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I have missed the Twitter train for long enough. One of my January objectives is to make Twitter an effective part of my suite of business tools. Until now, the extent of my tweets have been random oddities through my Facebook profile, like “Teaching my kid to appreciate the Ramones.” I want to use Twitter as a communication tool to add value to my business relationships and improve results through those connections.

I have bookmarked a ton of posts related to Twitter and how to it can be used to help develop business connections. Of those posts, I highly recommend reading Caroline Middlebrook’s Big Juicy Twitter Guide. In particular, Section 2 delves into the benefits that Twitter can deliver for your business.

It is well known that the more contact you make with a customer, the more likely you are to make a sale. These days it is much more ‘in vogue’ to sell by not selling, rather than doing the hard-push sales pitch. Twitter is a way of doing that. With Twitter you can chat to people in a friendly way and give them nudges and hints about what you’re doing in your world. Look at the benefits:

• It reminds them that you exist
• It shows them that you are human
• It allows you to mention new offers immediately
• It allows you to form a more casual relationship

Also, Dan Zarrella just did a guest post on Read/Write Web called 10 Ways Twitter Can Boost Your Social News Profile. More than just trying to boost the size of your connections (which is something that anyone can game), the article offers several valuable tips that increase the value of those relationships. The most important… Ask questions. While Dan focuses on asking questions as a form of “Twitter-jacking,” I see the questions as the core to relationship building. Find out what your customers and connections want by asking. Then give it to them.

There is much to learn about Twitter. If you have a post that you have found insightful or if you want to let me know what your favorite Ramones song is, give me a tweet.

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Are you selling a domain name? Did you put your domain portfolio up for sale through Moniker or post it on Sitepoint Marketplace? Do you have visions of big profits from flipping websites you have quickly built up? Great. Now, you need to be prepared to negotiate with buyers. Your negotiation skills help you get the price that you want or even higher. Plus, the buyer is happy with what they paid and are likely to do profitable business with you in the future.

Here are 5 tips that I have found invaluable when negotiating with domain name and website buyers.

1. The Low Ball Bid

Most deals start with the seller asking for a high price and the buyer offering an insanely low bid. Do not get offended or put off by a low ball offer. If somebody has made the effort to make a bid, then they are interested in your property.

The key is to identify one or more elements of your domain that the buyer values. For example, do they own a portfolio of other domains in your niche? If so, then you have something in common to build on. You can move forward with the negotiation by demonstrating your value, not just haggling price.

2. Moving Forward Based on Value

When you ask questions or research other properties owned by the buyer, you can identify what is important to them. This approach helps significantly during the negotiation or when you run into a roadblock. You have to ask how/what/why questions to diffuse any roadblocks and turn them around to increase the value to the buyer. This process is what salespeople call objection handling.

DomainerPro.com had a good example in his How to Negotiate Domain Name Prices post.

Countering Bluffs: I would add that you should learn to recognize and counter the most common bluffs that buyers use. If a buyer says, “I can’t go any higher,” don’t give in, and don’t call him a liar either. Instead counter with a reasoned argument like, “I understand what you’re saying, but this domain name will ultimately save you money by bringing you targeted leads. The extra money is worth it.”

3. Always Answer Questions

Potential buyers will always have questions about your domain. You will receive even more questions when you are selling an entire website. It is important that you answer these questions thoroughly and quickly. The buyer is asking for details so that they can better value what they are willing to pay. More likely than not, a detailed response from you will help increase the final selling price.

4. Always Answer Questions Honestly

Do not play games with buyers. If you think that you can maximize your selling price by lying and by sayging that your website is not an auto-generated, blackhat SEO quickie, then you are fooling yourself. Buyers know all the tricks and will bail on a deal if you try to snow them. It is okay to be honest. A quickie, no-effort website will not get top dollar, but then again it shouldn’t.

5. Build Relationships for the Future

If you are interested in making money online through a repeatable domain flipping process, then you need to establish and grow relationships. The more key, trusted connections that you have, the more profitable and repeatable you domaining business will be. Just like any business.

Do not burn bridges by weaseling over $100 or even $1000. A single solid relationship can help your business profit 10 or 20 times that. Keep providing value and sharing with your partners and they will return the favor in spades over the long run.

Do you have any other negotiation insights or stories that others can learn from?

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The first week of 2008 has gone in a blur. It took all my will power to not spend too much time this week reviewing the many eye-popping 2007 stats posts. After all, I know that the key to John Chow’s 2007 success has been action, not daydreaming about somebody else’s fortune. Here are some of the articles that I found incredibly useful in taking direct action to hit my own blogging goals.

First, I spent time analyzing where I can improve using basic SEO strategies. I started with keywords. My goal is to maintain a #1 rank for anyone who searches for Bob Angus, but I need to improve significantly across several other sets of keywords. SEO Design Solutions offered a good guide with SEO fundamentals called How to Extend your Keyword Empire in 3 Simple Steps.

Updated: Terry at SuperAff.com posted a good tip on Tracking Hot Keywords For New Blog Subscriptions.

Next, I am addressing link building. I refuse to take the shortcut, blackhat route or just buy links. One should build links that are sustainable, valuable, and trustworthy. One starting point is to analyze the competition and develop an external relevance profile for them. Hamlet Batista unleashed something that you will not find in any ebook with Revealing your Competitor’s FULL External Relevance Profile. Also, Earner’s Blog continues his series on link building with a good reminder to think outside the box in Link Building Guide Part 3 - Aboutus.org

Finally, I am quickly coming to a realization that I need to change my blog design. Skellie of Skelliewag.org delivered a great guest post on Blog Perfume called 8 Clever Ways to Lower the Bounce-Rate on Your Blog. The tips are design-oriented more than content-oriented, but they address a critical issue for low traffic blogs like bobangus.com. Each visitor who ‘bounces’ out of your site is a lost opportunity to gain a loyal reader or new subscriber. It is time to change my Wordpress theme.

