Empire Flippers is one of the most established online business marketplaces operating today.
Founded in 2011 by Justin Cooke and Joe Magnotti, it started as a small site-flipping operation and grew into a full-scale brokerage that has facilitated over $500 million in online business sales.
The platform connects buyers and sellers of content sites, SaaS businesses, ecommerce stores, Amazon FBA businesses, and other digital assets.
Key Takeaways
- Empire Flippers vets every listing before publishing, reducing the risk of scams or misrepresented businesses.
- Businesses typically sell for 20x–50x monthly net profit, depending on business type and growth trajectory.
- The platform charges sellers a 2–15% success fee, with higher fees applied to lower-value transactions.
What Is Empire Flippers?
Empire Flippers operates as a curated marketplace. Unlike open platforms where anyone can post a listing, every business submitted to Empire Flippers goes through a vetting process before it goes live.
The team reviews financials, traffic sources, monetization methods, and ownership history. Listings that don't pass are rejected. This keeps the marketplace cleaner than most alternatives.
The types of businesses listed include:
- Amazon FBA (Fulfilled by Amazon product businesses)
- Content/SEO sites (ad-based and affiliate revenue models)
- eCommerce stores (Shopify and WooCommerce setups)
- SaaS (software-as-a-service with recurring revenue)
- Amazon KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing portfolios)
- Dropshipping businesses
Most listings fall in the $50,000–$5,000,000 range, though smaller sub-$50k businesses do appear. The higher end of the marketplace has seen multi-million dollar exits from established content portfolios and SaaS products.
How the Vetting Process Works
Sellers submit their business via a form on the Empire Flippers site. The vetting team then verifies revenue by requesting access to income sources: Google AdSense, affiliate dashboards, Stripe, Shopify, Amazon Seller Central, and similar platforms.
Traffic is confirmed through Google Analytics or similar tools.
If there are inconsistencies between claimed numbers and verified data, the listing doesn't move forward.
This process typically takes 1–3 weeks. Once approved, the listing goes live with a sales multiple calculated by Empire Flippers based on the business model and financials.
Sellers don't set their own price, which removes some negotiation friction for buyers.
The vetting doesn't guarantee future performance. A site can pass vetting and then decline post-purchase due to algorithm updates, competition, or operational changes.
Empire Flippers is clear about this in their documentation.
Fees for Buyers and Sellers
Seller fees follow a sliding scale based on final sale price:
| Sale Price | Success Fee |
|---|---|
| Up to $700,000 | 15% |
| $700,001–$5,000,000 | 8% |
| $5,000,001–$10,000,000 | 5% |
| Over $10,000,000 | 2.5% |
Buyers don't pay a direct transaction fee. The marketplace earns its revenue from sellers. That said, listing prices typically reflect the seller's need to recover this cost, so buyers should factor it into any valuation conversations.
There's also a $297 refundable deposit required from buyers to unlock full listing details, including the URL. The deposit goes toward the purchase price if a deal closes.
The Buying Process
Once a buyer pays the deposit and unlocks a listing, they can review detailed financials, ask the seller questions through a Q&A system, and request a migration call.
Empire Flippers facilitates these calls as a neutral party.
If a buyer wants to proceed, they make an offer. Negotiations happen within the platform. Once both parties agree on a price, Empire Flippers handles escrow using a third-party service.
The migration process begins after payment clears, with the Empire Flippers team assisting with the transfer of domains, hosting accounts, content, and monetization accounts.
Migration support is a notable feature. Many smaller brokerages leave buyers and sellers to manage transfers themselves.
Empire Flippers assigns a migration specialist who walks through each asset transfer step by step. The process typically takes 2–4 weeks depending on complexity.
The Selling Process
Sellers who want to list go through the vetting stage first. After approval, Empire Flippers sets a list price based on a multiple of average monthly net profit.
The standard window for calculating average net profit is 12 months, though the exact approach varies by business model.
