When I first bought my site at sitepoint....

Hey have I ever mentioned that the first time I bought a site was on sitepoint the whole thing was a complete scam.

The guy that sold me the site made it look that the site was profiting 250-300 a month while it was making no more than $3 a month. I paid $1000 for it at a moment when I did not have money. I felt really bad.

My advise.

Dont rely too much on images for statistics, images for revenue and most of all dont rely on ALEXA. There are many tools out there that serve to manipulate your alexa ranking by inflating it.

Do your own research on link, serps, refferals, etc. combine those with the screenshots and just then, think on how much value this whole picture makes. If you find a single thread, attack the seller with specific questions - in public.

By the way, has anyone else been scammed the way I was?

What I really like about DP is the feedback system.

 

when it happened at sitepoint ?

well yes you have to investigate fully.

@dp check profile and history of that user.

 

It happened a year and a half ago.

 

First of all, if the asking price is too low, like three month of revenue, something smell fish..

and becareful about revenue..get at least a four month of stats. Look for the trend(going up or down) and traffic spike...

 

No but one thing I do hate is when they're selling a site then a week later (of course after you've already bought it), they decide to sell the turnkey of that site... It's like, "I bought the site" it's mine... Stop making competition!

It's to bad you can't take more action against them for scamming.

 

That is the big drawback of buying a turnkey site.
The seller, or someone else, who has the script for the site can create dozens and sell them each as unique.
Check ebay once in a while.
You will notice there sites up for sale that are turnkey, and are sold again and again with a different domain.
Same here or any other site selling sites.

True, you have to check to see what you will buy before you buy.
Again, to use ebay, too much manipulation of facts and figures.
First step is to do a whois to see just how long the domain has actually been registered.

Here, check the members doing the selling.
Their rep, their itrader, and ask others who may have bought from the seller.

 

Hi nikolaalx

I feel sorry for you - sitepoint does have a problem where the mods will delete posts that ask questions that the seller does not like! I try to expose dodgy seller over there but sometimes they get through.

Their new marketplace allows the seller to control everything, I was dealing with a seller this week who was deleting my messages as soon as I placed them. I ended up sending PMs to all those interested!

Have you got the URL for the auction, or the persons username?

 

Same here. SitePoint has been making so many changes (ie raising prices) but I didn't notice any feedback system in there...

 

Well it was pretty long time ago. I can look for it if you like, but I am pretty sure that the scammer has long forgotten about that account.

 

Sorry to hear about that. That's pretty much why I refrain myself from purchasing a site if it is too highly priced if I have never heard of the site before. You never know what happens after you purchase the site and no one can guarantee anything. IMHO, the higher the price, the higher the risk.

 

sitepoint will become a scammer heaven...

 

We're implementing stricter auction policies in the near future.

However, just like when you buy an item from your local newspaper or Craigslist.org, it's up to the buyer to do their homework and protect themselves (get a phone number, get a signed contract, use escrow.com, split up payments into two parts, etc.)

We have an extensive guide to buying Websites with plenty of tips on what to look out for.

 

You can always insist on a non-compete clause in the sale contract specifying that the seller cannot build, sell or manage any websites in the same market segment as the one you are buying for a specified term. It's similar to buying any business.

 

I was also burnt on a proxy site which had google adsense ads on it. When i tried signing up for adsnse for this site i was rejected and the guy that sold me the site never got back to me. Luckily i was only burnt for 175 bucks so it could have been worse. Matt i think new sellers should have more measures through which they have to prove themselves for. This guy ripped me off and ran

 

Is there any mechanism by which we can verify independently the claims regarding traffic,revenue etc made by a seller when one is looking to buy a site for sale

 

You should be able to verify their traffic claims by reviewing their server logs/stats. Revenue should be detailed in some form of accounting where statements can be produced (from CC processors, AdSense statements, etc.).