Welcome to part one of my whopping 11 part site buying guide.

Each part of this site buying masterclass will explain one factor that you will need to understand before purchasing a website. If you use these 11 factors then you can avoid buying a duff, or being ripped off.

Buying Websites Guide part one - EVERYTHING CHANGES

When you buy a site it will operate differently than when the previous owner ran it!

It may be the same site, but there will be some changes that you have to be aware of. The most important of these will be links from within the previous owners network.

For example… I was offered a football transfers website. It had decent traffic and ranked well in Google, but the majority of the links were from sites from the same owner. If I had bought the site I would have lost over 3,000 sitewide links overnight.
It is fair to presume that this would have a major effect on the sites rankings and traffic, and therefore ultimately it would effect the revenue.

So when you are considering a site purchase, make sure you do a WHOIS check to see if the owner has any other sites that are linking to the site.

Also, note that it is not un-common for a site to be placed back in the sandbox after purchase. Many people believe this is due to the WHOIS details being changed, so don’t rely solely on search engine traffic to get a sites value.

Also check if the site has any exclusive deals that may be void for a new owner. For example, perhaps the owner has a lot of power in the industry, but if that same power does not transfer across to the new owner then current deals may vanish. This applies for affiliate deals, content deals, ad deals, link trades etc….

If the site has moderators or staff, then check to see if they intend to stay onboard. This can be tricky if the current owner doesn’t want to tell the staff that he/she may be selling the site.

Finally, if you are purchasing a blog then beware of blogs that are built on the owners reputation or personality. For example, if a blogger has a distinct personality that his/her readers enjoy, then you are potentially going to alienate that audience when you take over. In this example it would greatly de-value the site, and it may be worth trying to get the old owner to continue blogging for x months.

Dean

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