Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Any ideas you can provide would be greatly appreciated.  Here`s my background:

I started a website: www.MoonTownCafe.com about 6 years ago.  The website was designed to help poet and writers succeed with their writing.  Currently we receive about 500,000 pageviews per month with traffic from over 75 countries.  Technologically speaking, I believe we are the most advanced of any poetry/writing social network.  There are 100`s of features, many unique to our site, and way too many to list.  The behind the scenes admin functions are truely remarkable.

The site is profitable, earning most of its revenue from Yahoo! ads and some from contests hosted for other poetry/writing sites.

The trends are in the right direction with traffic increasing at a modest 5% per month.

The site was designed to allow the users to create the content that keep people coming back.  There is no need for a large team to run this site.

Many people would assume incorrectly that poetry and writing are not desirable areas for a business.  From a search engine standpoint these are often the most competitive keywords to target.  We have a google pagerank of 5 and are in the top 10 for many highly competitive keyword phrases with over 25,000,000 searches per day.

I`ve run this as a part-time hobby since inception, but it looks like I will be needed in the near future to serve in Iraq.  Also, a new website that I just got online, www.SportingHelp.com, is consuming a great deal of my spare time.

My questions are simple:

- How do a find potential buyers for www.MoonTownCafe.com?
- How much is it worth as a social network for writer & poets? I think the common business rules do not apply to web businesses judging by recent transactions (YouTube sold for 1.65 Billion while losing 3-4 million dollars per month, and serving only 50 million pageviews. There are many other examples that prove that the bulk of a web business` value is from traffic, potential, technology, and an established network of users).
- Are there legal firms or advisors who specialize in these types of transactions?

Thanks in advance,

Kyle O. 

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Visit our poetry website today at:

www.moontowncafe.com

If the site is profitable for you, would you want to sell it?
Or would it make more sense for you to find someone to take it over while you are gone, so that you don`t start from nothing when you come back? (Like a partner, or an operations manager?)

I`d like to keep it going, but I have nobody that I trust enough.  There`s quite of bit that has to be done on a daily basis to keep things moving.  I do have a business partner, my best friend (mistake #1).  He is a very talented writer but cares litle about the business end. 

I also have very little business experience (BS in Nuclear Engineering and MS in Applied Physiss), but have managed to learn what I need to keep things moving.  A partner with a strong business background may help to take things off, but again there is nobody that I trust.

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Visit our poetry website today at:

www.moontowncafe.com

Well, it`s up to you, if you`d rather just sell it.

But I wouldn`t put "I don`t trust anyone" so high on the list that you`d rather burn it off than hire a business development manager.

I just thought it would be nice for you to have something to come home to as well. It`s a great site, and if you love it - keep it.