I’ve just sold one of my pet projects, hotelsrevealed.com. This was a special site because i blogged about it from day one starting here. From the idea generation to content, to logo design and the latest makeover in july…
The best way to sell
I’m not a salesperson. Let’s get that out of the way first. It’s probably been about 2 years since i last put a site up for sale. Yet i’ll often get people contact me about buying sites. Most are the online version of ‘tyre kickers’ – they just want to chance their arm on the off chance you’ll give them a site for nothing. But i don’t mind that too much… it’s flattering getting any sort of offer or interest in sites you’ve built.
The reason people CAN contact me is mainly because of this blog. Search for any of my sites and you can almost guarantee i’ll have talked about them here at some stage. So it’s not difficult to find me. If you’re interested in one of my sites it’ll take seconds to find out i’m the owner. And once you find out i’m the owner you can probably find out everything you need to know about me and the site from this blog…
So this blog is one big, powerful networking tool for me. It’s a CV, portfolio, diary, business card and life story all rolled in to one. That’s why i do it and have done for the past 4 years.
I’ll never let go…
On to hotelsrevealed.com and i was very reluctant to let it go. In fact i had typed out a reply saying i wasn’t willing to sell because i felt i could do much more with the site. Then upon reflection i thought hang on a second… yes, i can do more with the site but where the hell do i come up with the time needed to put my plans in to action? With college and theleavingcert.com, i need to keep some free time available for other stuff like client work which helps add to my portfolio and gives me some more contacts / references.
So i then decided i *was* willing to sell the site but only for a certain amount. I quickly edited the email and hit send, thinking i’d just wasted half an hour emailing one of these ‘tyre kickers’ who i probably wouldn’t hear from again.
Sale Agreed
Soon after that i got the offer i was looking for and before i knew it a sale was agreed. That was that. Hotels Revealed is no longer my baby but on the plus side it’s one less project for me to worry about. A mistake? A good decision? Time will tell. It’s a mistake if the site goes on to bigger and better things, but at the same time i hope it does… i can say i started it all off 
Right now though, i was doing nothing with it and realistically didn’t have the time to develop it further so for those reasons, i chose to sell and don’t have any regrets.