Sites Value?

[Chris]

I'm not sure if this is the right section, but this thread isn't really to sell my sites rather to see what they are worth because of late I have been thinking about off loading them to focus on other things in life. However seeing I have no idea of site values or what people pay for sites and domains I was wondering if some people could give me some rough estimates of what my sites might be worth.

Well because I'm not selling at this point in time I won't give out the domain names, but I'll describe the major features. I have three sites that I'd sell in total and they are aill about online gamng, MMORPGs to be more specific. Between them they earn me around $300 - $400 a month off adsense and have been reasonably consistant earners over the last 3 or so months. Between them they get around 3000 unique visitors a day and two of them have page ranks of 4 and one has a page rank of 3. The two with page ranks of 4 have been established for around 15 months now and the site with the page rank 3 has only been up and running for about a month but already receives around 600 unquies on average and is already ranking fairly well in google. The main two sites have about 7000 - 8000 inbound links between them according to google and the newer site has around 100.

As for where all the traffic is coming from, well on average between the sites about 40% of it comes from search engines and the remainder is from websites. As for rankings in the SERPS for the main topic keyword for all the sites they aren't in the top 10 but they do rank well usually on the seond or third page, plus the site topics are highly popular topics such that all my sites still receive tons of traffic from being listed on the second pages. Whilst they probably could use a little more SEO on the main keywords they do have many other keywords and pharse that rank well in the top 10 of not just google but the other major search engines as well. All my traffic is natural and I have never run an advertising campaign for it - they are just fan sites so I haven't exactly invested a great deal into them much past the hosting and domain names.

I dont really want to be divulging everything about my sites and I think I have covered most of the major aspects that would be factored in a purchase appraisal. So does anyone have some estimates as to what I might expect such a portfolio to be worth.

[Chuck Brown]

I dont really want to be divulging everything about my sites and I think I have covered most of the major aspects that would be factored in a purchase appraisal. So does anyone have some estimates as to what I might expect such a portfolio to be worth.

Well, of course, your site is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it.

But I think you should be willing to provide the URLs to anyone who is truly interested in buying it. I certainly would never consider buying a site without seeing it first.

Having said that, I don't have anything more constructive to offer as to the actual worth of your sites. :D

c-

[trader]

Well, of course, your site is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it.

But I think you should be willing to provide the URLs to anyone who is truly interested in buying it. I certainly would never consider buying a site without seeing it first.

Having said that, I don't have anything more constructive to offer as to the actual worth of your sites. :D

c-

I would even go beyond that and say without knowing how it got so many links, are they one-way or two-way, what kind of sites are they from, exactly where all traffic is coming from (i.e. is it all from links, typeins, advertising, etc?), and most importantly the URL's, it would be merely just a guess without much basis to arrive at an appraisal value. Without the url's most prospective buyers will not even show interest to ask for more info let along an estimate of value.

[richplay]

I also pay very much attention to SERPs. IMHO, they are one of the most important things, directly related to generating revenue. Be sure to include them in your auction / offer.

[Chris]

Well firstly I guess I should reclarify that at this stage I'm not looking to sell - its jsut something that has crossed my mind, so that is why I'm not giving everyone more infomation about it.

Well, of course, your site is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it.I obviously knew this - but I was looking for a little more of an estimate of what I might expect someone be willing to pay for it assuming pretty standard dispositions of buyers. I can appreciate that it all depends on the competition of buyers as to how much the sites will actually sell for but I mean if I was to try and sell the sites should I expect at least a certain amount.

I would even go beyond that and say without knowing how it got so many links, are they one-way or two-way, what kind of sites are they from, exactly where all traffic is coming from (i.e. is it all from links, typeins, advertising, etc?), and most importantly the URL's, it would be merely just a guess without much basis to arrive at an appraisal value. Without the url's most prospective buyers will not even show interest to ask for more info let along an estimate of value.Well I don't really want to give the URL's out, but my two main sites have been estiblished for a long time and have become fairly popular within the industry, the back links come from all over but they haven't had any real explosion in growth over the last 3 - 6 months, they have kept a fairly stable growth pattern for recent months. If you are worried about them dissappearing after I sold the sites - you can rest assured that they would remain relatively constant in number after the sale as well. As for what type of sites they are from - well they would be from other sites on the same topic for the vast majority - they wouldn't be irrelevent (but I have never really gone through google to check). Also I'm not certain about what you mean by one-way or two- way, but again the vast majority would be links that are linking to my sites with no return link from me. As for where all the traffic is coing from well on average between the sites about 40% of it comes from search engines and the remainder from websites. As for rankings in the SERPS for the main topic keyword for all the sites they aren't in the top 10 but they are highly popular topics such that all my sites still receive tons of traffic from being listed on the second pages. Whilst they probably could use a little more SEO on hte main keywords they do have many other keywords and pharse that rank in the top 10 of not just google but the other major search engines as well. All my traffic is natural and I have never run an advertising campaign for it - they are just fan sites so I haven't exactly invested a great deal into them much past the hosting and domain names.

