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How to Sell a Blog Part 2: Prepping for Sale & Determining a Price

Posted on July 5, 2010 Written by Leave a Comment


I make the real estate analogy often when I describe how to sell a blog. When a blogger sells a blog it can be just as personal as putting the family home on the market. You’ll also have to do some upkeep and make reparations in order to have a blog worth selling. Just as you would with a house, you’ll have to make sure your blog is staged properly, and also, that you have an asking price in mind.

Prepping Your Blog for Sale

When you’re ready to sell, you want to be sure your blog appeals to potential buyers. Though there are several ways to do this, there are three areas a potential buyer looks into the most.

1. Traffic: Obviously, the more traffic your blog has, the higher price you will receive when you sell. Most buyers will ask for proof of traffic so if you’re on a downward spiral, it won’t bode well in your favor. When I made the decision to sell, I worked hard at building traffic for several months in order to appeal to buyers. I studied search terms, gauged the needs of my community,posted content two to three times a day and promoted the heck out of my blog and its content.

2. SEO: If your blog reaches the top of the search engines, you’ll attract potential buyers. Though my blog had been at the top of many important search terms for several years, I continued to use those keywords and phrases to stay at the top. This doesn’t men that I wrote spammy SEO copy, because I didn’t – my community always came first. However, freelance writing blogs are a dime a dozen and I knew it was only a matter of time before I was dethroned from Google’s top spots.

3. Revenue: If you want top dollar, you’ll have to be taking in a decent amount of revenue. Serious buyers want ROI action. I had a heavily monetized blog which helped my bottom line. If you’re selling a blog or website, revenue is the single most important factor in determining a price.  To prep for sale I built relationships with several private advertisers and now the new owner has continued those relationships. I also worked on other revenue streams.  If I didn’t earn at least several thousand per month in revenue, my blog would not have been as attractive to potential buyers.

Everything else such as community, subscribers, and bells ans whistles are gravy on the proverbial potatoes, but it’s those big three details that matter the most.

Determining a Price for Your Blog

My biggest dilemma in selling my blog was in asking for and receiving a fair price. I did a little research on the subject and while there are a few links available, truthfully there’s not much out there that gives step by step details in regard to how to sell a blog. Fortunately, I have a friend who flips blogs and web properties on a regular basis and he was able to advise me through the process.

I learned:

  • Private sale is better than a public auction for a blog the size of mine. The folks who buy and sell websites at auction or mostly doing so with smaller properties or domain names and the bids are lowballs. So, I reached out to the people who have inquired about buying my blog in the past. I also reached out to a few webmasters and network owners who might be interested.
  • A rule of thumb is a year’s income times two or three, plus monetary consideration for search engine rankings and daily traffic.
  • The amount of money spent on the blog each year is also a factor. For example, I paid ten bloggers and a webmaster, plus various guest bloggers. This amount doesn’t figure favorably into the bottom line.
  • I had a price in mind, but also asked for two appraisals. The appraisals put the blog at a lower price than I originally intended, but a lot more than I expected to receive – if that makes any sense. I sold my blog at two years income, plus extra consideration for the search engine rankings and other amenities including a large Facebook group, 11,000+ RSS readers, a newsletter and more.

Next up…

When we continue this series, we’ll discuss how to reach out and what to present to potential buyers. Thanks to all who have reached out via email, Twitter, or comments – I hope you continue to find this series useful. In the upcoming weeks we’ll discuss everything I went through in selling my blog. I hope it helps you when it comes time to sell your own.

If you found this helpful, please see the other posts in this series:

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5 Things I Learned from Selling My Blog

Posted on June 25, 2010 Written by 9 Comments

I have to admit, the sale of my blog went very well and despite the emotional aspect, was pretty smooth sailing. Aside from my house, this was probably the biggest transaction that ever passed through my hands, justifying the five years of work put into building and growing a blog and community. Selling my blog was also a learning experience. I’m not quite sure what I expected when I announced I was selling, but I didn’t think it would happen so quick.

I thought I might share some of the lessons I learned in case you’re thinking of selling your blog too!

5 Lessons Learned from Selling My Blog

1. It’s Hard to Give Up a Blog

Selling a blog is like selling the family home or watching the kids go off to college. I didn’t think I would have such an emotional attachment but I do. Will I be able to watch someone else run the joint? Will I be able to butt out if I don’t like a decision that’s made? Can I bear to see someone else raise my child?

I thought long and hard before making this decision. To be honest, it took me about a year mostly because I didn’t want to hand over the keys to my kingdom to someone who might run it into the ground. The attachment is both financial and emotional. Not an easy thing to give up.

2. Not Everyone Shares My Vision

I was fortunate in that the people who bought my blog network shared a similar vision. This wasn’t the case with every potential buyer. One person wanted to turn it into a job board, one person wanted it to be a web content site and one person is someone who has publicly trashed me and my blogs several times in the past. I had to decide whether or not I could sell my blog to someone who didn’t share my vision – which I could not.  I always expected the new buyer would change things up a bit and certainly do something about the cluttered design, but I didn’t expect so many suitors to want a complete change of direction. That isn’t to say I expected every buyer to be me, just surprised at how many were the anti-me.

3. Not Everyone Sees the Potential

When I put out the word that I was thinking of selling, I received over a dozen inquiries and six serious offers. Many who inquired didn’t see beyond the monthly advertising revenue, which was enough for me to make ends meet, plus pay those who blogged for me. It didn’t matter that it’s the top online community for freelance writers or that it commands the top search terms in many categories. It didn’t matter that there were over 2,000 pages of content, several thousands visitors each day and a wonderful, helpful community. For some, it was only about how much the blog network was earning now – and not what it can do in the future.

4. Amenities Sweeten a Sale

I learned that beyond a fairly decent income and rankings, there were other perks to sweeten the sale. My blog network’s Facebook fan page boasts over 3,000 members. Plus, we have a Droid App, a 1,000+ subscriber newsletter, a pay to post job board and several awards and accolades including honors from the top print magazine in the niche.

5. Everyone Will Lowball

I was warned about this, so I knew what to expect. The first offer from any potential buyer is bound to be a lowball offer. Though they hope I’ll accept the lowball offer, they also leave negotiation room. I did received advice from someone who flips web properties on a regular basis, and it was spot on. When I received an offer I felt too low, I counter offered and the party on the other end of the negotiation table didn’t balk.

I also learned a few other things from this sale. For example, the domain transer didn’t go over as smoothly as I would have hoped, and I’m seeing my name next to the word “sellout” on some freelance writing forums. Also, I learned some things are more important than accepting the highest offer .

It’s so far been an interesting and enlightening experience.  I own several web properties than I’m building and growing and I’m sure those will be sold sometime in the future (though I’ll be holding on to this one for a long time.) It’s good to know what I’m getting into and what to expect.

Do you have any questions about selling a blog? If so, ask! Have you ever sold a blog? Feel free to share your experiences as well.

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Filed Under: blogging, Business Tagged: , , , ,