Some Tips:

- Screen shots are easily Photoshopped! Developers have tools like Firebug that fake what appears on the page itself.
- Treat all seller’s claims with scepticism. If you can’t verify something then play it safe and presume it ain’t true.
- Sellers often show videos or use screen sharing software so you can see – live – what’s on their screen. But even this can be faked relatively easily (by changing a small “hosts” text file!
- Sellers often claim hidden perks – cash payments or benefits in kind. If they are not regular incomes that appear in the statements, can be proven and can be quantified then their value contribution is safely ignored.
- Off the record “cash” income is not something that should ever be assumed as part of the profit.
- When approximations, estimations or projections need to be made, make them on the conservative side in your favour.
- Learn to distinguish the site-facts from the seller’s opinions.
- Use a PPC spying program to see if the traffic was possibly paid for rather than the free traffic claimed.
- Consistency: I made $500 last month is not the same as I make $500 a month. Too often sellers try to project a particular month’s profit as a steady regular income.
- Check the figures behind “average income”. Sellers choose a favourable time frame for averages. Compute what that the average would be over six months, a year and three years.
- Don’t assume scalability. A site spending $50 in Adwords Pay Per Click per month and making a profit of $100 won’t automatically make $100,000 if the ad spend increases to $50,000 (even if Adwords can really send that much of traffic).

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