Forums over 10k users - How much to sell?

[kau]

Just curious to those who have over 10k members what the bottom line you would sell your forum for. I'm not interested in buying any I just wanted to see what others thought their forums were worth.

[Paul M]

The pure number of members is not that relevant, the day to day activity is much more of an indicator of how popular a forum is.

[Guest190829]

Content is also a very significant factor...

[Blindchild02]

and look.
gotta be eye catching ;)

[Chris M]

Look is not really ultra-important...

A board can look really nice but have crap or non-existant content - I'd rather go for the content and activity than look; Look can be bought, at least alot cheaper than the other two...

Chris

[Blindchild02]

NO FREAKIN WAY
i think you're probably crazy...

[baronvonwalz]

We only have 500 users :(, but there are 140 or so that come every single day and participate, with some over 16000 posts, and that is since April of 2004.

[Chris M]

NO FREAKIN WAY
i think you're probably crazy...

Doubtful - Some of the most popular boards out there have the simplest of designs...

Chris

[kau]

Ok I will rephrase the question for everyone:

What is the minimum amount you would sell your forum for?

[Chris M]

I'd sell one mine for probably $200 :p

Another, probably up to $5,000 - It has no community (development) but the site content so far is invaluable and it could prove to be a big site...

Chris

[KTBleeding]

NO FREAKIN WAY
i think you're probably crazy...

He's actually 100% correct.

Overall traffic, and content is what will sell for big. My company just purchased the rights to a community website that is so horribly designed and coded that it literally makes me sick. They paid over $5 million dollars for it.

Honestly, I think it was a huge waste of money.. cause there's no way to resurrect this website. But oh well.

[kau]

What is the address?

[Kihon Kata]

What is the address?

I have often wondered this also about my site. One of my sites has over 12,500 users and over 244,000 posts averaging about 1,600 posts/day with 100 registering daily(avg)

Site has 6.9 million page views also.

EDIT: 8 million this last month lol

[Tony G]

Don't underestimate the power of the look of your forum though. For many forums it is what attracts new members to look through the content. If you have good content but a crappy look, new members will simply think the forum is crap. The forums that are popular with the simplest of designs have the lure of a busy looking forum attracting new members. If you're a new forum with good (but a little amount) of content and a crappy look, you won't get very far.

[amykhar]

So many of the "cool designs" that you guys around here love so much actually stink when it comes to useability. Give me a lean and mean default style any day with colors that are easy on the eye for long reading periods and a creative logo, and I'm happy.

Back to the topic at hand - I'm not sure I could sell a forum that I built up to that level. It would have too much of my blood sweat and tears in it.

Amy

[Tony G]

A good design doesn't have to be full of images and that - it just has to look appealing to a member, something they haven't seen at another forum or that. The style individualises the forum from others upon first viewing - and that's a very powerful tool to have right there.

But pumping a style up with images and giant banners that are megabyte's big doesn't do the trick.

[MRGTB]

This was talked about before of vBulletin, and then more people seem to think that content matters more than a fancy style. All though, I would agree if you can work both together "a nice style and good content". That's got to be better than just having one or the other.

Just as long as the nice template you use doesn't slow the site down, otherwise it will work against you and not for you.

[MPDev]

Give me a lean and mean default style any day with colors that are easy on the eye for long reading periods and a creative logo, and I'm happy.

I agree - so many forums lose me on the first page - especially bright colored text on black backgrounds. I'm also not a big fan of sidebars, although I have tried them I can't seem to get a page simple enough that doesn't distract from the content being offered.

http://www.extremefitness.com - I actually took elements from a half dozen skins I purchased and mixed them together to come up with a very simple layout that shouldn't fry anyones eyeballs when they went to it. I do offer some other layouts, from very simple to a dark one for those who want it - but the vast majority of people seem to like the default layout.

Oh, I have about 105,000 members and about 1,000 signups a day. I turned down a $20k offer a couple months ago - no idea what its worth, but don't really care either.

[Carforumsnet]

I agree - so many forums lose me on the first page - especially bright colored text on black backgrounds. I'm also not a big fan of sidebars, although I have tried them I can't seem to get a page simple enough that doesn't distract from the content being offered.

http://www.extremefitness.com (http://www.extremefitness.com/) - I actually took elements from a half dozen skins I purchased and mixed them together to come up with a very simple layout that shouldn't fry anyones eyeballs when they went to it. I do offer some other layouts, from very simple to a dark one for those who want it - but the vast majority of people seem to like the default layout.

Oh, I have about 105,000 members and about 1,000 signups a day. I turned down a $20k offer a couple months ago - no idea what its worth, but don't really care either.



How is it you 100,000+ members and only 279,538 posts?? Also, why does your online list say there are 300+ registered members online and yet only 30 or so are displayed as being online?

And how is it you are getting 1000 members a day signing up? I know the owners of several large boards (steroid.com, automotiveforums.com) and they don't get near that ammount and their sites are bigger than yours.

