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What are your thoughts on buying established, high earning sites as opposed to building up your own?

by high_plains_drifter
32 replies
i would love to earn money from a website that could pay for my future travels around the world but i dont have the money now to start marketing my own sites, plus i dont have the skills to create my own sites, plus i have about 1 hour per day of my own time to use the internet (full time job, gym pretty much takes up the whole day)

So it got me thinking what my options are, one skill that i do have is that i can save money very well, i dont drink, do drugs and can easily save a lot of my wages.

I could save roughly $10,000 per year, probably more. So maybe in 3 years i could by an established site earning a good monthly income. To travel i would only need $600-800 per month.

What are you thoughts on doing something like this? Is there a big risk of getting scammed? Would the site be popular enough to recoup my investment......
#building #buying #earning #established #high #opposed #sites #thoughts
  • Profile picture of the author sbucciarel
    Banned
    Of course it's a good plan if ...
    the site revenue claimed is legitimate and
    you do all the things necessary to maintain traffic and revenue.

    Very few sites are completely set and forget.
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      Originally Posted by sbucciarel View Post

      Of course it's a good plan if ...
      the site revenue claimed is legitimate and
      you do all the things necessary to maintain traffic and revenue.

      Very few sites are completely set and forget.
      well i would like to learn and continue to work on the site as i travel so it doesnt need to be set and forget.

      I was just looking at some high end sites on flippa and some seem very appealing. Im not much of an expert so i could be wrong :/

      I guess ill put my plan into action and start saving for a big website.

      What about buying several smaller websites in the $10,000 range, im guessing more sites = more work, more expenses

      BUT

      you get multiple revenue streams for backup

      @thebitbotdotcom ye i would love to create my own and have it go big and earn me a ton of money, but i have to be realistic, i simply dont have the time in the day, nor the knowledge or skills to make it happen.

      I really need to think about my future now because i dont want to stuck in the same boring job in London making someone else richer everyday.

      I want to travel and live in many different countries (im currently traveling Asia) and i really want to live here for some years as its so cheap.
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      • Profile picture of the author Black Hat Cat
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        Originally Posted by high_plains_drifter View Post

        @thebitbotdotcom ye i would love to create my own and have it go big and earn me a ton of money, but i have to be realistic, i simply dont have the time in the day, nor the knowledge or skills to make it happen.
        Then how are you going to have the time in the day and the knowledge to keep it earning if you buy a site?
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    • Profile picture of the author Hanz
      Originally Posted by sbucciarel View Post

      Of course it's a good plan if ...
      the site revenue claimed is legitimate and
      you do all the things necessary to maintain traffic and revenue.

      Very few sites are completely set and forget.
      Some sites can be sort of set and forget but that happens only when it's actually stable on page 1 of Googlefor a fantastic keyword bringing in hordes of traffic. The sites doing this though are many years old and Google rewards seniority. For example, there's a Google blog sitting on page 1 of Google for a monstrous keyword. The blog sits there on page 1 everyday and never moves. The keyword attracts thousands in traffic daily. This blog sits ahead of much bigger and better sites. The reason it sits there is probably because it's about 13 years old. It's attracted backlinks naturally overtime from other sites. But I guess it being a google blog also helps.
      I wish I had bought a ton of hot domains back in 1995.
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  • Profile picture of the author thebitbotdotcom
    I prefer to build up my own. That way I know what makes it tick. you don't really need skills to launch a website these days. You just need a domain, hosting and a content management script. The you just add articles. I believe that sbucciarel sells them...
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  • Profile picture of the author derekwong28
    Your plan is viable but is also very dangerous. The market is full of scammers nowadays and unless you are very experienced, you could well be scammed. I would suggest that you start buying smaller sites now and gain experience along the way. That way, you will find out what works for you and what doen't.

    I did buy a package of sites on eBay for $35,000 a few years. For all intents and purposes, the listing looked like a scam but I went ahead anyway. I then went on to recoup the cost within a few months and it forms the core of my business model today, although the original sites no longer make much money.

