WOW! Are we in for a treat. When I saw that Chris at The Traffic Blogger had written in a guest post on Problogger about how to sell a Web site that he had sold a site for $50,000 that was making a consistent $4,000 a month, I asked him to share with us how he did it. This guest post is his reply.
Recently, I announced on problogger that I had successfully sold my first website for $50,000.
One of the first questions asked of me was from Gail of GrowMap, (paraphrasing):
“I would love you to share with my readers (AND ME!) how your site was earning a consistent $4,000 and was worth $50,000?”
Thank you Gail for the great question. Now that I’m finished transitioning control of the site, I finally have time to respond with more than the following two words:
SALES FUNNEL
So what is this mystical “sales funnel” that we hear so much about? What are these “lists” that people claim are the secret to making money online? Contrary to popular belief, understanding and implementing these concepts is not difficult. The real challenge is applying them in such a way that you both maintain and grow your audience.
To understand a sales funnel,
you need to look at its simplest form:
a referral.
When two good friends get together and one friend notices the other has something they want, then there is an opportunity for a referral. “You can get this video game at Gamestop for $59. I bought it yesterday and it’s a blast. Go get it so that we can play co-op together over x-box live.”
The process of a friend referring another is the simplest form of a sales funnel. Like most things in life, the simplest method is the best and most effective method.
REFERRALS
So why was this friend able to make the referral in the first place? There were three things present that made the referral possible: trust, need, and social proof.
Three Requirements for Referrals:
Trust, Need and Social Proof.
From a series of life experiences, the two friends trusted each other deeply.
Referring someone without first establishing trust
is like trying to get politicians from opposing political
parties to fix our economic recession –
virtually impossible.
In the case of our example, a single recommendation was enough to convince one of the friends to go buy the game without even reading its description. Now that’s trust!
Every aspect of your business should be focused on
building trust and convincing others that you are a
genuinely honest, respectable person.
BE TRUSTWORTHY
Never miss an opportunity in private or public conversation to show that you are trustworthy to a fault. The act of following up on promises and making yourself available for others is a lifelong habbit that we could all use more practice at consistently applying. These traits also make you likeable, trustworthy, and attractive to others.
THERE MUST BE A NEED
The need of the one friend to have fun playing a video game was present before the referral was even made. All it took was a little encouragement from one trusted source and the purchase was complete.
If your referral targets a non-need then the odds of completing the sale are close to zero. Let’s say the referral was for hockey skates and the target of this referral had no intention of ever playing hockey. That’s a pretty long shot for any purchase to be made and the referring party would surely get some strange looks from the potential buyer.
SOCIAL PROOF
Part of your job as the developer of sales funnels is to attract the right people to the right referrals.
Social proof is the most vital aspect of your business.
Without it, you’re basically hoping that your audience trusts
you enough to rely soley on your word to make a purchase.
Even though our friend in the example purchased the game without even reading the cover, he had already seen commercials advertising how great the game was as well as heard about thousands of people who had already purchased it.
[Note from Gail @GrowMap: And THIS is why we must support small businesses that can’t afford high dollar advertising.]
The best way to provide social proof is to
publicly record and spread statistics about
your referred products in each sales funnel.
EMPHASIZE VALUE
Whenever I refer a product in my own funnels, I try my best to lead up to it with lots of numbers that prove the value of whatever it is I’m selling. A combination of these numbers and my own personal success with a product are usually a surefire way to sell anything.
How you go about accomplishing trust, need, and social proof are up to you, but I’ll now explain how I managed to establish them in order to sell my website for $50,000.
BUILDING a List of TRUSTING LEADS
Lists are essential to having a real online business. Without a list of past and potential customers (usually you track their email and preferred username), you’re basically starting over with each referral you create.
Through powerful online tools you can
automate your list building and sales funnel.
For my own site, I both used and recommend Aweber for developing both a list and sales funnel in a singular tool. I’ll now go through the steps I took, in general terms, to capture leads, establish trust, display social proof, and make the referrals again and again.
