Selling websites online is a very profitable way of making money in this digital age but the biggest challenge lies in getting that website to a profitable position for the potential buyer.
But you can weather this challenge if you are able to learn how to optimize and increase the value of a website. And that’s what am going to teach you in this article as I encourage you to keep reading to the very end.
In the meantime, I have a related article that will show you a step-by-step guide on how to build a website and make money online and you can read it via How To Build A Website And Make Money Online.
How to make money by selling websites.
To earn money by selling websites you must be able to study and understand the factors that influence the value of a website and in so doing be able to increase that value before you put it in the marketplace for sale.
And with that fact in mind, I will use the outline below to walk through the basic steps of making money online by selling websites which are:
- Study and understand the factors that influence the value of a website.
- Increase the website value.
- Gather your traffic and financial reports.
- Make sure all necessary data applicable to the website is transferable.
- Have an option for the website’s well-being after the sale.
- Find a website broker to help you sell your website.
1. Study and understand the factors that influence the value of a website.
Before you can be able to sell a website online and make money you must study and understand the factors that influence the value of a website which are:
- Niche or industry.
- Traffic.
- SEO (Search Engine Optimization).
- Monetization programs.
- Find a website broker to do the job.
Niche or industry.
The niche or industry of your website is the very first factor that will determine the value it will be placed. But the problem is that popular niches tend to have so much competition, so if you will be depending on free traffic sources then it will take a longer period of time for your website to start getting organic traffic.
But if you will be working on a budget then setting aside a reasonable amount of money will help you to run paid adverts that will begin bringing traffic to your website. In that case, you should settle for a popular niche.
But if you will depending on free traffic sources like search engines and social shares then you will have to exercise patience and while doing so write original and helpful content to start ranking on search engines.
Some of the popular niches are health and fitness, food, personal finance, business and marketing, travel, lifestyle, etc.
Personal finance and food blogs are estimated to make close to $10,000 every month.
Traffic.
Traffic implies the number of people coming to your blog and it plays a very important role in determining the value of a website.
If you have more people coming to your website, there will be the tendency for most of them to see your Ads and help you make money from impressions and also click them to help you make money from clicks, and this, in turn, will help you to generate leads and increase your conversion sales.
And for that reason, you must be able to figure out the traffic sources you are going to use to bring visitors to your website.
The choice to make here is between organic (free) and paid traffic sources.
Organic traffic takes a long time for new blogs that are able to write original and helpful content. Whereas if you are using paid traffic it will be possible to quickly bring people to your blog. But then the latter is cost-effective.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization).
Any website you want to sell and make money online must adhere to effective SEO strategies that include but are not limited to quality backlinks, fast loading time, clear navigation, etc. We will go a little into this when we will be seeing how to increase a website’s value.
Monetization programs.
Another factor to consider when trying to determine the value of a website is the kind of monetization programs that will fit it.
And you must ensure any monetization program you are going to use is making so much money for the website.
Google AdSense, affiliate marketing, selling digital products, etc are very good monetization programs to consider.
Find a website broker to do the job.
If you are still unable to study and understand the value of a website, bringing in a website broker to do the job might be a great idea. And who are website brokers? in case you might ask.
Website brokers are simply individuals or companies who sell websites. And having been in the business for a long time they really understand the kind of websites that move most in the market, hence they understand the value of a website.
2. Increase the website value.
Now that you’ve understood the value of a website, the next step is to aim at increasing that value, and below are the ways you can do so:
- Optimize your website.
- Devise a content strategy.
- Utilize several traffic methods.
- Use various monetization services.
Optimize your website.
The very first step toward increasing your website value is to optimize it.
By all measures, it is going to be very hard to bring traffic to a website that takes so long to load when visitors are trying to visit it. Google’s recommendation for an average website load speed is 2 seconds.
So to ensure your website loads appropriately you must do the following:
- Get a fast web hosting service.
- Use a fast theme.
- Use fewer plugins.
