11,000/month Revenue, No. 1 In Market, 1500 Customers
http://www.wpreviewsite.com/
Sold at Public Auction
$90,000
Bidding History: 3 bids- Started:
- Thu, Feb 4, 2010
- Completed:
- Sat, Mar 6, 2010
Website Statistics and Collected Data
Site Visibility
| Google PageRank | 4 |
|---|---|
| Alexa Rank | 44,558 |
| Links in Google | 39 |
| Links in Yahoo! | 5,260 |
Domain
| Registration Date | 31st Jul, 2008 |
|---|
Compete Stats
| Compete Ranking | 94,856 |
|---|---|
| Trust | 3 |
SEMRush Stats
| SEMRush Rank | 0 |
|---|---|
| Keywords in Google | 0 |
Site Content
| Possible Copies Found | 29 (view) |
|---|
Description
This is an 18 month old commercial plugin for the WordPress platform. WP Review Site adds Amazon-style ratings and reviews to any WordPress-powered website without having to write any code. The site converts like crazy and the average order contains at least one add-on purchase.
The product was an immediate success, especially among affiliate marketers. The site had $14,000 in sales its first month, and had individual months as high as $25,000 in sales. It has been reviewed by literally hundreds of blogs, including top names such as ShoeMoney and John Chow, and has #1 search positions for all the relevant search terms. It has tons of organic traffic and a pristine reputation as a robust and well supported plugin.
Sales leveled out at around $9,000 per month in the second half of 2009 with only $150-200 per month in AdWords advertising and making an occasional post about it in forums. I don't expect it to go back up to the $20,000+ numbers it was hitting in 2008 as it had no competition in 2008. In September when I went back to college, I stopped promoting it entirely, and cut my AdWords budget to $100 per month. It's averaged $5000-7000 per month in sales from only $3/day in AdWords and the organic traffic.
WHY I'M SELLING:
I run several other websites where I have 50,000 other users to support. I have two new products in the pipeline. I'm also moving, potentially across the country, in a few months. The money will let me properly market my new B2B products and pay off my student loans.
There is still huge demand for this kind of product. I'm extremely proud to have created it and the reputation it's gained, but I don't spend any time improving or marketing it anymore. I've got a list of customers that have never been marketed to, even to upsell the addons available. There's a lot of opportunity for a new owner to get more out of this site than I do.
There are over 9.7 million active self-hosted WordPress blogs out there. It's a big market. (Source)
WHAT'S INCLUDED:
- Rights and source code to the product -- WP Review Site plugin, WPRS: My Ratings addon, WPRS Theme Pack themes
- The website -- wpreviewsite.com website files and domain
- Database of 1,537 customers' purchase info and e-mail addresses
- The demo site for the product -- awardwinninghosts.com website files and domain
- Advertising info -- I will provide the AdWords keywords and ad copy I used, and the copy used in sponsored forum posts I made
- Login to the Clixgalore affiliate program account
ABOUT THE AFFILIATE PROGRAM:
There is also an affiliate program for this site paying 30% commission for referred sales. It is run on Clixgalore.com and requires absolutely no work -- Clixgalore handles all the tracking, payments, etc. They take 25% of the commission (not 25% of the sale) and can auto bill you by credit card. I will give you my login to continue running the affiliate program. There are no monthly or yearly fees. There are several hundred affiliates and they refer 6-12 sales per month.
WHAT YOU NEED TO RUN THIS SITE:
The website runs on WordPress with a one page custom built checkout process. The purchase page allows credit card payments through Authorize.net or PayPal. If you don't have a merchant account with the Authorizenet gateway, I can remove the credit card form and you can accept payment by PayPal only. After purchasing, the customer receives an e-mail with their link(s) to download the products they purchased and their purchase is logged in the database. The links are unique to that customer and everything is automatic.
If you are going to keep the Authorizenet credit card payment form, then I recommend VPS hosting, and you'll need an SSL certificate for the payment page. If you are going to accept only PayPal then shared hosting would be adequate. Other than needing SSL and curl for the credit card form, there are no special hosting requirements, just PHP and a small MySQL database.
