Tips on Selling Your WebsitesReprinted with permission from VotanWeb.comIf you're serious about selling your website, you'll need to spruce up your financial statements, budgets, and plans corporate. Managing your website as if you were preparing to sell it will improve your management practices and increase the value of your website. If you receive an offer you can't refuse, being prepared will put you in a great position to close a deal quickly. In researching my book "How to Sell Your Website for Top Dollar," I interviewed over 200 business owners who had sold their websites. Some issues have come up repeatedly that have little to do with the mechanics of preparing your website for sale, but instead require soul-searching. What do you want for yourself: in the future? How much of your self-esteem is tied to owning and managing your website? What will you do next? Thinking about the implications of a sale for you and your family will go a long way in helping you select the type of buyer you would be most comfortable with. There are two basic types of buyers, financial and strategic. Financial buyers make up a huge segment of the market. They look for websites that they can purchase using debt financing for between 50% and 75% of the price and that have sufficient cash flow to service that debt. With a few exceptions, they value a website using a multiple of four to six times earnings before interest and taxes (after making adjustments for expenses that would change for a new owner). There are disadvantages to selling to a financial buyer: there are no synergies, such as partnerships with complementary websites. There will certainly be pressure to increase cash flow due to the additional debt. Financial buyers are in business to make deals, so they may overlook some pain points. They often leave the day-to-day operations of the website unchanged, but buy with the aim of selling and don't give a damn about your vision for the future of the website. Strategic buyers expect synergies with their other websites. Thanks to these synergies, they can afford to pay a premium, but they may not need to because they already have in-depth knowledge of the market. They may know your website's strengths and weaknesses better than you. Therefore, strategic buyers offering premium prices are in short supply.