Post by Deleted on Dec 7, 2018 22:02:14 GMT
Pistonheads is at a cross roads.
Dhutch chucks his tupence worth in.
dhutch
2,535 posts
133 months
[report][news]09:04quotequote all
Talksteer said:
Well a cursory search would indicate that Autotrader got 12 million unique views per month and Pistonheads gets around 5 million.
When Petrol Ted sold the site it had 900,000 and he allegedly sold for 7 figures.
Interestingly enough around 45% of people find Pistonheads from a search engine which probably means that around half the views are related to the used car sales.
For reference Autotrader Group has a market cap of £3.9 billion!
So let's say for instance Pistonheads has 1/5th the amount of classifieds traffic and is only 1/10th as successful at rinsing buyers as Autotrader, that would equate to a £78 million value.
If Pistonheads classifieds had the same P/E ratio that would mean that they were turning over around £8 million per year.
I suspect that Pistonheads is less successful at getting money out of sellers because Haymarkets total turnover was only £136 million.
In short Pistonheads probably has the potential to be worth hundreds of millions and possibly billions as a genuine rival to Autotrader, I suspect that Carguru did not pay anywhere near that much but I suspect that they will have paid in the tens of millions.
Its mad really. Obviously I get that the site and classifieds makes money and that the brand is well known and established, but it is also crazy really that is has that sort of a value. Fair play to 'Petrol Ted' for creating a hell of a site, and while Haymarket have under invested of late they have carried it as a reasonable site and forum for over a decade which is more than half its life.
I have a natural wariness of what happens with sites/communities following takeovers, as well as the enormous trend of US investment to fail to understand the UK market, and really hope that CarGurus manage to retain the site and forums feel and momentum while introducing sensible investment to the sites software. Only time will tell.
As a forum owner myself (sites second owner) I am very aware of sharing the web with other platforms, in fact we as a site and brand have a facebook group which augments the forum. Facebook is better for transient content and the group and forum membership overlaps significantly, however the forum is also an invaluable tool and community platform and continues to do well, including new members coming in via the fb presence.
danllama said:
The charm of this forum is due to exactly what it is. Change it and people will disappear in droves.
You have to be super careful not to upset what you have. However improvements to the software behind the forum would be welcomed by a significant number and if done well should not be an issue to anyone.
As said, we will all watch this space. Retaining and listening to the current/existing staff, and spending time understanding the forum and consulting users will pay dividends in maintaining that and bringing people in to the classified and news side of the site as well.
I often recommend people look on our (PH) classifieds alongside Autotrader, and would not if it where not for the forum.
Daniel
farcebook is where it’s at pensioners 😜
the full thread for anyone remotely interested in PistonHeads future.
www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=23&t=1780964&i=0
Dhutch chucks his tupence worth in.
dhutch
2,535 posts
133 months
[report][news]09:04quotequote all
Talksteer said:
Well a cursory search would indicate that Autotrader got 12 million unique views per month and Pistonheads gets around 5 million.
When Petrol Ted sold the site it had 900,000 and he allegedly sold for 7 figures.
Interestingly enough around 45% of people find Pistonheads from a search engine which probably means that around half the views are related to the used car sales.
For reference Autotrader Group has a market cap of £3.9 billion!
So let's say for instance Pistonheads has 1/5th the amount of classifieds traffic and is only 1/10th as successful at rinsing buyers as Autotrader, that would equate to a £78 million value.
If Pistonheads classifieds had the same P/E ratio that would mean that they were turning over around £8 million per year.
I suspect that Pistonheads is less successful at getting money out of sellers because Haymarkets total turnover was only £136 million.
In short Pistonheads probably has the potential to be worth hundreds of millions and possibly billions as a genuine rival to Autotrader, I suspect that Carguru did not pay anywhere near that much but I suspect that they will have paid in the tens of millions.
Its mad really. Obviously I get that the site and classifieds makes money and that the brand is well known and established, but it is also crazy really that is has that sort of a value. Fair play to 'Petrol Ted' for creating a hell of a site, and while Haymarket have under invested of late they have carried it as a reasonable site and forum for over a decade which is more than half its life.
I have a natural wariness of what happens with sites/communities following takeovers, as well as the enormous trend of US investment to fail to understand the UK market, and really hope that CarGurus manage to retain the site and forums feel and momentum while introducing sensible investment to the sites software. Only time will tell.
As a forum owner myself (sites second owner) I am very aware of sharing the web with other platforms, in fact we as a site and brand have a facebook group which augments the forum. Facebook is better for transient content and the group and forum membership overlaps significantly, however the forum is also an invaluable tool and community platform and continues to do well, including new members coming in via the fb presence.
danllama said:
The charm of this forum is due to exactly what it is. Change it and people will disappear in droves.
You have to be super careful not to upset what you have. However improvements to the software behind the forum would be welcomed by a significant number and if done well should not be an issue to anyone.
As said, we will all watch this space. Retaining and listening to the current/existing staff, and spending time understanding the forum and consulting users will pay dividends in maintaining that and bringing people in to the classified and news side of the site as well.
I often recommend people look on our (PH) classifieds alongside Autotrader, and would not if it where not for the forum.
Daniel
farcebook is where it’s at pensioners 😜
the full thread for anyone remotely interested in PistonHeads future.
www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=23&t=1780964&i=0
