PhilosophyForum.com 3 Year old Established Discussion Forum
http://www.philosophyforum.com/ This site has been listed 3 times previously
Sold at Public Auction
$5,100
Bidding History: 2 bids- Started:
- Mon, Oct 26, 2009
- Completed:
- Wed, Nov 25, 2009
Website Statistics and Collected Data
Site Visibility
| Google PageRank | 3 |
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| Alexa Rank | 0 |
| Links in Google | 23 |
| Links in Yahoo! | 10,201 |
Domain
| Registration Date | 31st Jul, 2002 |
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Compete Stats
| Compete Ranking | 253,821 |
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| Trust | Neutral |
SEMRush Stats
| SEMRush Rank | 0 |
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| Keywords in Google | 0 |
Site Content
| Possible Copies Found | 0 |
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Site Details
Here's your chance to own the most Active Philosophy Forum on the net! Others may have been around longer but we're the most active.
Site Relisted! Originally purchased for $15,000 to a non-paying bidder.
ATTENTION: Serious bidders ONLY!
Description:
PhilosophyForum.com is a very well established forum with a very premium domain name that was originally purchased from BuyDomains.com back in 2005. The site was developed as a personal hobby of mine, off the cuff and has grown naturally to over 22,000 unique visitors per month, organically.
The site currently has Threads: Threads: 5,724, Posts: 95,352, Members: 3,048, Active Members: 493 as of the writing of this listing and is growing at a steady pace.
Features Include:
- vBulleting 3.8.4 Forum Software
- vBadvanced Integration portal software
- Live Flashchat Integration - This is a full featured and fully integrated live chat system which members use on a daily basis.
- Multi-player gameroom - This is where members can play Chess, Reversi, Four in a Row, Checkers and Poker (Includes Texas Holdem, 7 card stud, Texas Holdem Tournement) - Members Only!
- VBSEO - Search engine friendly URLS optimized fully.
- PhilosophyTube - This is a fully integrated video system that allows for video uploads, youtube browsing and integration, picture upload, favorites, ratings and reviews. You'll also get the PhilosophyForum.com Youtube account and video tutorials to go along with it and this is also Search Engine Optimized with URLS.
- Link Directory - Fully integrated and automatically pulls screenshots with SEF URLS, statistics, ratings and much more. This can be used as a link exchange system as well to monitor incoming links.
- Member Blogs - Our blogs are very active. Members are allowed to have their own blog and customize their blogs and profiles.
- Social Groups - Members can create social groups, both private or public and after 5 members join their group, have the option of creating a group forum.
- Donation System - This tracks members who donate and automatically adds a usergroup badge to their profile if they've made a donation.
- Moderating Team - We have a highly qualified and active moderating team that are long term members actively serving the community.
Please understand that this has been a 3+ year project for me and I'm not in the business of selling websites. Great care has been taken to combat spam and promote clean, quality content on this website and I'm hoping it can be followed up on and taken to the next level with the new owner.
I'm also willing to stay on as a part-time administrator or partner for years to come.
Traffic Details
This site has 100% organic traffic. URLs are unique and search engine friendly. Currently we do not even have a newsletter so traffic is true organic quality.
Traffic currently is being generated through organic search engine listings and we have a new twitter account that is generating some interest: http://twitter.com/PhilosophyForum
Spam Free Website
PhilosophyForum.com is a spam free website. Most of the members on the site are actively participating in ongoing discussions. There's a limit of 2 new threads per day per member to prevent any kind of spamming or over-posting. When someone creates a thread title, the forum automatically searches for similar titles and threads and suggests they read those before opening a new thread. This of course hasn't given us as many threads that are commonly found in other forums but the quality and uniqueness of the content is second to none. Feel free to compare statistic ratios to other forums.
Forum Management
The forum is managed by myself as the administrator and an additional administrator that has lots of forum experience. We also have a handful of long term moderators and a system of reporting and dealing with issues among members as well as combating spam on the spot, (we get very little if any). There is almost NO spam that gets through to the forum. This forum is highly moderated and well maintained community.
Operating Costs and Details
Currently, the Philosophy Forum is on a dedicated server at the Planet that I personally manage and have hosted approximately 50 other websites for clients etc. The site is averaging around 25 gig of bandwidth per month. This site doesn't need a dedicated box as of yet but as traffic increases, the need will arise.
Why am I selling it?
I'm selling this website because I'm funding another major web project that has nothing to do with philosophy, science or religion. :) I have spread myself thin with many websites and it's time now to either sell or work collaboratively with the new owner on improving the forum, monetizing it, and working on some link love.
The Transition
Obviously, there's going to be a period of transition with the purchasing of a website of this nature. I will assist in facilitating every aspect of the transition of ownership to the new owner. Here's what I will provide:
- Hosting for 3 months after the sale, free of charge.
