Buyers: How You Can Capitalize on a Website’s Potential

By | August 12, 2011

We at WebsiteBroker spend a lot of time focusing on the domain sellers, and rightly so. Domain sellers are here to make serious money, and in many cases they can use some good tips to ensure that they do.

But every domain transaction is a two-way street: without the buyer, there’s no money to be made.

And without any money to be made on the buyer’s part, well, there’s no transaction…period.

That’s why it’s important for buyers to realize how they can capitalize on a website’s potential, even if it means applying the old phrase “one man’s garbage is another man’s treasure.” We know, you’ve heard it before – but if you keep reading, you might just learn how to make that old axiom a reality for you.

Quick Tips: Recognizing a Site That’s Been Underperforming

One of the best ways you can capitalize on a website’s potential is to simply find a site that’s been underperforming – whether it’s due to bad management, an owner who didn’t realize the site’s potential, or not enough marketing. Here is a bunch of ways you might be able to tell an undervalued site.

  • Bad owner: When you see a domain that is listed high in SEO rankings but is monetizing none of the organic traffic, there’s a good chance the owner is just bad or simply doesn’t know how to improve.
  • Under-advertising: Does a website hit on all cylinders? Maybe it just needs a quick, stiff kick in the butt with some targeted advertising.
  • High traffic, bad conversions: If a site has a lot of traffic but converts none of it, then the site itself needs revamping, not the domain name.
  • Over-monetizing: If a site turns off too many potential visitors because it’s monetized too much, then cutting back on the ads and money-making bells and whistles might bring people back in through the front door.

Of course, we’d be remiss if we didn’t also address something else domain buyers need to consider: which domains should be avoided.

Websites to Avoid

Here are a few signs of websites that you should probably leave to more experienced buyers:

  • Bad niche: Maybe the website has everything that it needs and it’s in a bad niche. Maybe the domain name screams “Buy me!” until you research the market that would support it. Whatever it is, beware of a bad niche – niches that are too specific or too broad are frequent culprits here.
  • Low SEO rankings: Sure, SEO rankings aren’t everything. But you’ll have to put in some good effort in order to turn around a website that has bad search engine optimization as opposed to a site that’s ready to roll on Google.
  • Good owner: Maybe the site has had an experienced owner who simply couldn’t make the domain or website work. If that’s the case, it’s best to move on.

Whatever your specialty – SEO, recognizing the best niches, market research, whatever – it’s important to leverage your skills properly when buying a new domain. Buy a domain you can be confident in. The less you have to tweak after you buy it at WebsiteBroker.com, the better.