As a noob to DP I have been spending a lot of time reading the sites for sale section, and it seems to me that most of the listings are either scammers or just plain worthless. Usually they have one or more of these traits; 1. Recently created and being sold because the person “has no timeâ€. If they have so little time why do they keep creating new sites? 2. Recently bought and being sold because the person “has no timeâ€. Why did they just buy it then? 3. “Unique, handwritten, content†that is horribly written and full of grammatical and spelling errors, with little to no informational value. 4. A website that looks like it was put together by a third-grader and works about as well as you would expect from its looks. 5. A website with “thousands of dollars a month†in potential being sold for $200. Uh-huh, if I could make 2k a month off a site I think I would keep it. Five of those and I could retire from my day job. =) 6. A clone of another site. So my question is this: how do you separate the wheat from the chaff? What criteria/tools do you use to evaluate potential buys and how do you know when a site passes muster? Thanks in advance for your help.
You dont. If something is billed as a good earner, and the price is right, then insist on escrow, and taking the helm for a week so you can see how well it performs with your own eyes/account. Even then, sites can pass muster, then decline rapidly for a variety of reasons. At the end of the day, just remember common sense is common sense.. you made some good points
That said. There are several good sites available, and it is usually easy to tell when you have a keeper. The other aspect of the worthless sites, is that you can buy it cheap and save a lot of time (especially if its got a good domain and the writing is half decent). I think you really just have to go with your gut on decisions like this. As you pointed out, it is usually easy to see when someone is trying to unload a bad site.
After reading the thread title I was hoping that someone was asking a question about agriculture! It's nice to change topics once in a while... You can do it like this. Cheers, Pete. PS: It's friday folks!
If it's just a straight up domain (and not really the content) the domain itself and if it has any links built up. -SS
Ok, I'll be serious this time. I like to look FIRST at a site's PR *and* age. I have a theory about this: If someone cares about their website and really makes an effort to make it successful then that site will have good PR and be old (at least a year old anyway). This type of site will be easy to get going and monetize. Generally, a good buy. If a website is only a couple of months old and has high PR because of a few high PR links... this is probably a site that was built for resale. In the end, you might not make anything from either site... that's why I always look for decent PR; selling links is easy and fast money. Pete.
You're observations are spot on. When looking through the ones which fall under your point 1-4 & 6. The most important thing I'm looking for is the domain name itself and the template they're using. I look at them as starting points. As to ones which match your point #5, I generally don't even bother looking at them as it's such a crap statement. BUT... Ever so often a good site will rear it's head and as such those generally sell quickly and for competitive prices. They usually sell pretty quick as well. With the growth of DP it's harder to spot these as they only pop up every week or so while the site is being hammered with more and more sites for sale which match your observations.
Thank you for the replies, and the picture. =) Thanks, that's a good tip. Yeah, it seems like you have to monitor the forum pretty closely. When I do see a good site it's already bin'd. Thanks again!
Another tip: If you're really in the mood to pick up a low/medium priced site AS A STARTING POINT that needs actual work (because sometimes you can be in a buying mood); leave the sites sub-forum and head over to the DOMAINS sub-forum. It's often possible to find a good domain name, parked or expired, with decent pr (say PR4/5) for a very reasonable price. It's a great way to kick start a new website. I do this sometimes. Granted, there is almost never any traffic to start with but the advantage of having a handfull of old backlinks and a mid-PR to begin with can really help. I usually try to put up a decent looking site and several pages as soon as possible and then steadily build the page count while both buying AND selling links on the site. Buying more links helps with traffic/PR and that in turn helps you to sell more links for more $$. If you see that the site has potential to go farther, fast, you can take steps to move it forward... more aggressive advertising, building links (not necessarily buying), more content (this is a big one), SEO. I guess it's just a trial and error thing... I have yet to build a website that brings in hordes of cash. So far my personal strategy is to have several small/low maintenance/low earning sites, a few medium earners, trying to get at least one big earner and steady affiliate income through advertising. Have fun!