Last week was everyone praising the sale. This week is everyone sending me nasty emails, calling me out on their blogs and generally being a wee touch more pessimistic. Which is fine, because it’s exactly what I expected. Instead of answering and dealing with these individually (like I have the energy or time…) I figured I’d give my opinion on this whole thing, since I’ve been holding back.

This post will basically be all the details on the deal with the exception of the new owner and the figures. That will come once everything is signed and paid for, as I always hate to bring things out before their time.

So, bare with me if this is long and, really, everyone is free to disagree with me. It just didn’t make sense (to me) for people to disagree without the whole story (or as close as you’re going to get in the next couple of weeks). I’m going to do this in a question / answer format because then I can add to it as I realize I’ve forgotten stuff. Feel free to make this you “link to” page if you’re talking about this.

Why Sell Your Blog?

I get this question nearly more than any of the others. If the blog is me, and I’m the blog… Why sell it? If I’m sick of blogging, why not just close up shop? If I want to be a paid writer why not write for the larger magazines and sites out there? If I just want a few bucks why not get a job?

Well, I’m not sick of blogging. I love blogging. As far as being a freelance writer: been there, done that. Articles in hundreds of sites, half a dozen magazines, a dozen newspapers and contributed to a handful of books. I’ve been there and done that. The reason I turned to blogging was because I was sick of all the constraints. Oh, and I have a job.

When I got the first serious offer (2,000$ ish) it made me ask the question: would I be willing to sell the blog? For me, the answer was yes. I don’t know why. I just knew that if I had to I could let go. At the same time, though, I had to ask myself what the ideal offer I’d accept would be. For me, the ideal offer would have been to sell the blog, but stay on as a writer and maintain full editorial control. That would effectively mean letting go of the domain, design, direction, marketing and advertising… But the writing and, ultimately, the way my personality is reflected online would be the same.

I’d have been willing to sell for other deals, but that’d be the ideal and I know other bloggers would agree that if they got that kind of deal it wouldn’t be so bad at all.

Who Would Buy a Blog?

This is, of course, the flipside of the coin. Most people are willing to sell just about anything in their lives, but is anyone really willing to buy it? Thankfully I don’t have a large need to justify this. I didn’t go looking for buyers, they came to me. So ultimately I didn’t need to make a huge business case for this, I simply needed to state where I was at and watch the bidding go crazy (which it did for a few hours there).

As far as the “value proposition”, I do believe that blogs do need to be valued differently than businesses. While typical valuation methods (value of content, value of traffic, value of Search Engine Optimization, value of income) can be used, other things do need to be taken into account. Quoting myself, elsewhere:

Ultimately I still believe blogs need to fall under a different valuation model because you’re buying more than just the three Big Ones (brand, content and traffic). You’re also buying into a knowledge network, you’re getting a writer and (by definition) you are getting staying power.

All blogs grow as long as the writers keep writing. It’s what naturally happens in a social networking situation. While I’m not big on social networking sites, per say, I do know that the same rules that apply to real world social networking apply to blog social networking: all active nodes will attract more active nodes.

Whether this turns into profit is something else entirely.

Why You? Why Your Blog?

Ah, the golden question. This is sometimes phrased as “Who the hell do you think you are?”, to which I always respond:

“Super Grover”. … Typically that doesn’t help someone’s mood, somehow. Some people are way too uptight.

Anyways…

Ensight is mildly popular. Having been online, I am both mildly popular and mildly experienced. As a writer, I seem to have a mildly decent tone, pacing, etc. I know it’s not professional. I know it’s not journalistic. And I sure as hell know it’s not ideal. But it’s me. If you were to sit down and talk to me, and then read my blog, I’d like to think that you could hear my voice in the writing.

I’ve always said that I blog for me and for me only. I guess that’s going to change. Weird.

I’m getting off topic though. Why would someone buy me and buy my blog in particular? In my opinion it comes down to the weight the blog holds in the blogging community, traffic (and traffic growth), income (and income growth) and search engine power (and the growth of that). While someone could easily say that it’s nearly impossible to predict growth, I believe the social nature of blogs means that as long as I don’t “change” and as long as I keep writing Ensight is (at a minimum) going to grow through the growth of blogging in general. If I can raise it’s profile (and mine), the growth will be above the curve.

I guess that at the end of the day someone is investing in the same thing any investor invests in: the individual. I know a few VC’s and before anything else they want to know if it’s a good team behind something. A business plan can be tweaked and improved upon. A team can’t. So, I guess I’m an individual that’s worth investing in.

I’d like to say it’s because I’m incredibly handsome, but the picture in this article will nullify that statement damn quick. I’ve never been one to oversell myself. If you’re here and reading you’re going to have an opinion of me already and I don’t have the energy to change people’s opinions over such a small matter which ultimately isn’t about me anyways.

Why 15,000$?

Another frequent question (in truth these are all questions I’ve been getting a lot). Let’s be clear. I never said the blog sold for 15,000$. In fact, here is the quote:

The only offers I’m willing to entertain at this point are those above the 15,000$ mark.

I’ve been trying to correct this misconception since I said it. At one point in the bidding I had an offer of 4,000$. I said I wouldn’t accept any offers below 5,000$ because the offer was very close to what I was looking for. There was value in the cash of the offer, but there was also value in the terms and in the buyer. I’ve said all along (and I said to the reporter this weekend) that I wouldn’t disclose the final number until the sale was complete.

Either way, let’s say the value is 10,000$. Ultimately the question will be the same: why would someone pay that much for a blog. There’s a bit of a discussion going on here about that very thing. With some saying blogs should be value at less than their commercial counterparts. I guess to me blogs are uncharted territory. There isn’t a standard way of valuating them. Maybe it’d be good to do an interview with the buyer at some point (after the numbers are published) and see what he thinks about all this.

Is the Investor an Idiot?

No. Longtime net investor. He’s bought at least one project from me before. Someone I know and trust, as much as you can trust anyone you aren’t married to.

Is It the First Blog Sold?

No, apparently not. I know of a few others. Most were bought as part of hiring someone on, were changed to something other than what they were originally, etc. Thankfully I never claimed to be the first. Is this an “industry defining moment”? We’ll see. I’m no fortune teller, but I’d like to think anything that kicks up a stink and gets people thinking and talking is a good thing.

Well, for now I guess that’s it. If you have other questions, post them. I know I’ve forgotten stuff but I can’t remember what. At the end of the day, feel free to disagree with me, poke fun at me, say blogs are worthless, etc. Blogging’s about people’s opinion. Mine is that this blog is worth buying. Yours is free to be different :)