SaaS businesses with strong recurring revenue tend to command higher multiples than content sites, which carry more volatility.
Listings stay active for a set period. If a business doesn't sell, Empire Flippers may adjust the price or recommend relisting at a later date.
There's no ongoing listing fee during this period. Businesses that are priced correctly and have clean financials tend to sell faster, often within the first 30–60 days of going live.
Sellers can also request a business valuation before committing to selling, using the free calculator on the Empire Flippers site. The calculator provides a ballpark figure based on business type and estimated monthly net profit.
It's a reasonable starting point but shouldn't be treated as a final figure. Actual offers can come in above or below the list price depending on buyer demand at the time of listing.
One thing sellers should prepare before entering the vetting process is a clean profit and loss statement going back at least 12 months.
Sellers who can clearly document revenue sources, expense categories, and owner time investment move through vetting faster and tend to attract more serious buyers.
How It Compares to Other Marketplaces
A few alternatives compete in the same space:
| Platform | Focus | Approach |
|---|---|---|
| Flippa | Broader range, lower to mid market | Open marketplace with minimal vetting |
| FE International | Mid to upper market | Full-service brokerage with dedicated agents |
| Quiet Light | Mid to upper market | Agent-based, boutique style |
| Motion Invest | Sub-$150k content sites | Curated, content-site focused |
Empire Flippers sits between Flippa and the boutique brokerages. It handles volume while still offering more structure than an open marketplace.
For buyers new to acquiring online businesses, the vetting and migration support reduce some of the operational complexity compared to buying off Flippa.
For sellers with businesses under $30,000, Empire Flippers may not be the best fit. The 15% fee on smaller deals eats significantly into proceeds, and the vetting timeline adds friction.
Motion Invest handles this segment more efficiently.
What Buyers Should Watch Out For
Vetting reduces fraud risk but doesn't eliminate investment risk. A few patterns come up often in the Empire Flippers buyer community:
- Content sites dependent on a single Google algorithm cycle can drop sharply after acquisition
- Amazon FBA businesses tied to a single SKU carry concentration risk
- Seller-reported "add-backs" (expenses removed from profit calculations) can inflate stated earnings
- Due diligence on traffic sources matters more than the headline revenue figure
- Businesses with growth spikes in the final months before listing can inflate the trailing average used for valuation
Empire Flippers provides historical data and seller Q&A, but independent due diligence is still necessary.
Reviewing at least 24 months of analytics, verifying traffic source diversity, and understanding seasonal revenue patterns will give buyers a cleaner picture than the standard listing data alone.
Some buyers also hire third-party due diligence services that specialize in online business acquisitions, particularly for deals above $200,000 where the stakes justify the additional cost.
A practical step that many buyers skip is contacting the site's affiliate partners or advertising networks directly to confirm revenue.
Empire Flippers verifies this during vetting, but conditions change, and a call or email to confirm active account status before closing adds a useful layer of confirmation.
The seller Q&A feature inside the platform is also underutilized.
Asking direct, specific questions about traffic concentration, content update cadence, outsourced labor costs, and customer churn (for SaaS) often surfaces information that isn't visible in the standard listing documents.
Reputation and Track Record
Empire Flippers has been operating for over a decade with a documented transaction history. The $500 million in facilitated sales figure is publicly cited and supported by a deal database available on their site.
They've been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur, and similar publications, and have maintained consistent operations through several major shifts in the online business market.
Their podcast, "The Empire Flippers Podcast," has over 400 episodes covering acquisition strategy, business operations, and seller stories.
It's a useful resource for anyone considering buying or selling an online business, separate from the marketplace itself.
Conclusion
Empire Flippers is a credible, well-structured marketplace for buying and selling online businesses in the $50,000–$5,000,000 range, with a vetting process and migration support that put it above open-marketplace alternatives.
Buyers should still conduct independent due diligence, and sellers with sub-$30k businesses may find better terms elsewhere.