SUPPORTING THE PRODUCT:
You need to provide basic customer support. I receive 1-3 pre-sale mails per day asking about features. Only a few times per week do I receive a mail from a customer asking about how to install or use the plugin. You will have to become familiar with installing and using it yourself to answer those questions. I spend no more than 1-2 hours per week on support. There is a support forum hosted by Tangler embedded in the website, where customers actually help each other. You can create a Tangler account and jump in to answer questions too if you choose.
You should have some experience customizing WordPress or have someone who does available. You'll need that to help customers that ask questions about integrating the plugin and to test it when WordPress releases major new versions. The plugin has not needed any changes due to WordPress upgrades in more than 6 months, but if a new version does break something, you would need to make an appropriate fix.
The plugin has been sold with lifetime free upgrades as a feature. That means that if you make a bug fix to support new versions of WordPress, or add new features to the main plugin, you should e-mail the existing customer list so they can download the update.
MY SUPPORT:
I will provide 60 days of support for you and your customers so that there is a smooth transition. I can help get the site moved to your hosting and answer any questions you have. You can also forward mails to me for those first 60 days and I will help customers directly while you get up to speed.
Revenue Details
- August 2008: $14,019
- September 2009: $14,297
- October 2008: $17,048
- November 2008: $25,011
- December 2008: $15,407
- January 2009: $16,177
- February 2009: $13,899
- March 2009: $12,166
- April 2009: $9,276
- May 2009: $9,926
- June 2009; $7,856
- July 2009: $8,140
- August 2009: $9,444
- September 2009: $6,628
- October 2009: $6,556
- November 2009: $7,746
- December 2009: $4,727
- January 2010: $5,311
TOTAL REVENUE: $203,364
TOTAL ADVERTISING COSTS: $3,500
AFFILIATE COMMISSIONS PAID 2008: $5,536
AFFILIATE COMMISSIONS PAID 2009: $11,096
TOTAL PROFIT: $183,232 in just 18 months
An Excel spreadsheet showing every sale is attached.
The advertising cost figure is an approximation, but I have attached the AdWords report for the full 18 months actual PPC costs. The other approximately $500 of advertising was for sponsored forum posts ($20-$40 each). I have not made any sponsored forum/marketplace posts since August.
Traffic Details
This site has top organic search ranks for all the top search phrases for the market:
- #1 for "review site"
- #1 for "wordpress review site"
- #1 for "wordpress review plugin"
- #1 for "wp review site"
- #1 for "wp review plugin"
- #2 for "wordpress review theme"
- #4 for "wordpress ratings plugin"
- #5 for "wordpress review template'
- ...and many more
The site averages 250 visits per day with 500 page views per day.
I have verified the Google Analytics stats and will also attach screenshots from W3Counter.
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Comments 41 public, 7 deleted
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Claimed Traffic
| Page Views Per Month | 19,000 |
|---|---|
| Uniques Per Month | 9,000 |
Claimed Financials
| Gross Revenue (per month est) | $11,300 |
|---|---|
| Net Profit (per month est) | $10,200 |
| Warning: The seller has provided estimates (read more) | |
Monetization Methods
| Advertising Sales | No |
|---|---|
| Product or Service Sales | Yes |
| Affiliate Income | No |
Site Uniqueness
- Content is claimed to be unique
- Design is claimed to be unique
Seller
Attachments 3
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W3Counter Stats
png file
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Clixgalore Affiliate Commissions 2008
png file
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Clixgalore Affiliate Commissions 2009
png file
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WPRS Sales Data
xls file
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PayPal 2009 Financial Summary
png file
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AdWords 8/1/08-12/31/09
png file
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Verified Google Analytics PDF (6 Feb 10)
pdf file
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Verified Google Analytics PDF (6 Feb 10)
pdf file
Tags 4
Contextual Help
- The winner of this listing will be required to pay a 0% success fee to Flippa.
More Information ^ - Ownership transfer is safest when using Escrow.com (more information) ^
- These attachments have been added to the listing by the seller to give extra information to potential buyers ^
- The seller has added these tags to the listing to describe the site ^
good business!
i have PM you
Big fan of this.
I'm actually a customer and love it. Congratulations.
If there is specific information you would like to see please send me a PM, or comment, and I will attach it for everyone.
I want to put this out there since I've been discussing it with a lot of people by PM: I think one of the main reasons for the monthly sales sliding, aside from a lack of marketing, is that the last major feature release for this product was 6 months ago.