Not calling BS on your stats, just wondering a few things. If you are really getting 1000 members a day, I want some tips lol

[Chris M]

Alot of his users may be on invisible mode ;)

Chris

[nexialys]

Ok I will rephrase the question for everyone:

What is the minimum amount you would sell your forum for?
go to eBay.com and you will find some forums that are to be sold i'm sure...

on my side, i think that the amount a forum can be sold is related to the actual profits you make of it... if it's a free for all forum, even with 100k users, you pay for the license and hosting that will be related to it... if you ave subscriptions on your site, the value of it is related to the paid subscriptions for 2 years if the guy want to drive that car very far... this is evaluation like in the commun world.

[Kihon Kata]

How is it you 100,000+ members and only 279,538 posts?? Also, why does your online list say there are 300+ registered members online and yet only 30 or so are displayed as being online?

And how is it you are getting 1000 members a day signing up? I know the owners of several large boards (steroid.com, automotiveforums.com) and they don't get near that ammount and their sites are bigger than yours.

Not calling BS on your stats, just wondering a few things. If you are really getting 1000 members a day, I want some tips lol

Prolly a little bit of imbelishment ;) I know a few forum members who do this. It does seem strange that there are 300+ registered members online and yet only 30 or so are displayed as being online and with that little posts. Maybe they just like to come there and sit with no posting and look at the screen ;) lol

My forum had 8 million page views this past DEC. Loving it. I think our stats are more realistic compared to the one mentioned.

Total Threads: 15,561
Total Posts: 238,259
Total Members: 13,515

[Carforumsnet]

Alot of his users may be on invisible mode ;)

Chris


You really think 200+ registered members are on invisible mode?

As for the other stat of 1000 members registering a day, I still don't think that is an accurate count. Some of the biggest boards out there with the most traffic barely get 500 a day.

[MPDev]

How is it you 100,000+ members and only 279,538 posts?? Also, why does your online list say there are 300+ registered members online and yet only 30 or so are displayed as being online?

And how is it you are getting 1000 members a day signing up? I know the owners of several large boards (steroid.com, automotiveforums.com) and they don't get near that ammount and their sites are bigger than yours.

Not calling BS on your stats, just wondering a few things. If you are really getting 1000 members a day, I want some tips lol

Actually, I do not list all the users who are on the site as that section would be a monster to display (and significantly slows down the page load time). I use this block of code to only display users who are in a "premium" group:

// MDP: Do not show regular users on index
if ( $loggedin['displaygroupid'] != 2 && $loggedin['displaygroupid'] != 17 ) {
eval('$activeusers .= ", ' . fetch_template('forumhome_loggedinuser') . '";');
}

Right now I have over 670 registered users online - can you imagine how obnoxious that Who's Online would be to display? More than 25% of my traffic comes from overseas, so I try to keep my pages to a reasonable size.

Up until about 6 months ago when I converted to vB, I pruned posts every 90 days from my site. I've also entirely deleted one of the forums a couple of times and forced my users to start over from scratch when they couldn't follow the gudelines. I've had a forum on this site for more than 5 years.

I do not let people view IMG tags on my site unless they are registered; and I replace all IMG tags with links to the registration page telling them they can't view images and must register first. When I have this in place, I get 800-1000 signups a day (I frequently change this setting, sometimes turning off whole forums to unregistered users who then get a signup page from their Google referral).

Because I get thousands of referrals from Google a day, alot of those looking for pictures of so-and-so, its not unusual that a percentage of those would convert into signups. It's also why I have a low user-to-post ratio - alot of lurkers (which is why I don't care to list them in the Who's Online). I've been running the psistats module for about 6 hours now and have recorded over 2,000 referrals from Google in that time.

Just because you don't understand it, doesn't mean it's not legit.

[Carforumsnet]

Actually, I do not list all the users who are on the site as that section would be a monster to display (and significantly slows down the page load time). I use this block of code to only display users who are in a "premium" group:

// MDP: Do not show regular users on index
if ( $loggedin['displaygroupid'] != 2 && $loggedin['displaygroupid'] != 17 ) {
eval('$activeusers .= ", ' . fetch_template('forumhome_loggedinuser') . '";');
}

Right now I have over 670 registered users online - can you imagine how obnoxious that Who's Online would be to display? More than 25% of my traffic comes from overseas, so I try to keep my pages to a reasonable size.

Up until about 6 months ago when I converted to vB, I pruned posts every 90 days from my site. I've also entirely deleted one of the forums a couple of times and forced my users to start over from scratch when they couldn't follow the gudelines. I've had a forum on this site for more than 5 years.

I do not let people view IMG tags on my site unless they are registered; and I replace all IMG tags with links to the registration page telling them they can't view images and must register first. When I have this in place, I get 800-1000 signups a day (I frequently change this setting, sometimes turning off whole forums to unregistered users who then get a signup page from their Google referral).

Because I get thousands of referrals from Google a day, alot of those looking for pictures of so-and-so, its not unusual that a percentage of those would convert into signups. It's also why I have a low user-to-post ratio - alot of lurkers (which is why I don't care to list them in the Who's Online).

Just because you don't understand it, doesn't mean it's not legit.


That's awesome man, I don't let visitors view attachments on my site either unless they are registered. That's the only way to go IMO, especially when we do show coverage from various car shows.

