Forum Moderators: phranque
1. Check the whois information on the domain
The first thing I do is check the whois domain to ensure the seller I am dealing with is the true owner of the domain. You can also use the whois info to verify the age of the site. Many sellers will claim they are selling an 'established' website, even though the domain was registered within the last month or two. In my experience, the older a domain is, the better the value. You can also check the last time the whois record was updated to see if the seller has recently purchased the domain from someone else
2. PageRank
Next, I check the PageRank of the domain for sale using the Google toolbar. An established site should have a PageRank of 3 or higher. The higher the PageRank, the better. However, there is one more step you must take when checking PageRank. With the huge popularity of people buying and selling text links to increase PageRank, you must manually check the backlinks to make sure the PageRank is 'natural' and not purchased. I recommend you use the backlink tool at yahoo.com since it will show you more links that Google's backlink tool. The backlinks should come from a variety of different sites that are on the same or a similar topic as the website for sale. You can easily identify paid links because they usually are seperated from the content of the page and often mixed in with a bunch of other irrelevant links. Also, don't buy a site where all the links come from a small number of sites. This is usually a sign of paid links, and it's too easy to lose your links this way
3. Alexa Rating
Check the Alexa rating with the Alexa toolbar or at alexa.com. While this is not a totally accurate number, it does help you evaluate a website. The lower the number, the more traffic a site receives. If a seller tells you his website receives thousands of visitors a day, but his Alexa is 2,000,000 then there is obviously something fishy going on. Also, when checking the Alexa rating, always view the traffic history graph for the last year. It should show a steady climb in traffic, not huge spikes. Huge spikes usually indicate paid traffic to boost the Alexa rating.
4. Don't trust screenshots
If a seller is using screenshots of his accounts as proof of income ask to actually login to his accounts to verify for yourself. Screenshots can (and are) easily faked. If a seller is unwilling to show you his real accounts, don't buy the site.
5. If a deal sounds to good to be true, it probably is.
I see websites for sale on eBay all the time that claim you can earn $10,000 per month, but they site is being sold for $200. Obviously something is wrong here. Don't get caught up in the hype. Websites are usually valued at 6 to 12 months times their current earnings. So a site earning $500 per month would be worth $3000 to $6000. Of course, if you think there is potential to increase the earnings then it could be worth it to pay more for the website
6. Don't buy junk
There are tens of thousands of copy cat junk template sites for sale. These websites all sell the same things, using similar designs and ad copy. Stay away from these. They will never make you any money. Look for unique sites that have been custom built and been around for at least a year.
Nice post, oldskool79.
If a seller tells you his website receives thousands of visitors a day, but his Alexa is 2,000,000 then there is obviously something fishy going on.
Not always since Alexa is the rating of sites by popularity of visits of people who chosen to install their -ware. If website caters to Linux users then the site might have high traffic in reality, but very poor showing on Alexa.
Agree with the rest however!
If you are looking at a site that is geared towards non-windows users (Apple, linux, etc.) or a non-english speaking country then the Alexa rating is probably irrelevant.
This brings up another tip: Always look at the server logs or site statistics to verify traffic. Again, ask to actually login and view them, don't trust screenshots.