    Derek
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      Originally Posted by derekwong28 View Post

      Your plan is viable but is also very dangerous. The market is full of scammers nowadays and unless you are very experienced, you could well be scammed. I would suggest that you start buying smaller sites now and gain expereince along the way. That way, you will find out what works for you and what doen't.

      I did buy a package of sites on eBay for $35,000 a few years. For all intents and purposes, the listing looked like a scam but I went ahead anyway. I then went on to recoup the cost within a few months and it forms the core of my business model today, although the original sites no longer make much money.

      Derek
      thanks for the info. It comforting to know someone has actually done what i am thinking (ps i never knew you could buy sites on ebay )

      Ye i guess when im back home working ill buy my first website for <$5000 and ill get to grips with whats involved.

      Then ill just move up the price bracket.

      Maybe i could hire a company or freelancer to do the buying for me.

      I guess if i use escrow there isnt much chance of being scammed right?
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      • Profile picture of the author derekwong28
        Originally Posted by high_plains_drifter View Post

        thanks for the info. It comforting to know someone has actually done what i am thinking (ps i never knew you could buy sites on ebay )

        Ye i guess when im back home working ill buy my first website for <$5000 and ill get to grips with whats involved.

        Then ill just move up the price bracket.

        Maybe i could hire a company or freelancer to do the buying for me.

        I guess if i use escrow there isnt much chance of being scammed right?

        Most of the listings of eBay are scams, but occasionally there are a few good ones there. Another place to look would be Digital Point, but again it is full of scammers. But you will probably need to pay your "school fees" on this. I found that over 20% of my purchases did not perform well or were outright scams. That is why having some experiece in building your websites would certainly be useful.

        It is said that the ballpark price for established sites is around 10 times monthly earnings. The main reason why the purchase price is often so low is because mainly of volatility and also the high degree of scamming that is going on.

        Besides fraudulent earning claims, there were other nasty stuff I have encountered as well e.g.

        1. The seller did not have the right to sell the site in the first place so that the sale was reversed e.g. domains that were stolen by hacking.
        2. Seller had coded in a backdoor in the site so that he could shut the site down at will and extort the new owner at will.
        3. While installing the site for me, the seller accessed the server and purposefully caused damage to the other sites on the server.

        I would recommend escrow for any transaction above $500. However, once you have released the funds, it is not usually possible to get them back. Therefore, I recommend that you select a suitable inspection period of at least 3-7 days. If in doubt, reject the site.

        There are definitely a number of website brokers around but I don't know which ones are good. Best of luck.

        Derek
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  • Profile picture of the author Justin W
    I wouldn't jump right into buying expensive websites unless you are very familiar with the process. The idea of buying a website that's already established with a high PR sounds nice, but remember, you can create your own established website. It may take time to create it, but it's a better option than spending money you otherwise need. If you work at it, you can bring a brand new site to at least a PR3 within 3-4 months.
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      Originally Posted by TruthW87 View Post

      I wouldn't jump right into buying expensive websites unless you are very familiar with the process. The idea of buying a website that's already established with a high PR sounds nice, but remember, you can create your own established website. It may take time to create it, but it's a better option than spending money you otherwise need. If you work at it, you can bring a brand new site to at least a PR3 within 3-4 months.
      how can i get familiar with the process if i dont buy websites hehe

      Im aware that i could create my own website, i own 3 WP blog already but they are just for fun however i dont have the skills or knowledge to create a fully custom site.

      Plus as i said i have about 1 hour per day to use the internet.

      So when you say i could create my own site instead its actually not true, i would have to get it designed and coded by someone else which would cost me a lot of money, plus promotion and SEO. When i add it all up i dont think buying an established site will cost that much more.
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  • Profile picture of the author tpw
    It is cheaper to build one than it is to buy one...

    If you don't know much about building a site or getting the ball rolling on bringing traffic to your site, then you would probably be best to ignore my advice altogether...

    I have been doing this web thing for a long time, and I am pretty good at it...

