Buying websites for sale from well-known marketplaces like Flippa.com and the Digital Point forum is an obvious first step but there are other ways to buy websites for sale that nobody else even knows about. The advantage of buying sites privately is that you avoid competition from other buyers. And while that doesn’t always mean you’ll get a screaming deal, it does mean that you’ll at least get the first crack at the website.

Even if a seller offers to sell you a website privately for $10,000 and you know it’s worth every penny of that or more, you’ll at least get a chance to buy it. Contrast that experience with the scenario at Flippa. That same website listed on Flippa may sell for more than $10,000. And even if the seller lists it with a Buy It Now of $10,000 it will likely get snatched up very quickly. You’ll have to be fast on the draw to get it as there may be hundreds of buyers interested. The best way to avoid this feeding frenzy is to go where the other buyers aren’t and that is to buy websites privately.

How do you find these private opportunities? As my father used to tell me, it’s not what you know but who you know. This means you have to network. Learning how to network among website sellers and buyers is beyond the scope of this article, but what I’m going to show you is a fast and easy way to uncover websites that may be for sale privately.

The first thing you’re going to do is browse through the websites currently for sale on Flippa.com. You are looking for quality websites being sold by reputable sellers. In other words, conduct your searches as usual. This isn’t a shotgun approach to finding private sales. We want good websites and we want to deal with professional sellers.

As you’re browsing through the listings, I want to pay close attention to the auction descriptions. You’re looking for sellers who indicate in their descriptions that they are in the process of selling some (or several) of their websites. You may also find descriptions where they are selling a specific website because they have, “too many to manage.” You’re essentially looking for some kind of indication that they may have other websites for sale for whatever reason – they are too busy with other projects, they need to raise cash NOW, they only want to focus on one website right now, etc.

You’ll usually find this information in the description where the seller explains why they are selling-but not always so be sure to read the entire description. What you’ll do then is send these sellers a private message. Do not spam these sellers! Take the time to send a personal message. Here is an example of an email I sent to a recent seller:

Hello! My name is Travis Van Slooten. I’m a regular here at Flippa as a buyer and seller of websites. I was looking at your iPhone Apps website for sale. While it doesn’t fit my portfolio of websites, I noticed you mentioned in your listing that you’ll have more websites for sale.

Thanks!
Travis Van Slooten

A message like that will almost always get you a reply of some kind. The seller will either tell you about other websites they own that they would consider selling to you directly or the seller will at least let you know what types of websites they’ll be listing. If that’s the case, you can add them to your Flippa seller watchlist so you know immediately when they list their websites.

You can also use this technique on websites that have sold or that have ended unsold on Flippa. You’ll just want to change your message to the sellers accordingly (i.e. you are contacting them because you found one of their websites that sold). By employing this quick and easy technique, you’ll be able to dig up your own private gems.

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