USE AN AUTORESPONDER SERIES
Using Aweber’s inline and outline forms, I was able to introduce potential customers to my sales funnel. These forms enticed subscribers with the right needs by offering a free, seven day email series that focused on providing solutions to these needs.
By offering a series of emails instead
of a single, downloadable report I was able to
ensure that most subscribers remained
members for at least seven days.
This method is the best way I’ve found to keep people on your list longer, because it eliminates the common practice of signing up, downloading the freebie, and then unsubscribing from the list which a lot of people do now-a-days.
The seven day series helped me to establish trust
and credibility with the new member of my sales funnel.
Aweber’s follow up series (what I use to present the seven emails and many more automatically to new followers), gave me a method for making sure that every member of my sales funnel went through the same emails.
Through reporting tools I was able to refine the sales funnel and improve upon the emails based on when people clicked on my suggested links or even unsubscribed from the autoresponder.
PERSONAL CONNECTION BEYOND AUTOMATION
Besides the seven day series, I also asked after a few days how the subscriber was doing, what questions they had, and if they had any suggestions or requests.
This single followup email has provided me with
an endless supply of ideas for writing, improving,
and interacting with my audience.It also helped to establish a connection with
each member, even if they didn’t respond.
You see, even though my autoresponder was automatic, when a list member did decide to email me I was able to have a personal conversation with them that went beyond the automation.
Due to this effort on my part, I created a very personal and real experience for the subscriber: in their mind every automated email was a one on one conversation.
This, combined with valuable content, created an excellent level of trust between myself and the list member.
MAKING THE SALE
When it came time to refer a product, I simply released an email to my list that showcased social proof and many purchased within an hour of reading it.
This social proof contained numbers; both from myself and others who had used the product. More often than not, this was enough to make a large majority of my sales.
A responsive, trustworthy list combined with
a tried and true sales funnel was one of the primary
reasons that I could sell my site for $50,000.
SALES FUNNEL PROCESS:
This sales funnel could be broken down into the following steps:
- Attract leads with free offers.
- Collect leads with Aweber sign up forms.
- Provide content, develop trust, and ask for feedback with followup series.
- Display social proof.
- Make the referral.
One final word on selling your website: your affiliates have the greatest potential to buy your site and that’s exactly who purchased mine.
They are already making sales with your products and know firsthand how effective your sales funnel is if you have ever sold their products in the past.
Make connections and network like crazy,
regardless of your niche.
Good luck! If you want to see a full report on how I sold my website, please download it here (I do not require you to sign up for this, I’m giving it away for completely free!).
TheTrafficBlogger
Latest posts by TheTrafficBlogger (see all)
- Website Marketing Revealed: Consistent $4000 per Month Income Sales Funnel – Sold for $50,000 - October 21, 2011
- How to Twitter: 4 Advantages of a Healthy Twitter Account - October 7, 2011
- A "Kingly" Answer to the Relationship vs Content Question - July 26, 2011
Wow this is very interesting and you earn to much by selling websites. Congrats.
I can’t imagine you can income this huge amount in online marketing. I am a newbie and my first time to visit this blogs and thanks for sharing this information.
There is one thing I don’t understand: if your website was earning consistently 4.000 $ per month which makes 48.000$ per year why did you sell it? Just for 50.000$ which is only a 1 year earning? I mean if I had a website like that I would have kept it for myself.
Also with 4.000$ per month you could have easily outsourced it completely and still have earnings without efforts. Oh well, you know why you did it. But given how hard is to make money on the net it’s a bit confusing. Just my two cents. 🙂
Hi,
Since Chris hasn’t answered your questions, here is my input. Every site requires someone to drive it and invest time in keeping it valuable and growing. Sometimes a site owner will have other priorities and in this case if I understand his motives correctly, Chris wanted the cash to buy a house and had other projects he wanted to invest his time in.
It is NOT easy to outsource to anyone who will be as passionate about a project as the developer. In fact, I am willing to bet that often when a successful site changes hands it declines instead of grows because so many people have the incorrect impression that sites can just run on autopilot and continue to generate passive income.