Instead of pruning half the member list, why not just remove the listing of members and just show how many are online. I know several larger forums that do that (pbnation and several others) and it looks very clean.

Congrats on the traffic and signups, that is amazing.

What kind of server do you have the board on? I can't imagine what kind of strain those traffic numbers put on the site.

[MPDev]

Because alot of my regulars want to know when other regulars are online - its my way of pruning out the lurkers and provide a quick reference of those who are active posters on the site (or site supporters).

It's a huge drain on my server which is why I am constantly having to tweak my setup - I run 6mb/sec all day long with peaks in the 8mb/sec common. I run on a single high end Dell server but run a lightweight server for my images directory. When I hit 1,400 users online all my sites start to suffer and when I'm in the 1,600+ its getting real slow (my other auto forum viperalley.com runs 200-300 online most of the day). I should run a multiserver setup, but I'm actually trying to reduce traffic, not increase it.

To be honest, I have too much traffic; too much of it is worthless - alot of lurkers that generate high page view rates, low click-thru to ads and eat a ton of bandwidth. We don't allow attachments in our most active board except by our models which helps. I'll generate 1m impressions for ad space a day and get < 1% click-thru - I'm sure many sites with much lower traffic generate similiar incomes with much less page views.

However, that said, it does provide alot of referrals to my paid-photography site which does convert better than banner ads - so it's not all a wash. It's just a balancing act.

[Corriewf]

Why dont you restrict access to certain forums that are popular to those with (insert number) posts?

[MPDev]

Well, that's the next step in the process in reducing traffic; but because I invite people I know and work with to participate in some of those forums adding a post requirement would be prohibitive in some cases and put a more manual process in place as I would have to manually update each invited user to a new group.

[Corriewf]

Well, that's the next step in the process in reducing traffic; but because I invite people I know and work with to participate in some of those forums adding a post requirement would be prohibitive in some cases and put a more manual process in place as I would have to manually update each invited user to a new group.

So they have to post like everyone else.... I have friends too but they dont pay my hosting or manage my site(s).

[cmiller1014]

I think value has little to do with design, members, activity or any of that. I would say its based on the ability for that site to bring in revenue. What industry does it serve, are there other competing forums, does it bring a real great service to a group of people who cannot get that service elsewhere?

[BamaStangGuy]

I wouldnt sell my site for 10,000 dollars right now... 100,000 dollars... we might be talking.... my Mustang site btw

[joeychgo]

As a general rule - when you buy a website you should consider what income the site makes.

The accepted rule of thumb is you pay 10-12 months worth of income.

Obviously there can be other factors involved, but thats the standard measure of value.


Im always on the lookout for forums to buy, especially car forums.

[SouthernTn]

^ 10 - 12 Months is a good start but there are other things to consider also..

I bought my forum for $1,000.00 from someone who really didnt have the time. During the first month, I made $400 - $500 selling ads.

Did alot of work and developed a fully functional website and Im just now starting to advertise the website and build links. Traffic is also increasing because of this.

Now, with the small traffic the site has 600 - 800 Uniques a day, Im making $800-$900 a month by the means of Casale and YPN.

Now, If I were to sale now, 10 - 12 Months revenue would not be enough simply because someone could easily take it up to 3,000 Uniques a day and double - triple their money invested. Plus, on top of the forums, they're getting a fully functional website with over 200 pages and adding more everyday. Not to forget, days after buying the forum, someone who helped me move the database over to the new server offered to purchase at $7,500 right off bat.. Thats when I knew, I had something I could turn into a powerhouse..

Normally, alot of forums people try to sell nowdays aren't even worth the price... I know alot are "attached" to their forums. but being attached isn't what determines price for someone else. Traffic/Potential/Revenue is what it'll sale for..

When buying forums, Design hardly ever becomes a factor in the sale.

Also, my forum stats are

Threads: 50,513, Posts: 698,173, Members: 6,607

Since adding vBSeo, all of our posts are just now starting to get re-indexed in the search engines, and I predict a big traffic boost soon.

[antialiasis]

Mine isn't going to have over 10,000 members anytime soon (heck, I'm still just messing around with it and testing), but if it did, I'd never sell it.

Not that anybody would want to buy it.

[Lee]

I think a forum of that size is going to sell for 8-15 months of net income.

[Kihon Kata]

I think a forum of that size is going to sell for 8-15 months of net income.

That would mean mine is worth quite allot with 20 million page views/mo.

[Smiry Kin's]

I have often wondered this also about my site. One of my sites has over 12,500 users and over 244,000 posts averaging about 1,600 posts/day with 100 registering daily(avg)

Site has 6.9 million page views also.

EDIT: 8 million this last month lol

its a girls forum what you expect? every one no's they can chat like hell! lol

[Kihon Kata]

LOL @ Chat like hell! hehe It's true! The S3X forum is pretty popular

its a girls forum what you expect? every one no's they can chat like hell! lol

[Smiry Kin's]

LOL @ Chat like hell! hehe It's true! The S3X forum is pretty popular

could ya through that Age verifiy addon this way? ;) or what did you use dude?