- Moving of entire website to new cpanel hosting account on a linux server of your choice.
- Assisting in administrative services regarding the website for 3 months after the sale, (as part of the sale) and possibly for much longer under a partnership arrangement under the revenue building umbrella.
- Introducing the new owner and facilitating a smooth transition in ownership.
- All related usernames and passwords to accounts and licenses will be transferred to the new owner including the youtube account, twitter, facebook page and everything else.
- I will work closely with the new owner via phone, facebook, chat, or whatever to make this a profitable win win situation for everyone involved.
- Once we've competed the unfinished work, I will setup and provide a link exchange program that will improve traffic and page rank. I'll be more than happy to manage the link exchange for a month or or even more depending on how comfortable the new owner is with managing a link exchange service.
It's my hope that I'll be able to remain on the forum and continue to work on the features and projects currently in progress.
What's included in the sale?
- Owned VBulletin license
- Owned VBtube license
- Owned VBadvanced Directory license
- Owned VBSEO license
- Owned GameRoom license
- PhilosophyForum.com Twitter profile
- PhilosophyForum.com Facebook page (currently under construction)
- Youtube account for instructional videos etc.
- 1 Month free link exchange.
Unfinished Work
There is some ongoing work that needs to be finished and I'm more than happy to work with the new owner to finish these up. This work includes:
- Landing page clean up and customization
- Facebook Integration - so users can connect with their facebook account.
- Mandatory updates from Vbulletin - (Completed! - Latest Version)
- Implementation of new group of forums for Religion - (Completed!)
- Implementation and integration of infraction system - (Completed!)
- Privacy policy and terms of use agreement
- Integration of some additional features
- Debate forums - organized and moderated debates, 80% complete. (Hidden)
- Membership Table for paid subscriptions - 90% complete.
- Monetization of memberships and advertising.
This is a well established forum with most of the hard work already done. There is now only the need to monetize the traffic and build upon what's already there. We have unique content and high quality membership base.
Escrow Terms of the Sale
Due to Escrow.com not exactly being for website owners and not the most ideal escrow for website sales, to protect both the buyer, seller, and our members information, the process of escrow will go like this:
- Buyer wins auction and agrees to terms
- Buyer pays escrow
- Seller transfers the domain name, (leaving nameservers in tact)
- Buyer approves transfer and inspection period
- Escrow.com prepares funds disbursement
- Seller, once the funds are in route and everything is OK and approved via escrow, then the new owner will be given access to cpanel and the data - and of course administrative access to the entire forum.
Escrow charges will be split evenly between buyer and seller.
Due to possible abuse of the escrow system, buyer will receive sensitive data ONLY after the escrow is cleared by the buyer and in route to the seller. This is partly due to having offers previously for content only and to protect the interest of the members of the forum and their information from theft. It's also because Escrow.com is not exactly the best option for data driven websites, it's set up more for domains.
My name is Justin, I will work with the buyer directly via phone, email, or IM to facilitate the complete transition and moving of the website. I'm happy to work with the new owner until everything is complete! I think it's also important to make a public announcement on the forum and introduce the new owner and the plans he/she has for the forum.
The sale of this forum is transparent and all our moderators know what's going on and are very supportive of the potential new owner. You can find the announcement of the sale of the forum and what the members have to say located here:
Revenue Details
I'm not selling this site based on revenue. Revenue currently comes from forum donations into our paypal account and recently, (this year) we've implemented Google ads for non-registered users. The potential for revenue is very good and has yet to be expounded upon. Here are some ideas that I'll work with the new owner on implementing in the first 3 months of ownership.
- Paid Memberships - We've asked the members and they have no problem with paid memberships that provide greater access to the forums and some of the additional features. I have already drafted an html page listing the features and potential membership amounts and I think most of the active members would have no problem at all supporting this.
- Advertising - Aside from the recent implementation of Google Ads, there is no other advertising on the forum. We have not pursued any advertising at all.
- Book Store - This is something that we've been considering and the idea is to pull eBay auctions in through the eBay affiliate program to provide a niche site for books for our members. This is something I'm willing to consult the new owner on and possibly assist in the development of this since I have other EBay Affiliate sites. You could also use Amazon or other affiliates that suit your needs.
- Donations - I don't push. Only members can donate to the forum and lurkers or non-members cannot. We don't push donations but they could be pushed however, the above would be a better way of doing it. If paid memberships are implemented, then all those members who previously donated to the forum should be upgraded to the premium membership level or even lifetime member.
Revenue potential on this website is still in it's infancy. It's very possible that with a little organization and some chopping wood and carrying water, this site could easily produce good revenue. Paid membership subscriptions is nearly all set up and new owner will own this as well.