So with all this infomation can anyone give me a bit more of a rough estimate? Even if it is in the form of $x,xxx or something.

[ezymoneyathome]

Im not a website specialist. But look at the income that these produce. As a business owner i look at detail. If i was buying a business that made 400.00 per month i would be willing to pay 12 times that for it. A years income. Unfortunatly the internet is a high risk business a page could be great one day and down a month later. So i would say 3 to 4 months of the income you bring in would be suitable for any webpage as long as you can show proof before time of purchase.

Ezymoneyathome

[Chris]

So are you saying that I'd only get liek 1-2k for them?

[trader]

Im not a website specialist. But look at the income that these produce. As a business owner i look at detail. If i was buying a business that made 400.00 per month i would be willing to pay 12 times that for it. A years income. Unfortunatly the internet is a high risk business a page could be great one day and down a month later. So i would say 3 to 4 months of the income you bring in would be suitable for any webpage as long as you can show proof before time of purchase. Ezymoneyathome

IMO, your 12-mo income multiple estimate is quite low and 3/4 mos income is incredibly low. I believe the average is actually in the 3 to 8 yrs income range.

The recent record breaking 160 million dollar Marchek purchase of domains was based on 8 times yrly income from what I understand. The latest edition of the www.DNJournal.com has an article which "cited cases of buyers paying 50-100 times annual revenues."

[Chris]

OK so now I'm confused - see I get lots of different reviews from people. Some people tell me my domain names and traffic alone are worth a couple of thousand not to mention the alreayd eexistant revenues. Also whilst I know the interenet is realatively unsecure my sites have preoduced pretty consistant results and aren't one of those sites that is in it for the quik buck - they were made for the joy of making them original and only later were google ads added to cover the hosting costs so I don't see my sites as one of those sites that may flop over night and with 7000+ backlinks between them there is enough traffic coming from those for them to totally fall of the SERPs and still be fairly popular sites.

So I guess I was sort of hoping that they'd be able to pull high $x,xxx at the very minimum or maybe even low $xx,xxx.

[potentialgeek]

All my traffic is natural and I have never run an advertising campaign for it - they are just fan sites so I haven't exactly invested a great deal into them much past the hosting and domain names. I don't really want to be divulging everything about my sites and I think I have covered most of the major aspects that would be factored in a purchase appraisal.

What is Google's position on fan sites with respect to copyright law and Adsense TOS violation? The TOS, if memory serves, says something about intellectual property rights without actually using the word "copyright."

I just visited one fan site that has GoogleAds and apparently many similar sites do, too. Of course the internet is full of fan sites, but are they allowed to run GoogleAds or is it a TOS violation?

Google may not be the strictest enforcer on this, even if it is a violation of their TOS, since they themselves were sued for copyright infringement in the well-publicized, controversial book copying project.

Does anyone know? When I first visited this board, one person was writing about his fan site, saying it had been approved, and it was evidently the only site he used in his Adsense app, not a site added without approval after approval of his submitted site.

I have a few old, virtually abandoned fan sites without GoogleAds and don't want to risk adding the code if it would put my entire account in jeopardy. Has anyone here had experience with this issue, either had a site approved by Google, received a response from them on it, or actually been banned? :eek:

Still not sure I'd add the code even if it isn't a TOS violation. If you make money off other people's images, using Adsense or whatever, but didn't pay for them or get a license, isn't that illegal or at least unethical?

p/g

[chucknews]

It sounds like your real question is not about fan sites but really about using Adsense on web sites that infringe on copyrights. I would say Google has no way of knowing if a particular website has an agreement with the original copyright holder so how could they not allow it unless they requested to see the legal documentation from every person who has a web site that it is not violating any laws.

Is the reason you don't want to risk adding adsense on some pages because you know your violating copyright laws?

My original site I submitted to Google was a fan site and they approved it within a day.

Chuck
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What is Google's position on fan sites with respect to copyright law and Adsense TOS violation? The TOS, if memory serves, says something about intellectual property rights without actually using the word "copyright."

I just visited one fan site that has GoogleAds and apparently many similar sites do, too. Of course the internet is full of fan sites, but are they allowed to run GoogleAds or is it a TOS violation?

Google may not be the strictest enforcer on this, even if it is a violation of their TOS, since they themselves were sued for copyright infringement in the well-publicized, controversial book copying project.

Does anyone know? When I first visited this board, one person was writing about his fan site, saying it had been approved, and it was evidently the only site he used in his Adsense app, not a site added without approval after approval of his submitted site.

I have a few old, virtually abandoned fan sites without GoogleAds and don't want to risk adding the code if it would put my entire account in jeopardy. Has anyone here had experience with this issue, either had a site approved by Google, received a response from them on it, or actually been banned? :eek:

Still not sure I'd add the code even if it isn't a TOS violation. If you make money off other people's images, using Adsense or whatever, but didn't pay for them or get a license, isn't that illegal or at least unethical?

p/g

[Chris]

The fansites I'm running don't breach the TOS of the game - as the both support fan sites and have given us selected material to use for our sites so I assume if the games have no problem with my sites then I fail to see why google would.