I was intending to wait to announce the mystery blog until the seller posted his view of the process, the whys and the wherefores and such. However, the time we’d agreed for him to post to has come and gone, and he’s in bed dead sleeping.

Once he posts his account, I’ll link to it (obviously), however I felt it was rather cruel of me to not announce it sometime around when I said I was going to.

So, what is the blog being sold, who is the owner, and what is the story behind it (oh, and what are the high bids?)?

The blog is The Blog Herald, as several people at Blogaholics guessed (ultimately, John Evans won the contest, which included a free copy of Blog Marketing).

Why did Duncan sell it? I’ll let him give the full reasons, but the biggest and best were that he was no longer enjoying writing it as much as he used to, and that there was a perceived conflict of interest with a blog that was in a blog network reporting on blog networks.

Duncan’s been considering this move for a while now, but could never get enough interest up with the people he was talking to to make it worth his while. I told him I’d help out, broker the deal and take some of the stress off his shoulders. It’s always hardest to sell something you care deeply about (I know, having been there), so we both felt having someone who wasn’t directly involved with it doing the selling would be best (ie: me).

The current high bids are 60K, 65K and 72K. The private auction will be ending today sometime, after which we’ll get down to the business of sorting out the transaction. Once that’s all done, we’ll be announcing the winner at whatever time works best for the winner.

The current high bidders are all looking at the blog as a brand / profile investment more than a pure cash investment. After all, 36 times monthly revenues is a fairly high multiple for any site, even if it experiences 10% growth every month (as Blog Herald does) and could earn more. At 72K, it would likely take someone about a year to earn it back with a redesign and with the growth it’s experiencing.

Overall, this has been a great experience. Some really top companies (including a Fortune 500) inquired about the blog, and everyone was extremely professional. I’ve made some great connections that I’m hopeful I’ll have be able to work with in the future.

This process isn’t quite over, but I’m much more able to answer questions now that the blog is public :)

So have at it! Is The Blog Herald worth serious coin? Are blogs worth anything at all? What kind of business valuations would go into making a blog worth upwards of 75,000$?

Oh, and feel free to swear and call me names if you’d like. Enough folk have been doing it all throughout the process that I’d kinda be disappointed if it ended now ;-)

Update: I forgot to say, that it’s entirely likely there will be a transitional period post-sale. During that period, the blog will likely stay as part of b5media, and Duncan will likely keep writing it. Obviously this could change if a new bidder flew in, but based on the current high bids, this is how it looks like it’ll play out.