The only three numbers that set a multiple

Walk into any negotiation over an online business and you'll hear a dozen numbers thrown around. Traffic. Followers. Total users. The founder's hours. Almost none of it sets the price. Three things do, and once you can see them, you can value an asset on the back of an envelope.

1. Profit you can actually keep

Not revenue. Not "revenue if you cut these costs." The owner earnings a new buyer realistically takes home after every cost of running the thing — including the founder's own labor, replaced at market rate. A site that "makes $200k" but needs forty hours a week of the founder's unpriced time is not the same asset as one that runs on two.

Standardize this first. It's the denominator under every multiple, and it's where most listings quietly cheat.

2. How durable that profit is

A dollar of profit from a five-year-old content site that ranks for evergreen terms is worth more than a dollar from a store riding a single viral product. Same dollar, different durability — and durability is most of what separates a 2× multiple from a 4×.

Ask the boring questions. How concentrated is the revenue? How many customers, partners, or keywords would have to fail before the income halves? The more answers that make you flinch, the lower the multiple.

3. Where it's heading

Growth pulls multiples up; decline drags them down, hard. A business growing 30% a year can justify a premium because you're buying next year's profit, not just this year's. One sliding 10% a year is a melting ice cube, and the multiple has to price the melt.

Putting it together

Take keepable profit, adjust the multiple up for durability and growth, down for fragility and decline, and you have a defensible number. Everything else — the follower count, the awards, the founder's vision — is color. It might make you want the asset. It shouldn't change what you pay for it.