Should I buy a turnkey website ?

turnkey website what is the angle?

[keevill]

I am investigating the purchase of a 'turnkey website'.
The domain name is quite good with relevant keywords in a .com format.
The website is described as

A professional optimized, content rich, Google Adsense / Affiliate Website with 200+ Articles, keyword related RSS feed and a dynamic Amazon Store, containing over 20,000 products. The store is dynamic and tied in with Amazon Web Services and updated by Amazon, leaving you with no maintenance on the website.

I understand that for -it seems to me - a fairly modest payment of about $120 I get ownership of the domain name, the code of the existing website and any spin off commission by way of affiliate stuff from Amazon etc.
Normally I would just build my own website and put my products on there but this gives me the advantage that I can put my relatively few products in a similar product rich sales environment.
It seems a very good idea for me.
What is the opinion of others more knowledgeable than me ?
What is the vendor's angle on this ? It seems too good to be true . Even the domain name should be worth the money never mind the code for the website.
I presume I can change the products featured so that my own stuff takes precedence over generic existing stuff ?
Any commericial take on this is welcomed

[jbinbpt]

All that for $120.00?

I suspect that the seller is offering many of these templates and hopes that quantity is greater than quality.

If you decide, make very sure that the domain is actually yours.

[surrealillusions]

It seems too good to be true

then it probably is.

:)

[BananaFish]

There is no such thing as a turnkey website. However, "sucker template business" websites are a dime a dozen.

[keevill]

Do you think you could elaborate on the comment and give me some insight into this area of e-commerce as my question was actually just about this?
Or is it just a 'throwaway comment ' which you can't substantiate ?

[buckworks]

professional optimized, content rich

If the site package had any serious income potential there's no way the developer would sell it for $120; they'd promote it themselves.

How will you host it? By paying an ongoing fee to host it on the developer's server? That may be the income stream that the developer is after ...

How easy would it be to move the site to a different server? Are there any restrictions?

[keevill]

I have my own server on which I can stick this site . I am interested because for a small amount of money I can just modify the site and put my own stuff as the main featured ones without having to start from scratch to make a new site. AND I can perhaps earn a bit from the Amazon stuff on which the site seems to be built around.
If I do a bit of SEO I may be able to get some traffic .
I am just wary that I cannot add my own content as it seems to be an Amazon website. They say I have full ownership of the website and I suppose that means the code which should be changeable by me ?
Perhaps it's just for selling Amazon and a few other controlled Affiliate sites by the developer.
I am awaiting replies to those questions.

[adder]

Look for some hidden fees. Obviously you will be tied with a hosting agreement or you will not have full right to use/modify the script, the content, etc. or you will not own the domain.

There should be a catch. I would, personally, never buy a turnkey website. Partly because I think this is one of the most idiotic ideas on the web...

You will just lose money. Have you done the keyword popularity research? Have you calculated how much time would you need to break even on those $120 and start making money? Never buy anything without a research and a business plan.

Some sites will never make money and some keywords are not popular enough or just the contrary - too popular to make it impossible to compete.

[Rosalind]

If I do a bit of SEO I may be able to get some traffic .

You will find it extremely difficult to get links to such a website from legitimate sources. And if it's template-based and using free articles you will most likely come across issues of duplicate content that make search engine indexing a problem. How many other people might have bought the same thing?

Those are just a few of the possible catches.

[Anat]

I don't think it's that cheap if it's a turnkey site with -

1. Free articles (read as duplicate content)

2. Not the best of domain names (my-keyword1-keyword2-keyword3.com)

3. Not a unique design

4. No traffic

Back in the haydays of AWS sites, I used to sell sites like that, including an amazon store and 5 links to them from my own directories at $50 a piece. I don't sell any anymore btw, so please don't contact me ;)