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Selling a website business

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MISI_UK

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Jan 29, 2009
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I have a web based business.
Its an online craft site for buying and selling handmade and includes an online community forum.

It has over 19,000 members,
62,000 unique visitors per month, over 4500 twitter followers, good pr interest It makes a small amount of profit at the moment.
It has huge potential but unfortunately I don't have the time or resources to manage it.

I looked to sell over a year ago and had a reasonable amount of interest but decided to hang onto it. Now I feel ready to sell and move on to new projects :)

I don't really know where to start so need some advise. I either want to sell it for a smaller amount and retain a shareholding or sell it for a larger amount and cut ties.

Ive been looking at flippa.com but I'm unsure if this would work for a site with active members etc plus I'm not sure what I should be asking for as Im unsure of the market value of the site.

If someone could steer me in the right direction, I would be grateful.

Thank you
 
Hindsight and all that... 2 months ago, before 60% of the ranking keywords disappeared, it would have had more value than now.

https://ahrefs.com/keywords/overview/subdomains/misi.co.uk

Those who base their valuation on organic traffic data will be seeing that massive decline (and not just the reduced raw numbers) and want a reasonable explanation for why organic has tanked...

That said, at first glance it's got a lot going for it. Nice looking site, respectable organic and social, etc.

PM me a buy it now price, please.

Personally, I'd be thinking fair price + clean break. Retaining ownership in a business you've fallen out of love with is a recipe for disaster. Lost motivation, combined with someone else managing the accounts = perfect storm of pain.
 
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Webgeek, the ranking decline is consistent with a redesign and a mixture of that and not having the time that I used to spend on seo.

Thank you for all the PM requests, at the moment Im unsure of an asking price, I have a meeting tomorrow and will take further advice on this and get back to you.
 
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Take the annual turnover an multiply it by 4. That's the sort of figure you can sell it for. Other may offer more, some a lot less but everyone will want to see the figures.

If your ranking is dependant on continuing SEO work then that will reduce the value of the site considerably.
 
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fisicx said:
Take the annual turnover an multiply it by 4. That's the sort of figure you can sell it for. Other may offer more, some a lot less but everyone will want to see the figures.

If your ranking is dependant on continuing SEO work then that will reduce the value of the site considerably.
Click to expand...

So if the turnover is £1m and the profit is £50k, you would value it at £4m?
 
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JamieM said:
So if the turnover is £1m and the profit is £50k, you would value it at £4m?
Click to expand...
No. But you have to start somewhere and the figures I've seen tend to be 3-4 x turnover or 12 X profit after deduction - there is of course a huge variation. Basically you can charge whatever someone is willing to pay.
 
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fisicx said:
No. But you have to start somewhere and the figures I've seen tend to be 3-4 x turnover or 12 X profit after deduction - there is of course a huge variation. Basically you can charge whatever someone is willing to pay.
Click to expand...

There are too many unknowns to value an online business on turnover. I think you have to start with the net profit but it would have to be a very special business to get 12x.
 
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The figure is usually between 2 or 3 times anual turnover. However variables such as reasons for selling, traffic drops, backlink profile, active community, traffic, design and profit margin all have an influence on the sale price.

example: If you're turnover was 100k, of which 30k of it was profit, with an imaculate backlink profile, consistant traffic growth, 20 sales per day and healthy social media pages - i'd value the site at around 180k - 200k.
 
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Based on these figures, would anyone like to buy my ecommerce shop?

I'd be very happy to take 3 - 4 times my turnover or 12 times my net profit!

It does well on Google as well!
 
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Bricks and mortar at 4x run rate, sure. Heck, it was 10x to 12x during the dot com boom, but those days are gone.

Selling a pure play business which has only a website, some organic rankings and a community... Good luck getting 4x. (1x = likely, 2x = possibly, 3x-4x = holy cow, 5+ = there was more to it than meets the eye)

Anyone here ready to splash that kinda cash around, let me know, I've got several sites I'd part with, happily.
 
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There is no fixed calculation for a business, certainly online. I had an eCommerce business selling iPhone 4 cases, it has continued to do well but I won't get them figures for it because in the next year the market will be almost dead.

So many factors go into buying and valuing a business.
 
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I see you've reached your reserve on Flippa.

If for any reason the sale doesn't proceed you could try rightbiz.co.uk or, as someone has mentioned, businessesforsale.com or daltonsbusiness.com
 
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