DomainInvesting.com

I wanted to write about this before, but the news of AOL’s acquisition of TechCrunch motivated me to post this general question: At approximately what revenue multiple do you sell a website that has a business operating on it?

Over the past few months, a number of individuals and companies have made inquires on a couple of my websites. I’ve always replied that I have no interest in selling, because for me, it’s silly to sell a revenue generating website that has nearly zero overhead. On the flip side of this is the fact that there should really be a point at which I would sell the website and domain name, since the ultimate goal is to make money.

Now I know there are LOTS of considerations to take into account when selling a website (like loss of revenue and tax considerations), but at what type of revenue multiple should a company be willing to sell a website? This is a very vague question because it would be a very different answer for a company with an operating loss, tiny profit margin, or 100% profit margin, but I look forward to seeing what you think.

I’m out of town this weekend, and I hope you are enjoying some time off from work. Big week coming up.

A few people have posted comments asking for   rationale for some of my domain names’ asking prices. It’s a combination of gut instinct, comps, and even market saturation. Sometimes I want to sell a name quickly, and will price it accordingly. Other times, a rapid sale isn’t necessary, so I will price a name on the high side and slowly reduce the price, letting buyers figure out a fair price between my listed price and bottom price.   I don’t always sell names at the list price, but I sell a lot of domain names.

Just to give you an idea of my company’s domain sales for 2010, the average sales price for me has been $2,616.36. This includes everything from selling names as cheaply as “6 hand registered names for $100 total” to a number of large sales.

I have a great restaurant recommendation for you for the next time you’re in Paris. You’ll want to visit Le Hide near Champs Elysees. Not only will you have a great dinner, but you won’t break the bank either.

Thanks to Fairytale Brownies of Brownies.com & Brownie.com for the box of awesome brownies they sent me. I let them know that Brownie.com wasn’t resolving anywhere, and I hope the DNS fix will bring them additional business this holiday season.

If you like drinking good beer, I have a suggestion for a beer you might want to try. The other night, I had a bottle of Supplication from the Russian River Brewing Company. It was the most expensive beer I’ve had ($22 for a 12.7 oz), but it was great. You can probably get it in stores for $10/beer, and it’s worth a try.