the local RSA. Anything I cannot find time to address today will be responded to on Thursday.

Best...

Duncan

 

Hey Aaron,

Wish I found some more time to do what I had planned to do with the site. Your YPN ads are still there on the old home page and other areas of the site. Lazy me... or rather busy me more like it. Please feel free to disclose how much they have made, I have nothing to hide here and wish to remain totally transparent. I am not valuing this sale on revenues to date (and interested buyers realize this) but it isn't going to hurt.

Best...

Duncan

 

Duncan, how many of the backlinks for this site come from your LMA network?

 

Hey Yaffer,

I haven't linked to this site via any other sites I own or operate, including the LMA network. The SEO positions here are supported entirely through the age of the site, current content, and the original few incoming links the previous owner obtained. I believe that was limited to obtaining links on a few MMORPG sites. You can check this out via the link pop feature at marketleap.com

Best...

Duncan

 

BTW - the current highest offer is $2,800 from Eric via PM.

Best...

Duncan

 

check your PM

 

2900 from me