That is rarely true – and is especially not true of blogs that require regular quality new content and often answering many comments. Successful bloggers also spend a lot of time building relationships, driving traffic, and building links – things that a new owner or someone you outsource to may either not know how to do, have far less influence doing, or not be interested enough to do well.
IMHO, every blog needs a driving force and honestly knowing what I know now we would almost all be better off doing group blogs. Most successful blogs publish more and more guest posts or have many regular contributors – and sites that sell well often sell high if they have regular contributors on board who plan to continue being active even after a site sells.
We have JV blogs we would love to have contributors to or partner on so if anyone reading this wants to partner or learn blogging and social networking or intern to develop skills so I can recommend work to you contact me.
growmap would love you to read ..Why We Need Group Geo-Targeted Niche Blogs
Well I’ve seen that he just answers to some comments so thank you very much Gail for your kindness. My blog in January 2011 had a total of 200 visitors, now in February 2012 it has a steady average no less than 200 a day, mostly 300 honestly. So I know the amount of work required on a blog as well as I know how many errors I did and how much time I wasted trying every technique around. That’s why I think that if my blog will ever get to be really successful both in term of traffic and money I would never sell it especially if I could just sell it for a year’s earning. I could find someone to outsource at least a part of the chores or I could write one article per month instead of one per week, sometimes I even write two per week. If there are enough good articles in the archive then there is really no need to write too often. Clearly, that’s also the reason why I aim to write evergreen content, because I simply don’t want to put the same amount of effort year after year. That would be simply too much work for a one person blog.
Also with the advent of mobile there are fewer comments around everyday as writing on a pad is pretty uncomfortable, let’s forget clicking on ads and similar actions.
that is I see your point but honestly remain with mine. 🙂
Thanks again for your kindness Gail, much appreciated.
Hi Andrea,
We all answer as many as we can. Sometimes there just aren’t enough hours in the day or we don’t see them right away.
I agree with you that I can not imagine selling a blog I put so much work into growing. Many blogs are passions – not business investments. There are people that just like to grow businesses or blogs to a certain point and then sell them – hopefully at a profit. That isn’t for us, but it is a common business practice.
I know at least two people who like to buy established sites from their creators and either hope they’ll run on auto-pilot or hire someone to manage them. Quite often that does not work very well because someone being paid to do something rarely brings the same level of passion or commitment to a project or puts in as much thought, effort and time.
Anyone who believes that when you buy a site you are guaranteed that audience is sadly mistaken. If someone wants a project that generates a passive income for them they would be well advised to include the ability for those who are participating in it to be compensated for their efforts. Don’t expect them to make money for you for free forever. Eventually the best WILL move on to where they are more appreciated.
The consistent efforts of at least one someone – and ideally many someone’s – are required to keep any community, forum, or site active. I have grown at least three forums – one I founded and two where I invested so much time for other people that they grew and became extremely active.
I can tell you from experience that the minute I stopped being the driving force behind them they went into decline and within weeks to at most months activity dropped like a rock. To date – and it has been many years – not one of them has ever made a comeback.
We have been trying for two years to find bloggers to partner with on established blogs that are already monetized and are full of content that just needs edited and scheduled. Sometimes other experienced bloggers volunteer, but they soon realize they don’t have enough time to do their blog AND another one – which is why we need partners.
Who I expected to find was someone just starting out who wanted to learn what we know as a fast path. A couple have spent maybe half an hour and quit. One found that kind of work too boring.
Outsourcing sounds great – but you have to find someone who actually wants to do it and therein is the challenge.
I have on occasion agreed to manage another blogger’s “empire” because it had benefits to me and others for an amount of money there is no way I would work for in any other circumstance. Many who would hire someone have totally unrealistic expectations of what can be accomplished – especially for far too little money – because they do not, have not, and are unlikely ever to operate at the level that I and others like me choose.
