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Ask HN: How to Sell a Website

59 points by legrisch ↗ HN
Back in 2018 I started a Website together with two friends. It's a platform for people to create desktop wallpapers – I will not share the URL here. It's based on a feature that was introduced in a major OS back then and I think we still are the only online tool to make use of that feature. The platform is rather successful in terms of users/wallpapers/clicks but last year we needed to implement ads – a step which we tried to prevent from the beginning. It was necessary as the expenses went up quite a lot. We are now living in different cities (different countries even), the website needs a constantly running mac server (which fails often, very often) and we are all pretty busy with other projects.

We agreed to try to sell it and we asked ourselves how selling something like a website would go about?

Where would you find possible buyers?

What data is important to share?

Do we share our code for review?

21 comments

[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 54.5 ms ] thread
new_guy
Don't share your code, someone will just copy it and you won't get a penny.

Try https://flippa.com it's like ebay for websites.

[deleted]
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winternett
I have had a domain for many years I was thinking about using to build a luxury apartment listings or interior design site or app on, but there is a lot of work involved in pushing it forward. I got caught up in other projects and fear that it may just sit around for more time unused...

Was thinking about where to sell the domain name, but that market looks wild with all the scams around on the internet and excessive fees and processes...

Perhaps I may just make a email to send to key real estate companies at some point, but I have no clue on how to properly determine what the domain is worth. :/

galuggus
Cold email people in the same space
carlgreene
I would use flippa.com or microacquire.com depending on the revenue.

I also buy small website businesses and am interested! Email is in my profile

legrisch
Please feel free to reach out to me: email now in profile.
zigzaggy
I don't see an email address in your bio, can you add some contact information? Or at least come back here and post where you listed the site maybe?

Thanks!

legrisch
Please feel free to reach out to me: email now in profile.
_lex
I also might be interested - definitely reach out to me (my email is in my profile).
legrisch
Please feel free to reach out to me: email now in profile.
Brajeshwar
Besides the suggestions in the comments; add a ribbon/banner on the top of your site that it is on Sale. There also used to be lots of forums for buy/sell of domains/businesses. I'm not sure how they are these days.

About 10-years ago, I was approached by someone (who turned out to be a broker) for a pretty common tech-word domain. I sold it kinda cheap. Later, I learnt that the buyer (or final owner) was a one of the world's top tech billion-dollar company.

I think I just ran a simple blog on that for a while with a little banner that sold "Domain on Sale" or something in that line.

1_player
Check out feinternational.com - not affiliated, but I have almost been a client myself and I'd try again with them next time I have a business to sell.
dzab
Yes, they helped sell a Saas website for me and the entire process was professional and closed smoothly.
giarc
To share code for review, just create a few Github gists that you can share. https://gist.github.com/ That allows potential buyers to ensure it's not spaghetti.

I've sold on Flippa and MicroAcquire before. I'd suggest MicroAcquire. Happy to expand on my reasoning if you'd like.

hpagey
it typically goes for about 24 to 36 times your monthly revenue.
pedalpete
Can you give more details on this? What makes the difference between the multiples?
is0tope
Off topic question to those who are the buyers of these "small websites". What exactly is the idea here? Do you buy it up for the domain, or for the underlying business/cash flow? I've heard of this many times but have yet to meet anyone on the purchasing end of it.
htrp
InternetBrands LLC is the enterprise version of this.... so I imagine there are companies who buy these sites and just keep them running. Though IB could easily just vacuum up smaller sites too since most sites could just monetize on the webtraffic alone.
fragmede
It depends on the site being bought, but commonly, it's both, and also an Instagram account w/ followers. Or even just an Amazon account. Basically, instead of starting from scratch to make a site that sells, say, tactical turtlenecks, that ranks first when searching Google for that and when searching Insta, you can just buy the whole thing and have a known amount of revenue/year for an up-front cost.

We all know the drill, you get the itch to start a new project, but starting from scratch just sounds exhausting. If you've got the time and energy to put into a new venture (that the original creator no longer has), then why not take (buy) a stab at something, while standing on the shoulders of someone who's come before you?

If you already have a website selling something and just want the SEO, that's one price, but often times is an operating business including drop shipping (or fulfillment) that will generate you cash starting from day one.