advice Looking for Help or Advice about buying a website

[humbug1s1k]

Hi All,

Firstly apologies if this is in the wrong thread, mods feel free to move if required. I am looking for some advice on how to value a website. I work for a property company, we sell investment property. We are in talks with a 3rd party lead provider who has one of the leading property investment advice websites - They are not a sales site, just provide info and advice. When they get enquiries the leads are passed to us and we then try to sell to.

The owner of the info site wants to sell and has asked us whether we would be interested in buying the site. We know the rough traffic and approx. number of enquiries, and as we are the ones to sell to the leads generated by this site, we know the potential returns and we know of estimated running costs. What we dont know is what he wants (he has asked for offer)

My question is, does anyone have set rules to try and value a website? Or a particular formula to work to?

If anyone can offer any advice then it would be appreciated?

 

[VadimK]

You may wanna check flippa.com - they specialize in selling websites, - and talk to people there.
Here folks are mostly flipping names.
Just my 2 cents.

 

[Eric Lyon]

Hi All,

Firstly apologies if this is in the wrong thread, mods feel free to move if required. I am looking for some advice on how to value a website. I work for a property company, we sell investment property. We are in talks with a 3rd party lead provider who has one of the leading property investment advice websites - They are not a sales site, just provide info and advice. When they get enquiries the leads are passed to us and we then try to sell to.

The owner of the info site wants to sell and has asked us whether we would be interested in buying the site. We know the rough traffic and approx. number of enquiries, and as we are the ones to sell to the leads generated by this site, we know the potential returns and we know of estimated running costs. What we dont know is what he wants (he has asked for offer)

My question is, does anyone have set rules to try and value a website? Or a particular formula to work to?

If anyone can offer any advice then it would be appreciated?

Everyone uses a different formula to appraise domain assets and obviously, when you have a website attached that includes other asset types (E.g. traffic, unique content, revenue, search engine rankings, existing client lists, downloadable products, backlink profile, development history, apps, software, customize unique code, target demographics, market demand, etc.) bundled with the domain, the variables in the formula changes to compensate for each new added asset type deemed to have value in itself, to add to the total.

Here's a public evaluation I did back in 2019 for a domain + website to give you an idea of what I mean:

• (Public Evaluation) - https://www.namepros.com/threads/se...stateclipart-com-website.1133855/post-7216914

You can use those data points as a basic template reference. Though, I use a few added variables these days in addition to those from back then.

I generally only do Professional Appraisals which only VIPs and Gold members have access to. There's lots more to look at in that section. I try to do at least 1 evaluation each night and the new requests are handled in the order they are received, so when the queue fills up it can take a little bit to get to the newer requests.

I'm sure other seasoned veterans of the industry will have some more helpful evaluation information for you to compile with your own data points.

I hope my opinions, experience, and suggestions help.

 

[humbug1s1k]

Everyone uses a different formula to appraise domain assets and obviously, when you have a website attached that includes other asset types (E.g. traffic, unique content, revenue, search engine rankings, existing client lists, downloadable products, backlink profile, development history, apps, software, customize unique code, target demographics, market demand, etc.) bundled with the domain, the variables in the formula changes to compensate for each new added asset type deemed to have value in itself, to add to the total.

Here's a public evaluation I did back in 2019 for a domain + website to give you an idea of what I mean:

• (Public Evaluation) - https://www.namepros.com/threads/se...stateclipart-com-website.1133855/post-7216914

You can use those data points as a basic template reference. Though, I use a few added variables these days in addition to those from back then.

I generally only do Professional Appraisals which only VIPs and Gold members have access to. There's lots more to look at in that section. I try to do at least 1 evaluation each night and the new requests are handled in the order they are received, so when the queue fills up it can take a little bit to get to the newer requests.

I'm sure other seasoned veterans of the industry will have some more helpful evaluation information for you to compile with your own data points.

I hope my opinions, experience, and suggestions help.

Great reply @Eric Lyon and really appreciate the link to the appraisal, its given me a really good starting point and a decent direction to head. Thank you so much!

 

[Eric Lyon]

Added note: Be sure they didn't decide to sell because their marketing style resulted in a spam score that effects the site's pages being dropped into supplemental indexs and email black lists. Generally, good acquisition teams will use spam scores to devalue assets substantially since they need to be cleaned in order to operate at full potential.

 

[Eric Lyon]

For reference:

Helpful information about spam scores:

• This guide from MOZ can help walk you through some stuff regarding spam scores: https://moz.com/help/link-explorer/link-building/spam-score
• This one provides a checklist to reduce high spam scores: https://www.copernica.com/en/documentation/some-tips-to-lower-your-email-spam-score
• This one will help with email blacklists: https://uptime.com/blog/domain-blac...:text=If your site is on,to ask to be removed.

 

[Eric Lyon]

You may also want to consider the following IP (Intellectual Property) methodologies when evaluating developed assets:

• Cost method
• Market method
• Income method
• Decision trees
• Competative advantage valuation
• 25% rule
• The Monte Carlo Method
• Real Options method
• Binomial method
• Probability weighted expected return method
• Relief from royalty method
• Excess earnings method
• Markov chains
• Bayesian Analysis
• Probabilistic Methodologies
• Acquisition comparables
• Stock price indication methods
• Venture funding comparables
• Cross-licensing
• Citation Analysis
• Enforceability
• Current Impact
• Claim scope breadth
• Technology strength
• Validity Confidence
• Research intensity
• Litigation avoidance
• Science strength
• Franchising/Partnering licensing potential (White-label, partner-label, black-label, distribution, retail, etc.)
• Innovation cycle time
• Technology cogency
• Exclusivity and independence
• Future benefits
• Automated appraisal tools suggestions
• and more!

You can Google each of those for more information. I generally use a combination of several IP methodologies in each evaluation depending on the asset type(s) to get a better idea on current real world market value and scaling potentials.

Everyone's different though and what works for one may not work for another. All the above comments/suggestions by me are simply in my opinion and 20+ years of experience in the branding sector.

 

[bestremoteteam]

Hi All,

Firstly apologies if this is in the wrong thread, mods feel free to move if required. I am looking for some advice on how to value a website. I work for a property company, we sell investment property. We are in talks with a 3rd party lead provider who has one of the leading property investment advice websites - They are not a sales site, just provide info and advice. When they get enquiries the leads are passed to us and we then try to sell to.

The owner of the info site wants to sell and has asked us whether we would be interested in buying the site. We know the rough traffic and approx. number of enquiries, and as we are the ones to sell to the leads generated by this site, we know the potential returns and we know of estimated running costs. What we dont know is what he wants (he has asked for offer)

My question is, does anyone have set rules to try and value a website? Or a particular formula to work to?

If anyone can offer any advice then it would be appreciated?

These are easy steps to follow buying a good website
Step 1 - Past History of the website
Step 2 - Which Technology powers the website
Step 3 - How easily Change the website
Step 4 - Know your demographics
Step 5 - Marketing strategies Practices
Step 6 - Check the Higher traffic quality
Step 7 - Check the maintenance cost of the website
Step 8 - Website reviews
Step 9 - How much cost pay for this website
Step 10- Pleasant connection with the owner

 

[poweredbyme]

The median of website prices is around 16-20 months revenue. Prices can go up to 4-5 years revenue or can be as low as 4 months revenue in very rare occasions. Price is a partially subjective thing.

Those are not up-to-date info. Changes on interest rates and lots of things affect investments.