Hi Warriors,

Thought I might post something to help out the site flippers here on the forum. Site flipping was all the rage last year but seems to have lost its popularity in recent times. Why? I think it's mainly because people were building small content sites and selling them on straight away for just a few dollars - the market just got too saturated.

When I first started flipping brand new sites I was able to get up to $150 for a 10 page content site - now I'd be lucky to get $60 for the same site. That's only $6 per article (not to mention the time it actually took to put the site together). Because of this many would be site flippers have just given up.

Anyway, I've had some success flipping sites so I thought I'd post a few tips. Plenty of people are doing this already, but for those who don't it's a nice little cash earner - and very easy to do (as long as you have a few basic skills).

What people want (and will pay good money for) is sites that have traffic and are already earning money. They don't have to be earning a lot, and they don't even have to be that old, but flipping brand new, no traffic, no earnings sites just doesn't cut it anymore.

By the way this is what I do myself, so I'm not just talking out of my hat!

Here goes:

Step 1 - Find a niche

Generally I just go to Clickbank and look at the top 5 products in each category - if they have a high gravity then they're obviously selling well so I might choose one and base a site around a particular product. I also take a look at CBTrends and take a look at the top 100 most researched/requested products.

For instance if I chose Fat Loss 4 Idiots my niche site would be based around fat loss (fat loss as opposed to weight loss as I want to keep it as targeted as possible).

Step 2 - Keyword research

I used to use Free Keyword Suggestion Tool From Wordtracker but nowadays I prefer the Google Adwords keyword tool at https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal - both are good though.

Look for keywords that correspond to the product you've chosen.
E.g. if I chose the product 'Reverse Phone Detective' I could use keywords such as:

"reverse phone number look up" - according to the Google keyword tool that exact phrase was searched for 40,500 times in August. Our competition on Google is only 64,000 so this keyword should be easy to rank for.

I choose 10 - 15 long tail keywords that I can base my sites articles around.

Step 3 - Choosing a domain

I would choose a domain name with the keyword in it - for instance if reversephonenumberlookup.com (or .net) was available (it's not) I could use that. 90% of the time I can rank on page 1 of Google for the phrase included in the domain name so it is important to choose carefully.

Step 4 - Create your site

I generally either get a free template from Open Source Web Design. and use NVU, or I use wordpress (I like the templates at Wordpress Themes and Wordpress Themes and create it like a html site (using a static page). I start by writing and adding 10-15 articles to the site - all of them based around a particular searched for keyword.

Next add in your affiliate program. One of your articles should be a good review of this product and I always have a short presell on the main site page as well.


Step 5 - Promote your site

The first thing I do is submit some articles - I usually start with about 10. I submit the majority to Ezinearticles and the rest I submit using Article Post Robot to the top 15-20 directories. Submitting GOOD articles to Ezinearticles will get you traffic and sales from the first week. Use appropriate anchor text and link to both the home page and internal pages.

The next thing I do is social bookmark the site with Social bookmarking service. Fast tagging and posting to all major social websites - SocialMarker.com

Depending on the niche I might also do some forum posting with a link to my site in my sig. I find topic related forums at The largest Message Boards and Forums on the web!

Step 6 - Using Web 2.0 sites

I build a Squidoo lens, a Hubpage and a wiki at Wikidot - Free Wiki Hosting to provide more backlinks (and some extra traffic) for my site. When selling my site I always include the Squidoo lens but I don't think you can transfer a hubpage or wiki.

Step 7 - Site maintenance

I always monitor each site closely to see how traffic and earnings are progressing. If they're not, I submit more articles to Ezinearticles, do more forum posting, blog commenting etc. However if you've chosen a niche with little optimized competition you shouldn't have to do too much to rank your site well. I also keep my Squidoo lens updated as well, because a high-ranking lens with lots of good unique content will add value to the sale. Generally I might only spend 30 minutes a week on maintaining the site.

Step 8 - Sell your site

I only sell on Digitalpoint and Sitepoint - maybe I'm only limiting myself because I haven't tried any others but they work for me. If I've had a steady income for 3 months in a row (or a steadily increasing income) then my site is ready to sell. Generally I get 6-10 times monthly income (a lot more for Adsense though), which may not seem like a lot, but because the site is still quite new it's probably reasonable.

If you wanted to keep the site longer then you would probably earn more, but I like to sell my sites in between 4-6 months.

The whole setting up the site process should only take you a day or two at most - much less if you outsource. Plus you'll get quicker every time you do it.

Although this is basically what I do written out in the simplest of steps, it's still necessary to have some marketing skills - good article marketing and preselling being the main ones, plus of course the ability to create a simple website.

It actually isn't that hard though - this is all information that you probably knew, it's just a matter of putting it into practice. If instant cash is what you're looking for this may not be the method for you, because although you'll have earnings from your sites you won't get the big sale payout for at least 4 months.

Just think though - if you built one site per week or more (and kept it up week after week), in a few months time you could be earning a 6 figure income from site flipping!

All the best,
Martin

P.S. Why not try setting up a site now and try selling it in a few months for a bit of extra cash for Christmas!