Forum Moderators: LifeinAsia
The site is six or seven years old and has a decent number of quality backlinks. It gets a steady stream of visitors (low 4-figures daily uniques), about 75% of them from the Google SERPs. The owner has had AdSense on it from the start of the year, which produces a monthly 3-figure sum; seems to be fairly stable in terms of CTR / eCPM.
On the minus side: the content is fairly dated; some of it's "evergreen" stuff, but there's a lot I'd have to rework / replace, to the extent that I would put only a nominal value on the content itself. Recently the site dropped out of Google for a month or so; either that was part of the recent random Google website droppings, or a few serious SEO issues on the site triggered something. The domain name is nice to have but of little intrinsic value; there are similar ones still available.
The owner appears to have some emotional attatchment to the site and would probably really like to develop it further, but has no time and very little SEO / Adsense / site management knowledge and is realistic enough to see that's not practical for him. He'd like to see the site put into good hands, i.e. someone who won't rip it down and put up something else althogether. I think I can convince him on that point, because the site's theme is one I'm quite passionate about and already have a small website along similar lines.
My gut feeling would be that the basis for valuation would be a multiple of current revenue, probably about 12 x current monthly AdSense income rounded up to the nearest thousand or so. On the basis that I'd like to recoup my investment in about a year; anything much longer term I see as unpredictable, due to the site's dependency on Google for both visitors and income (although I do think the site has potential to expand and diversify visitor and income streams with a fair bit of effort).
Am I thinking along the right lines, and is there anything else I should consider?
On the minus side: the content is fairly dated; some of it's "evergreen" stuff, but there's a lot I'd have to rework / replace, to the extent that I would put only a nominal value on the content itself.
That's on the plus side. If an established set gets Ks of visitors per day with weak content, then it has plenty of potential to do better as you add new stuff (no need to ditch the old, provided it's OK).
There is a thread here (someone will know it!) that gives useful tips; but ultimately, it's worth exactly what you are willing to pay. I'd start by asking him what he is looking for. See how close that is to the price you envisioned.
Always remember that if he's attached to the site. he may have unrealistic ideas of it's potential. And that if he feels you don't see that, he may drop the negotiations and sell elsewhere.
But be clear in your mind what your maximum is before you start.