The few competitors have created new features to keep their sites/products fresh. Some of the features they've implemented, such as CSV importing ratings/reviews, or even features they haven't added that customers requested such as adding a "was this review helpful" function, would be simple to create. A freelancer could probably do it in a few hours. Now you can up the version number on the site, run sales, and rally the affiliate base behind promoting the new features.
I haven't done it myself only because I lost interest as I became absorbed in my newer products, but innovating a WordPress plugin is very easy. There is a readily available WP plugin developer pool and it's quick, cheap work.
hi, i also checked your google keyword searched ans they seem to have slipped alot, alot of them you list as number #1 are actually number 4 or 5.
any reasons for this?
I listed the search ranks as they were at Google with a fresh browser, cleared cookies, no web history on February 4th. You are probably seeing results customized for you -- Google has turned on personalized search results for all users in December.
Whats your reserve price ? I am interested in buying this. Please let me know.
I will send you a PM
Hello would you also PM the reserve to me?
Yes, I have sent you a PM as well
please pm me reserve as well
Send me a PM with your reserve.
PMs have been sent
Could you PM me the reserve? Could you also help in finding WP plug in developer if we were to purchase?
Sending you a PM now
Can you PM me the reserve? Thanks.
This listing received a Buy-it-Now offer, but the bidder was not qualified (registered today, no response to PMs, high risk country) so the offer was rejected.
Just to clarify to those watching that this listing is still open and accepting bids.
$3,622 in sales so far this month, which is higher per-day average than January or December. The only extra advertising I did compared to last month was a $20 listing in the SitePoint Marketplace.
I was asked earlier for a breakdown of sales by source. This is from the last 9 months only as I don't have conversion data going back all 18 months:
7% Google AdWords
11% forum & marketplace listings
27% affiliate referrals
55% no source tracked (organic search/links)
Please PM Reserve
Sure, PM sent
Current sales for February are now $4,320. This is 10% higher than January's average daily revenue and 24% higher than December's.
There are several other free plugins that look like they do what your plugin does. Why would they choose to buy yours when they can get these others for free?
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/easy-review-builder-for-wordpress/
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/star-rating-for-reviews/
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/mombly-review-rating/
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/starred-review/
Thanks :)
Not a single one of those plugins allows you to collect reviews from your users which is what WP Review Site is all about. Those are plugins to make it easier for the blog author to put his own review in a post body.
People buy WP Review Site because it is full featured, comes with two complete themes, and comes with support so they know they're not on their own with nowhere to turn. It does lots of things beyond adding user ratings with a very granular level of control (per-site, per-category or per-post configuration) such as Google Maps, comparison tables and affiliate link management.
Most importantly, WP Review Site comes with the recommendations of dozens of the top affiliate and WordPress bloggers, and that's something very few products can say. The fact that it is well regarded and well recommended from so many sources is one of the strongest attributes of this site. You can clone software but you can't clone reputation.
I use this plugin on my site. It saved me thousands of dollars and made me good money. Thanks Dan and goodluck with your plans!
Please PM the reserve. Thanks.
The reserve price is $90,000 USD. It will not be lowered, and I am not offering financing. At any lower price point I would prefer to hold the site and earn it monthly -- it's only an hour a week of work for me as I said.
There are 7 days left to place bids, feel free to PM me if you have any questions.
Why has your revenue started to sink?
I have already answered this (lack of advertising and promotion, no major feature updates in 6 months... read the listing and the previous comments). Please PM me if you have any other questions.
Also, February's daily revenue is higher than January's which is higher than December's, so the trend for the past 3 months is up, not down.
hello Dan
Can you please tell me what's your main competitors ?
They are wpreviewengine.com and reviewpluginforwordpress.com. They are not new competitors, they have been around since the end of 2008 / first months of 2009. As the second one was publicly sold to new ownership twice, we know that WP Review Site has higher sales, better search ranks and requires less work to run.
How about february earning, can you edit details for feb earning?
The details of a listing cannot be edited after bids are placed. February was only 28 days but sales were $5,492.
Could you advise the buyer of what features you would recomend adding to the plugin - and also putting him in touch with the WP plugin developer pool that you mentioned?