Have you ever listed a website for sale on Flippa, and added a BIN price right off the bat? Now, have you ever seen one of these auctions sell? Now, let me reword that… have you ever seen one sell for what it is worth?
So… what is your site worth? Is it worth the total sum of all income over a 12 month time frame like some people will convince you? Even better, is it worth the keywords that are in the domain, or how well it ranks? Truth be told, there is no one defined value for any one website that is truly universal. This is why I’m not a fan of domain and website appraisals. If someone shows me their site that ranks #1 for “dog washing” and they tell me that it is worth six figures, I simply stare them back in the eye and say, “Oh well, that’s great. But what is it worth to me?”.
Just about every auction that I broker is met with either comments such as “Are you adding a BIN”, or private messages much to the same taste. The bottom line is this simple. If you start an auction with a 1$ opening bid, and a $5000 BIN price, chances are (from my personal experience only) that it is either going to go one of two ways. You are either going to get a lower price than that BIN price, or someone is going to get an absolute bargain, as the site is worth more to them than your BIN.
So, Should I Add A BIN To My Flippa Auction?
I think the real question here is WHEN should you add a BIN. Truth be told, there is no real way to gague what a website is worth until the market has spoken. Here is a highly unrelated example that I put together just then…
I am about top purchase this guitar that I have been after since the day I first demonstrated it to an old customer of mine at the music store that I worked at a few years ago. The guitar has a RRP of $1499, however, I am getting it at $899 as an off range item. Now, when I made the decision to go ahead and purchase that guitar, I was prepared to pay the $1499 for it, but am I going to? Hell no! Its there for $899, and I am going to buy it for that price, however, if the price was still at the original RRP, I would probably haggle a bit, but I would pay a lot more than its ticket price.
The same scenario can be applied to your auctions. Set yourself an ideal price that you would like to receive for the auction, then gage the response of the market, check how bidding goes (always wait until the final four hours!). In a lot of cases, you will see the price go much higher, then you can set the BIN price accordingly.
Here is the one rule that I go by in all auctions that I list. There will always be someone willing to pay more than the last bidder in all auctions. As much as auctions are fun, someone is always willing to end the auction early to secure the website for themselves. Ending an auction too early is a bad thing, and the easiest way to end an auction is to see it get some action, then add a BIN price.
So, lets say that your “dog washing” website has a personal value of some $5000, and bidding has reached over that figure. How glad are you going to be that you didn’t add a BIN at the start of the auction?
Ryan T Malone
The Original Website Flipping Broker