Those who have a goal of writing blog posts in 15 minutes or outsourcing everything because their goal is only to make money and not much else just aren’t doing the same thing that I am doing. Those whose focus is making money are rarely willing to invest any reasonable amount of money in creating a truly worthwhile community that benefits others.
I promote those types of projects when I feel that they benefit the users, but often once they make money consistently they start reducing the benefits to the early adopters until they finally leave and they are left with the masses who will not lead. If they do not replace the leaders their community will decline slowly over time.
growmap would love you to read ..Top Small Business Books – My Picks for SmallBizTrends 2012 #BizBookAwards
Well, this applies also to the real world, without leaders everything goes wrong. Actually given that today there are just bosses around and no more leaders that’s the reason why the world has gone crazy. But that’s another matter.
I see your point Gail, and probably the best thing to do, imho, is to try to write good content who gets found through search engines over time so after a while even publishing one post per month keeps it alive. Clearly it depends from the topic of the blog and from the reason why the blog was established. If someone writes about technology then it surely can’t be left where it is on its own, but if someone writes about business best practices than the content is evergreen. I mean, is there someone who can say that the principles of Dale Carnegie are outdated?
Just like in the real world, there are business which get established to be carried on for a long time, and business which get established and then sold. Like houses, there are people building homes and people building houses.
It probably depends on each one’s goal. My goal is to establish well my blog and then maintaining it over time with little care because if you have to put the same effort on a blog on day one and after five years then blogging can be fine for expressing personal feelings but it is surely not a good business model.
There must be a point when the efforts decrease. Like BodyBuilding, you must train a lot to build muscles but after you’ve got them you need a very little time to keep them. Am I wrong? 🙂
Great post. Website marketing is not easy. Congratulations that he made it! Thanks for sharing your great experience in web marketing and the secrets behind this success.
congrats on selling the website.. i for one would of stick to it, but i guess u know it better..
thanks for the tips thought..
~alex
Cinderella story of how smarts and hard work paid off. Good to know it’s possible, and good to know it’s consistent with sound values and practices.
AstroGremlin would love you to read ..Are You Running Out of Time?
Whenever I hear about something that will be of interest to my readers I go out of my way to connect with the people involved and ask if they’re willing to share details. We are fortunate that Chris was so willing to write this guest post and share so much background information.
There are far too many people online selling snake oil and not nearly enough people telling the unvarnished truth. The blind leading the blind will never work – but knowing what someone really did that worked can make a difference to those willing to put in the work.
growmap would love you to read ..Why We Need Group Geo-Targeted Niche Blogs
Congrats on selling your site. I think I would have hung onto it, but still an inspiring story, and some great tips in this post.
May I ask where you auctioned the site, if that is what you did?
Tim would love you to read ..Cheap Dental Implants Abroad
I auctioned it on Flippa.com.
I know it seems like I sold it for cheap, but there was a lot of controversy regarding whether the site would survive another year. Decided it was time to sell when the getting was good.
That makes sense, then! Flippa gets a bit of stick for not having so many quality websites, but I’ve been having a look today, and there’s definitely been a few that have caught my interest. Not sure I want to pay $50,000, though, just at the moment.
Tim would love you to read ..Neck Lift Surgery
am new to Internet marketing and these are the resources I need to succeed. Never heard of how I can harness “sales funnel” before and am glad to have stumbled upon your site.
Wow, you make it sound so simple – but it makes sense! How long did it take you to build up the site? I’m thinking that you have a few sites like the one you sold that you are still building up – then plan to sell. What a great way to not only make money but be able to experiment in different fields/products! Congratulations!
Amy would love you to read ..Ways to Fight Cellulite
Thank you! It took me three years for this site, but I am able to build them a lot faster now that I know what I’m doing.
That being said, selling your site is often not the best way to make money once you understand what works.
I think if its making $4,000 per month, wouldn’t it be better to collect that for the next couple years and attempt to get that monthly number a bit higher, and at the end of the day you’d be pulling in MORE than $50,000. Although I guess it seems nice to get the bulk sum all at once.