Traffic Details
100 percent organic. We have never advertised or participated in link exchanges although we have a link directory in progress that will facilitate link exchanges and link submissions.
I have never pumped the traffic or link exchanges because I haven't been ready for it. I think there are few key
Top search queries
1 philosophical questions, position 3
2 philosophy forum, position 2
3 define ego, position 7
4 philosophy forums, position 4
5 burgomeister, position 6
6 imanuel kant, position 7
7 burgomeister books, position 8
8 define nature, position 7
9 biovisions, position 8
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Comments 19 public, 4 deleted
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Claimed Traffic
| Page Views Per Month | 180,000 |
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| Uniques Per Month | 25,000 |
Claimed Financials
| Gross Revenue (per month est) | $100 |
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| No profit is being claimed. | |
| Warning: The seller has provided estimates (read more) | |
Monetization Methods
| Advertising Sales | No |
|---|---|
| Product or Service Sales | No |
| Affiliate Income | No |
Site Uniqueness
- Content is claimed to be unique
- Design is claimed to be unique
Seller
Attachments
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Bandwidth Usage
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1 Month Analytics
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Full year dashboard Oct. 7, 2008 - 2009
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Donations
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August - Sept
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Search Engine Keywords
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Traffic Sources Full Year
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Contextual Help
- The winner of this listing will be required to pay a 2.5% success fee to Flippa.
More Information ^ - Ownership transfer is safest when using Escrow.com (more information)
Seller also accepts payment using: Electronic Transfer ^
I've updated this auction to include some additional time for hosting and link exchange while leaving the door open for an Administrative partnership with the new owner.
Also, the reserve price has been lowered and the starting bid lowered as well. Interested parties, feel free to ask questions.
Nice site, and nice sales presentation.
I have 3 questions for you:
1. How much traffic is coming in monthly from "philosophy forum", your #2 keyword?
2. Can you link us to the members list? I like to see the distribution of posts between members, etc.
3. Do you have any other forums for sale?
Being honest here, I probably won't be purchsing this right now because I am up to my neck in projects at the moment and just started 2 new huge ones, but I love forums and would love to add this to my collection.
One more question:
On average (look through the past 2 months please), how many new posts and threads are posted every day?
@tylercruz - Thank you for the compliments on the presentation.
To answer your questions:
1. Last Full month, Oct 5 - Nov. 4: 2034 visits from keyword 'Philosophy Forum' - 2481 visits from keyword 'Philosophical Questions'
2. I cannot link you directly. You are free to sign up on the forum and make one introduction post and you'll be able to access the member list.
3. No other forums for sale.
If you decide you are serious about this forum, I'd be more than happy to give you access to analytics as well as temporary access to the moderator forums because we have a system of checks and balances in there as well.
If you are up to your neck in projects, no problem. I'm able to stay on as administrator for longer if needed. I'm also open to staying on as a partner. Likewise if you have other forums, there maybe an opportunity to work together on some of these in the future. I love forums as well.
As far as the posts. Currently, members are only allowed 2 new threads per day. That's why we're not loaded with threads.
September 2009: 326 new threads; 6730 new posts
October 2009: 302 new threads; 5937 new posts
November 5, 2009: 53 new threads so far; 926 new posts
These are actual statistics, not spam. Spam doesn't get through the cracks unless it's a manual spammer and they don't usually make it through either. We get maybe 5 spam a month if that.
The forum is an active one... very active... the most active of any other Philosophy Forum and has the best team of moderators. PM me if you need access to analytics and don't be afraid to register and and make one post to gain access to the member list and some of the other features.
Regardless of how recent the Adsense implementation is, I'd like to know what the daily revenue has been.
All the mods you have - how active are your community in those mods and would the members care if most of that was removed? All those mods are a pain to maintain over time and don't really add core value.
I'd like to say that this is a good forum and is certainly worth the asking price to the right buyer.
@DirtyDog - Adsense is kind of grim. The only people who see the adsense are those who are not members. Today adsense from the forum is $2.45. Last 7 days is around $10.00. Not very good. The plan is to make adsense available to all members in moderation with the exception of Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Lifetime membership which is work in progress at the moment. I have the tables nearly completed for this. What I will do, is test the effectiveness of the ads for members who are logged in for the next couple days and see if it makes any difference. Donations far succeed any advertising revenue currently.
The mods are really not a big issue. Subscriptions... or the plan for them will allow them access to the multi-player games and some of the other features. Vbulletin has started to charge a license fee per release so no time soon would I want to update this to the newest version of vbulletin. Keeping 3.8 up to date with the mods is not a problem. If you intend on upgrading to the newest version of vbulletin, I'd wait a year or two to make sure the new addons and mods are incorporated. It really hasn't been an issue.
