Do you have a website that you’ve put your sweat and tears into and you’ve now reached the point where you think you may be ready to sell it? This is a huge moment and, depending on how much money you get for the website, it could be life-changing. While money can be a huge motivating factor to sell, it shouldn’t be the only one. Here are five important factors to consider before you go ahead and sell your website. You want to ensure you make the most informed decision possible.
What Are Buyers Looking For?
Most website buyers are not interested in brand-new sites published less than 12 months ago. These sites might have the potential to be profitable, but right now they are a speck in a heavily crowded marketplace.
Buyers want to buy sites that have already proven their worth. These sites are the most valuable. Websites with a high level of regular traffic, good conversion rates, and a great position in the SERPs for relevant keywords are likely to attract buyers, in particular, buyers willing to spend the big bucks.
There is no point in trying to scam buyers by faking results. Any interested buyer will want to see facts and figures, such as revenue, traffic, and profitability. They will also want to know how involved you are in the site, why you want to sell, what your competitors are, what you are offering as part of the sale, and any other relevant information.
Put together a sales pack before you begin marketing the website for sale, so interested parties have access to the information they need. This ensures you are not wasting anyone’s time and timewasters are screened before things progress.
Does Your Website Generate Results Right Now?
The first thing that potential buyers will want to know is what kind of results the website is generating now. It’s not about buying into an idea or a dream since buyers want to see cold hard numbers and facts. Chances are they don’t want to be the one that has to build the dream; instead, they prefer to buy into something that has already been established. What this means is that you need all your numbers and stats handy when it comes time to list the site. Potential buyers aren’t just going to take your word for it, as they will want the proof that backs up what you claim.
Make Sure You’ve Done Everything Possible to Build Traffic
Speaking of traffic, you want to be sure you’ve done everything possible to boost traffic as high as you can. If there are areas of concern, you can bet that these will act as red flags to potential buyers.
If you haven’t focused much on SEO, now is a good time to look at your level of website traffic. The more website visitors you have, the more attractive your website will be. There are plenty of low-cost things you can do to give your SEO a jumpstart.
Start by analyzing the stats. Look at which pages are underperforming. Are they missing vital keywords? Is the content a bit thin? It won’t take a lot of effort to refresh the content on pages that don’t see much love from Google and other search engines. Do some keyword research and make sure these pages are targeting relevant keywords.
Add a blog to your site if you don’t have one. Publish some good quality content that is relevant to your niche. If you don’t think your writing skills are up to scratch, outsource the work to a freelancer.
Put some time and effort into your social media presence, as this will help drive traffic back to the site.
Publish guest posts on relevant sites with a link back to a page on your website. This is an easy way to build quality links.
What’s the Website Worth?
As you sit on the fence about whether to sell or not, a huge deciding factor can be what the website is worth. How much could you get for selling it? This is why assigning a realistic value to an online business is so important. Just because you feel like your website should be worth the big bucks, doesn’t mean it is.
Figuring out its value can leave you surprised in either a good or a bad way. There’s a lot involved in determining a website’s worth; it’s more than just sales. It also comes down to the traffic it gets, benchmarks and transactions by similar businesses/websites to give yours a truer valuation, the fact that cash flow varies monthly, and more. Should the website not be worth as much as you hoped or expected, perhaps that just means that now isn’t the right time to sell. You can re-visit the idea later down the road when the website has increased its value.
How Professional Does Your Website Look?
Just as you would think about curb appeal before selling a home, you need to think about how the website appears to potential buyers. How was the website built? Does it look professional? Does everything load smoothly and quickly? Is the navigation user-friendly? Do the links all work? Is the layout clean and modern-looking? Are there any glaring issues that may turn off buyers? These are the kinds of things you will want to remedy before you try to sell the site. A few small tweaks and improvements can make a huge difference in the amount you get for the site.
Identify Who Your Buyer Could Be
Just like when you’re selling to customers, it’s important to identify who your target buyer is. This will help you with messaging and the logistics of where to list the website (you can use a broker or a marketplace as an example).
Before jumping into the sale of your website, it makes sense to take a little extra time and get everything in order and ensure that you can get top dollar for the site.
