TravisVS Under 
Tags: Folks, I’m not going to lie to you here, but this is one looooong interview (my first two-part interview) but a must read for any website flipper! This is an interview I had with JD Carr, an experienced and successful site flipper who provides some incredible insight into what it takes to be successful. He stresses that the three keys to success are relationships, community, and networks.
In this interview you’ll learn how JD applies these to his businesses and how you can too. You’ll see the three keys in action with his newly launched website flipping community, DigitalFlipster.com, and JustClickAuctions.com, a marketplace for website buyers and sellers.
Tell me a little bit about yourself – what your background is, how long you’ve been an Internet Marketer and what specific areas of Internet Marketing you specialize in.
Well first off let me thank you Travis for taking the time to help us get our message out. I love what you’re doing with FlipWebsites.com because it’s so important to get the right message about our evolving industry out there. To answer your question, I’ve been involved in ecommerce and web development since the early days of the Internet. My first real online company was MDSI which was a portable and online electronic medical record system. Back in 1998, SanDisk created one of the first mobile medical record carrier devices called the P-Tag. They originally developed it for the Army but what we did as MDSI was build an online medical record management system around the P-Tag for commercial use. This was the early days of electronic medical records (EMR) so we played a small part in that evolution. We raised some money, did a field trial and sold the company. That was one of my first experiences dealing with large data warehousing projects, online development, and obviously the sell of a company I had created.
I really got into web development by building websites for my own ventures after MDSI. I learned that I really enjoy creating companies and selling them off and I especially love online companies. In the early days of the Internet, we had BBS and forums on sites like AOL. Back then it was primarily geeks like myself on them but we had a real sense of community. As the Internet evolved, we lost that for a while but social networking has really brought the community aspect to the forefront and so naturally I started figuring out ways to combine web development, selling, and social networking into a business model. That’s primarily what my company does today and how we came about.
I believe there are two types of site flippers – short-term flippers and long-term flippers. A short-term flipper is someone who buys (or builds) websites with the sole intent of adding value to them so they can quickly sell them for a profit. A long-term flipper is someone who buys (or builds) and HOLDS the property for a while (a year or more) and then down the road sells it. What camp do you fall in?
I agree with you. I know some that are short-term flippers and others that are definitely taking a long-term approach. Until recently I probably fell into the short-term category. I think either approach works well but my preference at this point is the long-term one because frankly there’s more money in it. Short-term flipping is exciting though and definitely a great way to make some fast cash.
How many sites have you sold in the past year?
Over the past year I’ve primarily been working with a company I started in September 2008. It was a niche network and online training school that I just sold a couple of weeks ago. So for the past year or so I’ve been focused on that as well as launching another niche company using the same business model. I have flipped a few blogs/websites though during that time. I maybe did 10 last year and have done 4 this year already. Certainly my focus however is on the longer-term projects as I mentioned earlier.
Can I ask you what general price ranges your websites have sold for?
On blogs and smaller websites I typically try to sell in the $250 – $1,500 range. I always focus on building traffic, readership, and some decent stats before I’ll even attempt to sell it. I’m a firm believer that if you build value in your sites, folks will pay for that value. Now on larger projects such as the one I just sold, the sale included a 5,000 member network and an online training school for that specific niche. I basically worked on the project for a year and the site along with the network netted just over $60,000.00. I could have probably held it a little while longer and gotten more but I was ready to move onto other projects including the one I’m working on now which I’ll talk about shortly.
Where do you primarily sell your websites – do you sell them publicly on sites like Flippa or do you sell them privately?
Thus far they’ve all been sold privately. Obviously now I’ll begin selling them on our new auction site.
How do you go about selling a site privately?
That’s a great question. I’ve worked hard to develop a large network to tap into when I’m looking for buyers. I think relationships are key to any successful flipper. Anytime I create a new site, network, or whatever, I’m always starting out with the assumption that I’ll be selling it down the road. This includes sites that I acquire to build up for later sell. So, for example if I’m working on a niche site in the pet sector, I make sure that I reach out to and develop relationships with folks in that space that I can approach when I’m ready to sell. Industry insiders always are interested in buying or if not, they usually know who is.
