Places to list my site for sale
See also: Good
places to buy a web site
Major advantage of selling a website is that the market is wide. The poor
coffee shop owner is restricted to selling to someone in the neighbourhood. You can
reach the Outer Hebrides.
Business Broker sites or Business Transfer Agents
(For the sale of higher value businesses)
Probably the best known is BusinessesForSale.com.
They have syndication agreements with various outlets and your ad is likely to
appear on more than just the businesses for sale website. There is a fee of $70
for a standard listing and $90 for a premium listing. Typical of rip-off Britain
the price of a premium listing for a UK based business is not $90 converted to
sterling... it's all of £90. Well done businessesforsale! (I don't know if it's
worth choosing your location as the US and then giving them a UK credit card.
Somebody tell me if that worked for you).
If you're looking to sell a $100
website then this is obviously not the right place. Sites and businesses for
sale here typically range from the low five figures to several millions of
pounds/dollars/U-rue. For sites under $10K the webmaster forums below are
probably a better bet.
BizBuySell.com also has a fair few
of the six-figure-and-above web businesses. Costs of $45 and $75 for standard
and premium listings. Your listing stay live for two months.
Business-sale.com lists UK
businesses selling for over £250,000. Listing is free for three months if you
sign up for their newsletter.
Tip: When using a broker make sure the broker is working for you, not the
buyer. His commission being a percentage of the sale fee is an incentive but in
itself not sufficient protection. Read our article:
Making your broker earn his
commission.
eBay: eBay is, of course, a good place to sell anything. Haven't you seen
any "Find broken glass" or "Best prices on used condoms" ads yet? With
businesses and websites worth $30K+ however... eBay is a tricky market. You'll need
to bear in mind that prospective buyers have spent a lot of time weeding out
templates, cookie cutters, various get rich quick schemes, and more than the odd
con. They're reading your auction with some deal of wariness and it'll be up to
you to build the trust required to close the sale.
Sub $30,000 sites
Various webmaster forums like the below. Don't forget to read our
top ten tips to make the most of your forum listing and maximise your sale
price.
Digital Point:
This forum has become very active very quickly. Hosts both WTB and Site For Sale
posts. No charge for posting. The rules are more relaxed here than at some other
forums, and the moderation less rigid. 1000 PM limit so ample for most users.
Probably the best bet for most lower value sites for sale.
Sitepoint:
Now charging $19.95 per listing but may be worth it if you expect your site to
sell for anywhere from $100 to about $30K. Note that the PM box is limited to a
total (inbox + sent) not greater than 250. You may need to empty your PM folder
regularly or risk missing some enquiries. Links to online auctions or external pages advertising
your site for sale are not permitted. Looking to post a wanted ad? Allowed but
with some restrictions:
on this
page.
Search
Engine Forums: Part of the big Jim's World webmaster forums. Was down for a
year or so, was moved, and is now active again. No Pr0n, casino, gaming or
spammy sites allowed. Wanted ads welcome. No charge for listing.
WHT:
Web Hosting Talk is, as the name suggests, not really a site dedicated to
selling and buying businesses. However, the link leads you to a section on their
forum where a lot of sites do sell. These tend to be sites costing under $10,000
with most of them under $2,000. Free to list your site or post a WTB (Want to
Buy).
Geek
Village: They definitely don't like adult sites here. Posts limited to one
free post every 30 days. Generally for sites worth less than $10,000. WTB
allowed. Free listing.
Webmaster Talk:
Not as active as the others, but still worth a shot. It's a free listing for
sale or purchase.
Domain State: Little known but at least
as good as one or two of the others above. Free listing.
DNForum: This is a paid forum and the focus is more on domains than on
websites. But, complete sites do sell here. Tip: You could save on the
membership costs by buying DNF membership elsewhere. WHT (above) often has threads where people sell
their "spare" memberships. Browse through there for a few days and you are bound to find
one. DNF does allow adult sites to be listed buy you'll have to be discreet in
your wording of the title and the post.
Sitebazaar: Like the webmaster
forums Sitebazaar generally has the lower priced sites and has a basic search
feature. The few categories offered include Adult, Sport and General. The site
allows you to search for sub $1000, sub $10K and above $10K.
Hotscripts is worth visiting if the main asset on your
site is the script/program/code behind it? Sitepoint also has a
Scripts
and Software forum.
Site Owners Forum:
A newer forum without the member base that some of the others have.
Performancing: Listing of blogs
for sale. Still very basic and yet to gain traction.
Sedo: One of the best known places
for the sale and purchase of domains. Others are Namepros
and Afternic. They use their own
internal escrow rather than
the route we
advise.
Business forums (like Aardvark),
and pretty much any other community of webmasters like
V7N
Last and least: Loot,
Craigslist and other local classifieds. Note that
in Loot, for example, you don't
want the "Internet Services and Equipment" section under
"Businesses and Loans" but the "Opportunities" section. I
would have given you a link direct to the relevant page if it wasn't for their
less than inspired navigation/URLs. Loot wouldn't be my first choice and I
wouldn't list a site in there at all unless it happened to cater for people in a
small geographical area (as Loot readers are generally looking for something in
their backyard).
Important
tips to make the most of your forum listing.
Adult sites:
Since adult content comprises so much of the internet, and most forums don't
allow the sale or listing of adult sites, it would remiss to not point out at
least one location where you can list your over 18 content: go****yourself.com.
It has an active site buying and selling section. The asterisks are, of course,
replaced by the world's favourite "F" expletive. Other "adult" webmaster forums,
like just7blow8me dot com (remove the numbers)
do also allow listings.
Other ideas:
Put a notice on your site itself. Create a page, put as much information you
feel comfortable disclosing and stick a form on there for interested parties to
contact you to find out more. You could maybe even get them to agree to your Non
Disclosure Agreement (link coming) as part of the form.
If you don't want your usual visitors to see it don't link to that page from
your homepage. You can give it an obscure link from the bottom of your sitemap
or some other rarely visited page and search engine spiders will find the Sale
page. If confidentiality is really, really important don't list it on the site
at all (as it could come up in a search for "Site:www.yoursite.com"
i.e. a search that lists all the pages on your site). Ask a friend to host your
page for you.
What words would someone looking for a site try in their favourite search
engine? "Site for sale", "Want to buy a site", "Buy
websites"? Or they may try to search on phrases that sellers are likely to
have used: "This site for sale", "Buy this site",
"Selling this site". Optimise for those.
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