Buying and selling websites as become a strong emerging market and we’re seeing more users than ever participating. With web estate only a few years old, it is hard to understand exactly what’s going on with the industry as there are no official reporting standards for the marketplaces, brokers, agents and individuals involved. One thing that has remained consistent from the start is buyers want the numbers, and they want the trends. Justin Gilchrist, owner of Flipfilter.com and Centurica.com, has become the defacto statistics analyzer for the industry and has put out his new Website-Buyers-Report for 2014. The report does a great job breaking down the numbers and trends this industry is heading.
The report breaks down the web estate market by 7 different categories: Content and Media, Membership and Subscription, Ecommerce, Saas and Software Products, Lead Generation, Marketplaces and Transactional, and Services. Looking at the data, he makes a very clear point as to which markets hold the most value by providing sample sales, opportunities and dangers for each category.
Another significant point the report makes is about the decreasing valuations gap. Breaking down the industry in two year increments, starting at 2008, we can clear see that as average buyer sophistication grows it directly effects the valuation of the website that is purchased. Buyers and sellers have access to more information, knowledge of correct due diligence methods, and experience that weighs in on every transaction.
It is obvious that correct due diligence is exactly what this industry needed in order to manage corrections.