    Your experience will likely be different from mine...
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  • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
    Originally Posted by Chris Kent View Post

    You actually have a good point. It's nice that one can go from rags to riches with internet marketing but many often advise to invest in a few tools.

    what do you mean by this? what are the tools?

    you mean senuke, xrumer etc?

    Im glad you also are thinking about buying some sites too, i wish you the best of luck, hopefully you can give me some tips in the future

    and yes you are right it is a comforting thought that i can buy websites/businesses that will earn me good money so i can quit my job and travel.

    Though ill probably work to earn money to outsource loads of SEO.

    Im probably going to sound like a noob, and probably am completely wrong but it really doesnt sound that hard.

    Well apart from saving up for 4-5 years to build my portfolio of sites
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  • Profile picture of the author fort21
    hi,
    wouldnt you be taking a big risk paying huge amount for a website if you are not even competence in it. How are you going to maintain it? I will at least wanna be proficient in IM before I look into buying website. but when I am proficient I might as well set it up myself??? bottom line for me is that I would only want to be in something I know even in brick and mortar business.

    cheers and a nice weekend!
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      Originally Posted by fort21 View Post

      hi,
      wouldnt you be taking a big risk paying huge amount for a website if you are not even competence in it. How are you going to maintain it? I will at least wanna be proficient in IM before I look into buying website. but when I am proficient I might as well set it up myself??? bottom line for me is that I would only want to be in something I know even in brick and mortar business.

      cheers and a nice weekend!
      you can outsource most thing pretty cheap these days, server maintenance, content creation, SEO. All can be done cheaply.

      Most established sites that i have been looking at (5 years premature i know but im still interested to see how much profit these sites make) require little maintenance, just answering emails etc.

      They are well established websites which means all the hardwork has been done, the traffic and revenue is there.

      Again i could be wrong, but this is what i can tell from the sites being sold
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      • Profile picture of the author rhinocl
        The advice you got to start small was good. Instead of waiting three years and spending $30,000 on one site, save up for a month or two and buy a site for $200-300. Then scale up the income--that way you will have built up your knowledge and skill by the time you are ready to purchase a more established site. If you buy a clunker you can start over with another $200. If you get a winner you can still buy a few cheap sites on your way to getting the big one, and if they do well enough you will never need to shell out the $30,000 so you can get a new car, or a new girlfriend, or stick it in a Roth Ira.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mr.S
    In my opinion one of the most important things is learn how IM works. You can buy site that makes money but if you don't continue doing what the previous owner was doing the site will start looking its position and eventually you will stop making any money. Once you know how IM works and you know what works in your niche it is much easier to succeed. Just remember choose a right niche and stick with it. I would recommend building your own website. Please do not start 10 different project because you will most likely fail. Start one or two and stick with them. You can outsource a lot of task so it is not that hard. Good luck and happy traveling.
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      Originally Posted by rhinocl View Post

      The advice you got to start small was good. Instead of waiting three years and spending $30,000 on one site, save up for a month or two and buy a site for $200-300. Then scale up the income--that way you will have built up your knowledge and skill by the time you are ready to purchase a more established site. If you buy a clunker you can start over with another $200. If you get a winner you can still buy a few cheap sites on your way to getting the big one, and if they do well enough you will never need to shell out the $30,000 so you can get a new car, or a new girlfriend, or stick it in a Roth Ira.
      excellent advice , you know, i was just thinking about dropping a thread asking 'if you had $200 to spend what would you spend it on'

      im thinking of buy one of those niche sites and outsourcing some SEO and just see what happens.

      Is this a good or bad plan?

      And yes you are right, i could have many sites making smaller profits that could add up to buying a bigger site

      Originally Posted by derekwong28 View Post

      Most of the listings of eBay are scams, but occasionally there are a few good ones there. Another place to look would be Digital Point, but again it is full of scammers. But you will probably need to pay your "school fees" on this. I found that over 20% of my purchases did not perform well or were outright scams. That is why having some experiece in building your websites would certainly be useful.

      It is said that the ballpark price for established sites is around 10 times monthly earnings. The main reason why the purchase price is often so low is because mainly of volatility and also the high degree of scamming that is going on.

