Building Value to Sell Your Business

Over the past year or so, we have been seeing an increase in our clients selling their businesses. We advise our clients from the early preparation stages to the ultimate successful exit, or sale, of their business. We have worked on over 50 transactions providing transaction support, financial opinions, and valuation services to prepare a business for a sale.

Let’s talk about the basics of what we typically examine when valuing a business to sell. We identify your business’s gross margins, the cost of goods or services sold, sales, the gross profit, and the expenses. It is crucial to determine the value of your business and analyze your business’s financial standing. Valuing your business allows for improvement before your business goes on the market. Your focus should be for your business to be at peak performance before selling to attract buyers.

A business is an organization with systems, sometimes inventory, financial records, employees, a history, customers, or clients, databases, equipment, and intellectual property. It’s important to organize all these things when preparing for a sale, as a buyer is going to look at every detail that makes up your business.?The buyer’s end goal is to make sure the deal makes sense.?That’s why it’s crucial, as a seller, to make sure every aspect of your business is in order and enticing.

Branding is essential, even more so now than ever before, and will probably be more valuable than the actual operations of your business. The more refined, the better someone can visualize the brand that helps you retain customers, or clients, and helps capture your audience and ultimately creates a culture for your business.

Your business’s work culture is also a part of branding. The goal here when you prepare your business for a sale is, you want to leave your business in the hands of people who have worked with you for an extended period of time, who are loyal, enthusiastic, diligent, and self-sufficient. Buyers want to make sure the people who contribute to the business running smoothly are going to be around for a while.

If you are in the process of selling your business or are thinking of selling your business and need advisement on how to prepare for a sale, comment “Exiting” below, and we will send you additional information.