Hi Greg,
One thing many don’t realize is that maintaining a blog is a lot of work entailing many hours every week. Sometimes there are good reasons to want to sell – like buying a house or wanting to focus on other projects.
growmap would love you to read ..Frugal Living eBook Launch from BudgetSavingMom
To build a trust with your audience is crucial if you want to make money online todey. Without trust nobody is going to buy from you.
But I can’t understand one thing, if a website brings in 4000$ each month, why sell it ? And why sell it for 50.000$ ? That’s a bit cheap if you ask me.
Trust is paramount. Very good tips here. Particularly liked how you kept your audience engaged for 7 days and built trust for yourself over this period.
Did you use AWeber to get targetted leads or did they come to you via a sign-up form?
SEO Adelaide would love you to read ..Kwasibot: An Identity Is Born
Aweber was my main tool for list building. I went from 2,000 to 10,000 subscribes in 6 months from this and several strategies I implemented before selling the site.
$50,000 is nice money for some people, but if website make $4000.. Maby best invest some resources and up income to 5-10 k$ / month?
I dont get it..
Kay would love you to read ..Kay Jewelers: Diamond Bridal Rings
Congratulations to you for selling website!
referral is very important that you wants to say and thanks for tips and congrats on selling your web at this huge cost. i am sure the buyer will also get benefited through this.
Thank you for your great tip about a sales funnel, so i need to establish Trust, Need and Social Proof? I will look for ways to establish that so that i can make more sales. I hope i can make sure my websites will make a lot of sales so someday i can sell a website. But selling one website for 50.000 dollar is out of my league, i think…
I want to give you a very big compliment for selling your website for 50.000 dollar, damn i can only dream about it…!!!
What an interesting term “Sales Funnel”…and how accurately used. Good to you for making such a fine deal…hope you have other web properties like this to…?
In one year and half month, he could gain that $50,000. Yes, that was a good price. If I were in the position, I will continue the blog and enhance it. Anyway, congratulations on selling it!
First, congrats Chris on selling your first website 😀 50k is a good deal!
Second, I just want to say thank you for sharing your experience with us. I agree with you that building a list with trusting leads is the way to do business in the long run. When someone buys from us one time, and they feel good about the product, they will come back for more. And sometimes, they will be begging to buy if we establish enough trust with them.
Very good case study man. I think I will bookmark this and come back again.
Have a nice day!
Duy.
Thanks! I am trying to avoid responding to the praise comments due to the number of them, but I really do appreciate everyone for responding as they have.
Feel free to check out my blog as well!
I see a lot of websites, which once they have converted a visitor to a customer, they pay a lot lesser attention to him, resulting in churn eventually.
Carrisa Schaffer would love you to read ..Anger Management for Children
I totally agree! They even give more discounts on new customers which is unfair to loyal and long-term clients. It’s sad when this happens because you can predict that the company you trusted are thinking innovative ways but not to offer a much better service.
Websites that were build with a trustworthy method and was done naturally are the ones that will sell for this kind of money. Anyway, congratulations to him for selling his website for that much. Not many websites sell that high.
Aweber is a fantastic tool, and a great way to keep on top of your lists as well as keeping in contact with them, Mailchimp is another great tool to use and it’s free.
Wow this guy knows his stuff. Does anyone know if he is willing to do online classes?
Bart would love you to read ..Robert Brophy, MD, discusses rotator cuff tears- Washington University Orthopedics
Thanks for these tips! So that means referrals is really something important in this types of work.
jlem1125 would love you to read ..dog training
Wow! it’s great to have this, also thanks for the tips………
I really love it.Great tip that your affiliate has the greatest potential to buy your site…
nicole would love you to read ..flat rate movers
Excellent post, I really enjoyed this walk-though of the sales funnel. If it was able to get you $4000 a month it must be pretty effective. 🙂
I agree, a site making $4000 a month is a great amount, i have 7 sites that all together make that much in a month! I think i have been trying to avoid using sales funnel as i have always thought that they wouldn’t be that effective, my friends from the industry have advised me to use it.. i guess your post as compelled me to think again.. i wish all of my sites could make that kind of money!