Image of the Week

Rue Pachinko by Renaud Bec is amazing concept art for the Red Steel video game by Ubisoft. For more incredible video game concept art, see the annual collections from IntoThePixel.com.

Check out other pictures and images on my Flickr photos.

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2007 has been absolutely incredible in every way – from the happiness of my family to making many new friends to my personal achievements to being a part of the invigorating internet advertising industry. I am grateful for the good fortune and the many opportunities. I hope that 2007 has been just as amazing, gratifying and successful for you.

In about 12 hours, it will be 2008. The end of a year is a time when we often take time to reflect on the past and think of the future. New Year’s resolutions are always inspired. Our goals are given a clean slate with the desire to build momentum and achieve something great. 2008 looks to hold opportunity unlike any other year. It is time like no other to think big.

Happy New Year!!!

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2007 is coming to an end. 2008 is straight ahead and is shining bright with opportunity. As always, the week between Christmas and New Year’s is chocked full of “best of 2007″ year end lists and 2008 resolutions lists. The top celebrity meltdowns of 2007 have been particularly popular here at Commission Junction…

• More Boy George escapades than we all really need in NY Observer’s Top Ten Celebrity Meltdowns of 2007
• Babies remain the “in” accessory of the stars. There are now a slew of celebrity pregnancy blogs including a list of 2007 Favorite Celebrity Pregnancies.
• Or of course, I am sure that everyone spent an inordinate amount of time procrastinating by watching the top videos on YouTube.

I like to look forward too. Making goals, setting personal challenges, and guides on how to completely breaking free are seemingly more popular than ever in the blogosphere.

• I re-read one of my favorite inspirational posts of the year How to Achieve Ridiculous Goals on Self Made Chick. Christine should know because she took the plunge into full-time online entrepreneur.
• Dosh Dosh provided some helpful blogging hints to clean the slate and start fresh in 2008. It’s all in the preparation.
• Or if you do not want to spend New Year’s day on the couch, check out Active.com’s list of New Year’s Resolution Runs in your area.

May you have a great 2008!

Image of the Week

Running the Jet to Jetty 10k race in Playa del Rey, CA. I did not even need the help of HGH like Roger Clemens and most of professional baseball.

Check out other pictures and images on my Flickr photos.

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Earlier this year, I did a post on Flipping Website Real Estate for Profit. The market for buying and selling websites is even hotter today. The Sitepoint marketplace and Digital Point marketplace are flowing with buyers and sellers. Buying a website, building it up, and selling it for more is a business model that works. However, I am seeing more pure blogs in the mix. If you are thinking about buying a blog, be careful. The metrics you use and value that you place on them must be different than a standard website.

Hot Topic

I have read three poignant posts this week that have led me to write this post.

Devlounge - The Dangers of Buying a Blog: David gets right to the point – expect to lose approximately 33% of the current traffic right away. Unique visitors are not eyeballs, they are readers. You have to value why those readers are visiting the site and if that readership can be maintained.

Portfolio.com - What’s Drudge Worth? - by way of ProBlogger.Net: Duff estimates that The Drudge Report should be valued between $10-20 million based on eyeballs, ad sales, and his mom’s opinion. However, he goes on to say that it is worth zilch if you cannot lock Matt Drudge into a long-term writing contract. I could not agree more.

Dosh Dosh - Building an Online Empire: Of the 16 website types Maki mentions that you can buy/sell, none of them were a pure blog. He lists a product review blog, but that type of site is more dependent on the product than the author.

There are many more helpful articles if you do a Google search. Or I also recommend reading related forum posts on WickedFire, Sitepoint or Digital Point.

The Metrics

Before buying a blog or any website, you need to know the following metrics:

• Unique visits per month
• Page views per month
• Feed subscriptions
• Posts per month
• Monthly Revenue
• Google PageRank
• Alexa rank
• Date established

Of course, you should ask for the trends and seasonality of these metrics. A snapshot in time or peaks can look great, but they can be pumped up and a single number does not tell the whole story.

Beside statistics, you should also have a clear understanding of the intellectual and technical property you are acquiring. You are not buying a domain. You are buying a website and everything that goes with it, including posts, comments, media, databases, customized themes, etc.

Recommendations

There is no cookie-cutter, rule of thumb for valuation, like $10 per post or 10x monthly revenues. Here is a swag bid estimate calculation that I use:

1. Your valuation calculation should start by defining a financial benchmark. Estimate the monthly profit (preferred) or revenue per thousand unique visits or subscriber that you are achieving for your current blog properties.
2. Then use that value and apply it to the same measure for the blog in question… less 50%. Remember David said 33%. I go more conservative when making financial estimations.
3. Finally, my bid would be approximately 12 months of that estimated profit or 6 months of the estimated revenue. That is my personal valuation rule based on my desire to be rolling full speed with a site within a year.

For example, let’s say your current blogs make $2 profit per thousand unique visits per month and the potential purchase has 20k uniques per month. Then I would expect to make $20 per month ($2 x 20 x 50%). My bid would be in the range of $200-250 (or $20 x 12).

In addition to making a good quantitative decision, you should also be prepared with an action plan to minimize readership erosion and to increase your ramp to profitability. Specifically, make sure you line up engaging writers and content to hit the ground running and get your promotional methods implemented.

Now I am off to see if there is anything on Sitepoint or Digital Point that catches my eye!

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