- Make sure you have an image optimizer plugin that will resize the image and do other things to prevent the site from being too heavy.
Besides website speed, there are other optimizations you need to do on your website which are:
- Use a menu to give your website a clear navigation that will make people find their way around your website.
- Add an About Page that will enable people to understand the mission and purpose of the website.
- Add a contact Page that will make it possible to reach out to you and whoever will own the website after it is sold.
- Get external and internal backlinks to help your website establish authority in your niche.
Devise a content strategy.
Your content strategy must begin with “keyword research” which will enable you to find the queries you are going to answer in your articles. And you must ensure that those articles are not copied and pasted from other blogs but rather original and helpful content.
Even if you are going to carry out research on other blogs before you write your content, make sure you add value based on some experiences you have had so far concerning the topic you are writing on.
You must also be able to have a content format as well as decide how often you will create content on your website.
For example, here on Taculia 9ja, I create a minimum of 5 content every week.
Utilize several traffic methods.
There are several ways and methods you can employ to bring traffic to your website. Basically, the two methods of getting traffic to a website are organic (free) and paid methods.
The free method as the name implies is not going to involve any financial expenditures but then it will take a longer time before it begins to yield positive results.
But paid advertising will help you to quickly bring traffic to your website, but since it is cost-effective you must therefore decide to roll with it based on your financial strength.
Search engine marketing and social media shares are the common free traffic methods, while Google AdSense and social media Ads are the paid form of traffic. Google AdSense is very effective but expensive but if you are using Facebook Ads, you will have the opportunity of spending a minimum of $1 a day.
Use various monetization services.
Since you are going to submit a financial report which shows how much your website is making already before someone can buy it you must use various monetization services that will bring money to the website.
Below are some of the monetization services you can get started with:
- Google AdSense.
- Affiliate marketing.
- Guest posting.
- Selling physical and digital products.
3. Gather your traffic and financial reports.
The only way to convince potential website buyers is to show them a well-formulated traffic and financial report that will go a long way to add credibility and effectively communicate the value of your website.
There are some tools out there that will help you to gather a statistical report of your website traffic and Google Analytics is the one I recommend.
It is going to give you both traffic reports and Google AdSense earnings if you are using it.
If you have other income sources, you need to detail the profit and loss statement for your business’s revenue as well as what you have spent in a specific period. Generally, most website brokers will require 6 to 12 months of reports when you approach them to sell your website for you.
4. Make sure all necessary data applicable to the website is transferable.
When building a website you want to sell, make sure every data outside you are going to use that pertains t the website is transfeable.
For example, if you will be using Google AdSense to monetize the website, make sure you open a separate email address and use it as a Google AdSense account instead of adding it to your existing Google AdSense account where you have already monetized other sites with Google AdSense.
5. Have an option for the website well-being after the sale.
After selling the website it is going to be left for the buyer to choose the well-being of the site henceforth. This includes managing the website, creating new and updating old content.
I he offers for you to continue doing so, then an agreement must be reached on whether he will add an additional amount or hire and pay you as a freelancing service.
You will be more relieved if he doesn’t make the offer but go ahead to do everything afterward on the site or better still hire someone else.
6. Find a website broker to help you sell your website.
There are lots of website brokers that will help you to sell your website in the website marketplace and my candid advice is to avoid independent website brokers so you don’t end up with someone hijacking your website.
A few website brokers I recommend are:
- Flippa.
- Empire flippers.
- Motion invest.
Now before you settle for any website broker make sure you consider the following factors:
- Do they provide the means of showing your traffic and financial data, revenue operating cost, etc to a potential buyer?
- Who is going to pay for the domain transfer affter the website is bought?
- Who is going to provide the legal documents that will bind the buyer and seller?
- Do they have enough buyers to whom they relate accordingly?
- How about the security measures that will be implemented when the transfer is being carried out?
Wanna learn other ways to make money online aside from selling websites, then read the article: How To Make Money Online.