Grant would love you to read ..The Web Surgery are Shortlisted for the Richmond Business Awards
Wow, I am amazed after seeing your site and some posts. They are really very good and educative. There are so many contents to learn. Thanks a lot for sharing.
Kazi Rahim Ullah Rahi would love you to read ..St. Martin’s Island – Bangladshi Natural Resource
waaall?that‘s really a good way to make money.$50000, it’s a unreachable gole. i need work harder.
I have no idea a blog could be sold this much, congratulations! Reaching a $4000 a month is already inspiring. I want to learn more on you, thanks for sharing the update!
If we include in your site what is the requirement of your audience and readers will get benefits from your site, you will earn a lot from your web site.
Good introduction but i never had any success with newsletters and europeans. Nearly everyone downloads and then cancels the subscription, no matter what content you provide.
Most subscribers i had have used fake-mails (trash-mails) just to get the product. Im really disappointed with the success of newsletters
Interesting read, I must say. However, if I had a website generating 4 grand a month, I would keep it, rather than selling it for 50k… But that’s just my oppinion.
In order to have a successful transaction, TRUST is the key of it. Otherwise, no one will surely have a deal with the seller. The advantages of what the site are very important points to consider so you could come up with a great website marketing strategy.
Greg would love you to read ..Yard Machines 31A-2M1A700 21-Inch Snow Thrower Review
Chris (and Gail)
This is one of the best written pirces I have seen on how and why a sales funnel works. Bravo.
It really does come down to doing the things we all know we should be doing. Building trust, providing value, establishing a list and making sure that list has a REAL connection opportuinity…not just a series of sales pitches.
I can certainly see why your site was worth an easy 50k now!
Steve would love you to read ..15 “Google-Proof” Ways to Create a Quality Niche Site [Niche Affiliate Income #2]
Congratulations! That person is indeed very fortunate to be able to buy your website and you are also very lucky to have the talent in making one. Thanks for posting your update!
Excellent tips. I love the idea of creating a sales funnel. Referrals are generally warm too, but having the funnel at the ready helps guide them towards buying.
Ana would love you to read ..CommentLuv Premium
Wow these are some great tips from somebody who knows his stuff.
Great tip that your affiliate has the greatest potential to buy your site.
Danny would love you to read ..Husqvarna 327P5X Pole pruner 25cc 12 inch bar
Wow! That was something, seems a lot of Internet Marketers are using Aweber, I think I have to get mine too. Thanks for the useful guide and tips! Really helpful for a starter like me.
sanjay would love you to read ..How to Create Clean Corporate Website – Tutorial in Photoshop
Hi Chris, congratulations on the sale and thank you for the report. The thing I love about your process is that anyone can replicate it without a lot of technical know-how or a staff of people like we see from the big named marketers selling their products.
I love AWeber but I’m wondering how you sold the list with the website. I believe in order to transfer the list each subscriber must reconfirm and that would end in disaster. Do you just hand over the entire account? I’ve considered building a list on sites I plan to sell but handing the list over always stopped me from the work.
Brian D. Hawkins would love you to read ..Blogging Tip – Walk Away | Quick Blogging Tip Thursday
Wow Chris, first of all congratulation on your first site sale and making it big.
Secondly, thank you for this post. I have never sold any site, though I have gotten offers from my blog a few months back for about $25000. But considering I am making around $4000-$5000 a month with it, I didn’t think it was a good deal.
Plus, I had never done it and I was kind of scared now knowing everything and being afraid of getting scammed. Of course the real reason was that it is my first big blog and I really love it. Its like a child to me and I didn’t want to get rid of it.
Any way, congrats again and great guide.
Satrap would love you to read ..Fun Ways to Make Money
wow man 4000$ is awesome earnings that any would love to have it
anandy would love you to read ..How to Transfer Contacts from Hotmail
Wow the one who bought the site is lucky because its cheap to get a website that makes a constant 4000$ earning at that price.
Dipendra would love you to read ..Tihar Sms in Nepali 2011 2068