Should I sell?
Hey guys,
I built a website to practice typing, and traffic and revenue from ads has been quite stable. It does not require a lot of work. I maybe spend a total of half a day to 1 day a month working on it. Someone is interested in buying it at 2.5 times the yearly revenue. I currently don't really need the money but at the same time I think it could help me move on, start something new. Do you guys have tips? Do you know blog posts about this topic?
If you're excited about the project and the potential, you should figure out how to move it to the next level. If not, my vote would be to take the payment (as long as it's not an earn out and as long as they don't need you to provide support for an unreasonably long time) to free up the focus and the energy for your next project. Whatever that might be. The more time goes by, the more I realize that my biggest limiting factor is focus...
Best Wishes,
Peter
I'm not super excited about the project and don't feel like taking it to the next level. I enjoy the current situation because the passive income it provides is giving time to focus on other topics. I notably spend a lot of time studying deep learning. Thanks for your feedback.
I'd sell. If you were keen on the project and could see some potential that you could eagerly try for, that's one thing. But you're not, and the sales multiplier is solid.
There's no guarantee that the near-passive income would continue - it could disappear in the space of weeks due to competition, SEO, etc. I've seen this first hand, watching passive income from sites get obliterated by various changes.
Selling gives you money in hand, plus frees up all your time and mental space for the next project.
I agree with those who say sell, for all the reasons they provided. Mind sharing where you found the buyer, or how the buyer found you?
The buyer found me but he did not know exactly how. The search was handled by some contractors..
I would sell.
In the past, I made a mistake of not willing to sell. I was a jerk at the time thinking it's not worth the trouble, but the service ended up shutting down after years. Anything is better than zero and the experience is priceless.
2.5 times the annual revenue sounds like a good deal, it's like financing from your future. If you can invest the cash for your future project, you have a better chance of getting higher ROI for the same money with your elevated experience.
Thanks for sharing your experience. I now have a better idea of what to do.
Congrats on the win! Definitely, sell! You are not inspired to make more money from it. It already costs you 1 day a month (over 2.5 years, that's 15 to 30 days). Let's say it's somewhere on the middle, so 22.5 days, 8h/day, 180 hours of work you are also saving yourself. Also with mobile phones and better speech recognition, my guess is there is going to be less typing in the future. You would be selling high
Hi marcemile, send me the site info if you haven't sold yet, i might be interested. thanks.
JP
Hey @marcelmile, I recently sold one of my side projects. I also didn't really need the money, but it was great to pass it on to someone who wanted to take it to the next level.
If you are not passionate about I would consider selling it as it is just going to sit there.
If you are not sure another tactic you could use is ask for 3x revenue and if they are willing buy at that evaluation then it's win and if not you just keep doing what you are doing.
Remember the ball is in your court, no rush to do anything either way. Happy to talk about this more if you would like. For me it was almost a relief to sell my project in the end :)
Hi Joe, I have a few questions for you. How can I contact you privately? On Gmail I'm marcbelmont.
Hey @marcelmile, you can reach me at joe@tinytracker.co :)
If you do sell, just make sure you have no regrets during the process and after you sign the paperwork.
Also, if your name is attached to the site, make sure it's made clear to the users you have sold the company through a blog post or email newsletter. Heaven forbid something horrible happens afterwards, and your reputation gets trashed in the process.
If you have a passion for the project and see where it could go, then go there, otherwise you will regret it.
If you think the money sounds nice, sell it and enjoy it, and write a blog post about the experience.
I say hold onto the site and use the passive income to support yourself while you learn about other topics.
My first thoughts about it would be to follow your guts. 2.5 times the yearly revenues mean that you will have that money guaranteed, opposed to what will be the state of your service in 2.5 years.
If you believe this niche is a huge opportunity and the current state is just the beginning, then continue to pursue your work, but otherwise (if you don't think it will be, if you don't WANT to continue working on it), maybe selling it is a good way.
TLDR: Do what you want ;)
Can you link the website here? I want to see it for research purposes.
It's hard to say whether or not I would sell the site without knowing the actual dollar figures. (is it a stable $2/day or $200/day?)
Given that there is interest in the product, what are you giving-up by selling? (is there any IP that you would need to give up in exchange for the sale?)
Are there any small tweaks that you could do to increase the passive revenue? (e.g. changing ad placement? )
Sell. Looks like you're not excited about the project anymore, so take that money and invest it in the new project you'll be excited about.
Selling at that price sounds like a good deal.
This.
If it will help you focus on what you really want to do, I would recommend selling. 2.5 times the yearly revenue sounds reasonable.
Thanks for your feedback. I also think it's a reasonable price.
This comment was deleted 9 years ago