The Ultimate Guide to Selling Your Website

Learn how to maximize the value of your website and sell it for a quick profit!

While many people start a website for the pure enjoyment of it, a website can be so much more when it is properly run. A successful website can potentially sell for over $1 million, but getting this price takes into consideration that you understand exactly how to sell your website.

Selling a website for hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars is not plain luck. Websites that can be successfully sold for these amounts have been created and maintained following a few basic rules. When done right, the website doesn’t have to be a spectacular income-generator. Although, the proving the website’s ability to generate a steady stream of revenue certainly won’t hurt.

Any successful website should be able to be sold for a minimum price equal to twice the annual revenue the website generates. This multiple can be increased depending on several other relevant factors:

• Brand Recognition – A strong and memorable brand will sell for more than one that is easily forgettable or has no energy.

• Stability – For a website, stability is measured in what is called defensible traffic. Anyone can buy traffic for a website, but that traffic means very little when it can all be diverted whenever the folks at Google arbitrarily change their algorithm.

• Sustained Growth – A website that has stopped growing will sell less than one that shows continued growth.

• Niche – All websites have a niche, and the value of website adjusts according to how valuable that niche is at the time the website is sold.

• Exceptionalism – This term encompasses both uniqueness and the ability to be a market leader. A unique website in a popular niche is exceptional and can easily be turned into a market leader, which fetches a higher price than other websites in that niche.

• Buyer Competition – When multiple buyers are competing to buy the website, they can drive up the price amongst themselves.

Building a Website Worth Selling

Getting a good price for your website is largely dependent on the work that went into the website. This doesn’t mean you have to despair if you started off on the wrong foot, as many mistakes can be corrected down the road. However, it is much easier and takes less time when you begin with a clear understanding. Some of the issues that should be understood include the following:

• Understand your website’s value – This was touched on earlier. Your website’s value is somewhere in the range of two times its annual revenue. This multiplier can vary by as much as 0.5 times to 5 times depending on how many of the aforementioned factors the website shows.

• Understand the type of person interested in buying your website – You have to know your target buying audience because different types of buyers require using a different sales tactic.

• Understand the market – Never go into the sale unarmed. Before listing your website for sale, you should research similar website sales that were recently completed. Look at the details of successful sales and try to uncover as much as possible about the website and the strategy used to sell it.

• Optimize the website and its profits – Before selling a website, do all that you can to optimize its appearance and the profit that it generates. Make sure you are getting all you can from advertising, and make sure the website has strong affiliates. Optimization may take some trial and error. Ad placement, ad strategy and different means of monetizing the site should all be tested to see how they perform. Remember, the profit of the site is the basis of your selling price.

It’s Time to Sell

When you are ready to sell your website, you have three distinct possibilities in how the sale will be handled: sell it yourself, hire a broker or seek an investment banker.

If you choose the first option, you have the benefit of not having to pay a fee to someone else for selling your website. You also will not have to research the credibility and sales records of brokers or investment banks. The downside is that you may not have experience in selling a website. When selling the website yourself, pay attention not to fall into these pitfalls:

• Do not list the site using unnecessary and meaningless data.
• Do not try to capitalize on short-term fads.
• Do not list the website without monetizing it.
• Do not list the site without including an honest prediction of its long-term potential.

In most cases, a broker can get a better price for your website than you can, but you have to factor in that the broker is going to charge you around 10 percent for his or her work. The only problem with a broker is that they are not always the most aggressive marketers.

If you are looking for aggressive marketing, you may want to consider an investment banker. An investment banker will actively create a market for your website. Investment bankers also have access to buyers that cannot be reached other than through them.

This guide was created to teach people how to sell their websites. If you’re interested in selling your website for a fair market value, please contact us today.