Valuing a domain

Quick guide .

[irishaff]

Hi,

I have the possibility to purchase a PR6 with organic and on topic inbounds in a niche market. Any help or advice people have in terms of price would be good. I am sure I will have to ´haggle´like a true Irish man , and am not sure what its truely worth. Does anybody have some advice?

Also do subdomains automatically come with a main domain when you buy it? Its got five PR5 subs with it .

Best Wishes
DAvid

[canuck]

Some important factors to consider when purchasing a domain/website are:

• Domain Name: Brandability / Market of domain (potential profitability) / length of domain / extension of domain / type-ins?
  
• Links: Be careful with link popularity, since it's not uncommon for webmasters to power their sites with other sites they own. Once you purchase the domain these could disappear almost overnight (same with paid links if any). Be sure to investigate the backlinks to the domain you are purchasing.
  
• Content: if it's included in the sale (is it unique? quality? quantity?)
  
• Traffic: You can get an idea about the domain's current traffic levels with several online tools (Alexa, Metrics Market, etc). Don't place too much stock in these tools since they are often not overly accurate and they can be manipulated. Also, what is the value of this traffic in the domain's sector?
  Source of Traffic: is it getting its traffic from organic SERPs or PPC/etc? Check the domain's rankings in the major search engines and PPC networks.
  

Also do subdomains automatically come with a main domain when you buy it? Its got five PR5 subs with it

Yes, when you purchase the domain all subdomains will be yours to control --- you can change them, add more or delete them altogether if you wish.

Be sure to also ask yourself why the owner would be selling such an amazing domain... make sure you take a good, long look.

- canuck

[irishaff]

Hi thanks,

This has given me a good deal of information and I thank you for the time to send me an answer.

I have decided to buy the domain. I have developed a good raport with the owner , essentially a mom and pop site guy . The links are organic and on topic etc. and not likely to dissapear, if i keep the contact intact. The layout is old style , but i am convinced that it will stick as the site has sat there for the last three years with nothing done to it and what appear to be organic links have built it up to a PR6, with 5 subs on PR5. As I said the most important thing is that the site is bang on topic.

My challenge will be to not change the theme ( ie make it too commercial) so much that people decide to remove their links to it, esp the DMOZ editors. I can with a few chosen links boost my own main domain to PR6 from PR5 with a good
´local rank ´.

Cheers
David