      Besides fraudulent earning claims, there were other nasty stuff I have encountered as well e.g.

      1. The seller did not have the right to sell the site in the first place so that the sale was reversed e.g. domains that were stolen by hacking.
      2. Seller had coded in a backdoor in the site so that he could shut the site down at will and extort the new owner at will.
      3. While installing the site for me, the seller accessed the server and purposefully caused damage to the other sites on the server.

      I would recommend escrow for any transaction above $500. However, once you have released the funds, it is not usually possible to get them back. Therefore, I recommend that you select a suitable inspection period of at least 3-7 days. If in doubt, reject the site.

      There are definitely a number of website brokers around but I don't know which ones are good. Best of luck.

      Derek
      thankyou very much for this information, i didnt realise the market was so rife for this sort of stuff

      Originally Posted by Mr.S View Post

      In my opinion one of the most important things is learn how IM works. You can buy site that makes money but if you don't continue doing what the previous owner was doing the site will start looking its position and eventually you will stop making any money. Once you know how IM works and you know what works in your niche it is much easier to succeed. Just remember choose a right niche and stick with it. I would recommend building your own website. Please do not start 10 different project because you will most likely fail. Start one or two and stick with them. You can outsource a lot of task so it is not that hard. Good luck and happy traveling.
      yes i will have to learn, but i guess i can learn as i go, i read someone say that its better to actually action a plan and learn from it compared to just reading a load of stuff and never actually doing anything about it.

      Maybe i will start my idea of what i said earlier in the post, buy one of these small adsense niche sites and outsource the seo and see what happens.
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  • Profile picture of the author sitefurnace
    I think your plan is more than do-able. What you are talking about has always tempted me as I have around $15,000 that I could invest (if I could convince my wife!)

    Unfortunately she is very sceptical about my plan for world domination, but here's why I think it makes sense.

    On average you get back around 10% of your initial investment EVERY MONTH! you're lucky to get 5% a YEAR on any other investment in the real world or a bank account. You can double your money in around 10 months.

    If you look at buying websites as an investor then those figures are incredible by anyones standards. Of course there is a higher level of risk but as with any investment risk can be managed.

    Making a profitable website is not easy at all and requires either a deep understanding with consistent effort, or luck. I have made around a dozen 'adsense' sites in the past and out of those only one has ever come to anything. You can do all the keyword research in the world but at the end of the day you never know if you will be successful until you spend months building and promoting the site, and hope that the google god looks fondly on you.

    It makes sense to let someone else do this hard work for you. A site that can show a genuine profit and sells for 10 times its monthly income is an absolute steal, the testing has been done for you, the puzzle is solved, just get your cheque book out buy it and go do something else instead.

    Manage the risk by starting off small and learning about 'due diligence' Perhaps spread your eggs and buy in different niches for example. Maybe buy different sites that earn their income in different ways, buy an adsense site and buy a site making its money from affiliate sales for instance.

    Maybe even employ a third party to take a look for you and check it out, there's plenty of very experienced warriors that would be happy to help you I'm sure. Think like a business man and use your money to get jobs done that you are not skilled to do yourself.

    It's definatley not without risk but you can learn to minimise it. Look at these people that buy businesses. They do all kinds of analysis and checks, it's a skill in itself. Understanding how the different sites work will definatley help you but just get stuck in with a small site to start with and work up.

    If you want $800 per month for your travels (my dream is to do exactly the same thing by the way and it is incredible how well you can live in certain parts of the world on that kind of money) then you would need to spend around $8000, perhaps buy one for $4000, one for $2000 and two for $1000.

    I would aim a little higher though, spend a bit more, and look to generate a bit more income and then re-invest the extra income into some sort of monthly 'upkeep' That may be getting backlinks built, getting articles written or whatever keeps the site alive and well. You never know it may even grow it into something much bigger.

    There are loads of threads about how selling sites on flippa is really hard right now, no-one seems to be getting the price they would like. Now is a BUYERS market by the sounds of it so go for it! Oh and while youre at it, can you convince my wife for me so I can do the same thing!