Thank you for the compliment. I certainly have a heck of a lot more than $15,000 wrapped up in this if it includes my time at the rate of .50 cents an hour.
Feel free to ask questions and I'll do my best to respond.
Nice forum ... however I'm afraid that philosophy is a sector within which I will hardly be able to cover up the server costs and the license fees ... and nobody wants to lose money and get work on top of this ! The books market is going down, affiliation can't work with this kind of traffic, and paid ads would yield pennies (precisely for the same reasons).
I myself own popular high-quality educational forums which I maintain just out of pure dedication on my server. Considering that I still have a lot of room on this server, I can value your website based on its earning rather than profit and would thus like to propose $3,000 (a 2 year and a half multiple), assorted with the guarantee that you will be selling to someone who is not profit-driven (I can give you links to my other communities, which are kept 100% ads-free and within which nothing is being sold).
@juliensa - While I appreciate your offer and what you are doing with your educational websites, I'm not in the Not-for-profit business.
Your valuation of $3000 is based on revenue and traffic alone, let's not forget about the domain name. I paid well over half of what you are offering for the domain name alone. Besides, you're offer is well below, (almost low-ball) compared to other offers I've received.
I do appreciate your interest but I'm going to have to pass.
Ok tld, good luck with the sale, this is a nice community !
5 days left and no bidders. Hmmm... I'm actually a bit surprised because the first auction had a $5000 bid.
I deleted a couple comments on here because they weren't really necessary. It was mentioned however that I have been trying to sell this website for several months which really isn't the case. For those of you who have been following this, here's what happened.
You'll notice there are 3 other listings for this website above in the links. What happened is I listed the first time I had a very large price on it and it ran through the 30 days with a $5000 bid. It automatically relisted itself in a private listing and I canceled it the same day, Oct. 2. Then I was approached by someone after the closing of the auction that made an offer to purchase of $15,000 and I believe it was listed for 10 days in which the successful winner ended up being a non-paying bidder.
So, after paying now 3 times to list my site, I figured I'd take the re-listing and see if there was anyone out there who may be interested in a site like this. I realize it's not going to be for everyone and that's fine. I also understand the 'perceived' limitations of the keyword, but limitations are things we place upon ourselves. Domains, websites, and keywords are hardly the limitation.
It is what it is. The nice thing about this website is it's a positive contribution to the internet community. I could easily build out sites for World of Warcraft or just sites that gather user content, monetize them, then turn them over for a nice profit... but then, what is the real contribution to the Internet? So, the PhilosophyForum.com has a lot of possibilities. Is it going to generate $10,000 month right away? No! Can it eventually? I think that depends on the vision of the owner of the site, not the keyword.
My hopes is that the sale of this website will be a win-win situation for all parties involved, including the members. The buyer should have some interest in this area or at least some interest in developing it further for the good of the community, not just the pocket book. If it's pocket book sites you want, SEX, DRUGS, and ENTERTAINMENT is what sells.
Someone, the right someone, please purchase this website and take it to the next level. FYI, the current reserve on this auction is $12,000 and believe me when I say there's much more invested. So good luck and thanks for reading this update. Someone start bidding!.. or better yet, BIN!
We have a bid! Thank you Civiliokas for your bid. Best of luck to you.
On that note, I've lowered the reserve to $5100. This makes this auction a true auction. High bidder wins! Feel free to ask questions.
@juliensa why post negative comments? If you aren't interested in bidding or purchasing why not browse on? He has a nice forum. Sure it's not making millions but then what site is other than google? All sites in general are making far less than what it used to be in the 90's. More competition and everyone thinks they have that one in a million idea!
@tldagent Keep up the good work. The right person will come along and take the forum into the next level.
@macattack - She was making an offer. It's not a big deal as there were far more negative comments that were removed. It's also admirable of her to run educational sites and support them on her own server without funding and her offer was genuine, I guess that's all that really matters.
There are a lot of sites on the web today that are low quality and loaded with many posts and advertising. It's a shame that quality and educational websites aren't worth more... But, people want to be entertained and that's what sells and that's why it's going to take the 'right' person with creativity and a keen interest in philosophy.
Thank you for compliments and I'm sure everything will work out just the way it's supposed to.
Peace!
Update - I've adjusted the front page a little on the landing page with tabbed content and dropped the ads below the tabs which shortens up the page a bit and I've gone ahead and customized the tabs as well to match forum. Gives it a bit cleaner look than before. Thanks again and good luck in the auctions!
1 hour left and currently at $5100,... almost makes me sick thinking about it. LOL. Anyway best of luck in the auction. I'll be here to answer any last minute questions. Thanks for all the comments, advice, and support above.