    Good luck
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      @sitefurnace im glad you are thinking the same as me.

      Alot of the things you say are true, i have my plan now, i have decided to go ahead with it.

      Im going to start off small as many people have suggested. Ive got $10k to invest at the moment, when im back from traveling, and have a steady income im going to use this to purchase some sites and use some of my monthly wages for content and seo.

      I will most definitely hiring, or maybe even someone will help me for free from these forums to assist me in analyzing the sites.

      Yes i would really want to be earning $1k + in profit per month before i moved to Asia. Though i like to be safe so i would probably wait until i was in the $2k+/month range. Then i could live like a king over here.

      I could live cheap and reinvest in more projects.

      I guess once you start making profits with sites it gets much easier to raise the capital to expand your portfolio
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    • Profile picture of the author Thomas De
      Very good post sitefurnance. Another option is to use good running projects for new ideas and source out all the work like installing the cms, write and post the articles and backlinking. With this strategy you could have your money back within 6 months.
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  • Profile picture of the author sampip
    From my experience if you are going to make a site from scratch and watch it grow you will need to have a lot of patience and don't give up with it.
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  • Profile picture of the author MassiveMarketer
    There are advantages on both sides. It's up to you to weigh how it can help if you get an established site or start a new one and build its ranking.
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      Originally Posted by MassiveMarketer View Post

      There are advantages on both sides. It's up to you to weigh how it can help if you get an established site or start a new one and build its ranking.
      i hope i can do both really, i think i will purchase a few <$1k sites and then the profit from those will pay for the setup and outsourcing costs of the new sites.
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      • Profile picture of the author addice
        It's best that you do your own blog because:

        • You have full control of how you want your business to be packaged.
        • The list of users you have (like guest bloggers, administrators etc)
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  • Profile picture of the author DrewG
    See, I almost feel like you have to build an established, high earning site before you can go out and buy one.

    Because once you know how to build one, you'll know what to look for when you're browsing Flippa for your next purchase.

    I find it pretty easy to spot the fakes from the real earners now in Flippa, because I know what to look for. If you believe and can identify when a site is legit and will continue to bring in consistent auto-pilot income, then it's a good buy.
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    • Profile picture of the author high_plains_drifter
      Originally Posted by addice View Post

      It's best that you do your own blog because:

      • You have full control of how you want your business to be packaged.
      • The list of users you have (like guest bloggers, administrators etc)
      good points but i think of it the other way, buying an established site means i already have a business packaged that is profitable. Obviously when i buy it i will have full control over this.

      i think you second point can easily be built up quickly if you have an established website, i think people are probably more likely going to want to write and work for an established site as opposed to a new one.

      Originally Posted by Drew Castle View Post

      See, I almost feel like you have to build an established, high earning site before you can go out and buy one.

      Because once you know how to build one, you'll know what to look for when you're browsing Flippa for your next purchase.

      I find it pretty easy to spot the fakes from the real earners now in Flippa, because I know what to look for. If you believe and can identify when a site is legit and will continue to bring in consistent auto-pilot income, then it's a good buy.
      ye good point, few people have mentioned this, ive taken all your advice and i will start off small (as i said <$1k sites to start) just to get my feet wet a little before going after some larger sites.

      I may need your help then if you are good at spotting the fakes
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  • Profile picture of the author forfun_cash
    Think about this, why would people want to sell their profitable sites? Either it's not as profitable as it's claimed to be... or it takes to much work to maintain.
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  • Profile picture of the author Ephrils
    I've just started looking into buying established sites. I'm still going to actively seek good niches for other possible ideas, but I think even a small investment on a site already proven to make a little money can take a lot of the pressure off to start from scratch and build something from the ground up. Experience in doing that at least once will definitely help since it's hard to maintain anything for long without some SEO love. I'm don't have as big of a budget as the OP, and I think at that amount there isn't a whole lot to lose from trying out a few sites.

    I definitely agree some kind of SEO knowledge, that you've proven to yourself works, is a factor here. You don't want to buy a site making money then accidentally run it into the ground because you were unable to improve/maintain it's rankings.
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