GET MORE FOR YOUR BUSINESS®

List the Business for Sale

Advertise your business for sale by owner, or by broker.

Objective

Identify the appropriate Business Listing Services (BLS) platforms and list your business for sale. This step may also include advertising the business in various newspapers, magazines, and industry trade publications, either print or digital.

Tasks

Determine which listing services are best for your opportunity. Craft a listing profile that will entice serious and qualified buyers. Post your ad and track views, clicks, and inquires.

Best Practices

There are two ways to market a business for sale. The first is INBOUND marketing. That’s essentially what listing on the BLS is. The second is OUTBOUND marketing. That will be covered in Step 8, Buyer Prospecting.

For the purposes of this guide, a BLS is any Business Listing Service or advertising outlet that lists businesses for sale. Most are online, but there are other mediums that should be considered to advertise your business for sale, like newspapers, magazines, billboards, and signs. They are all mechanisms for inbound marketing.

Inbound marketing is like bottom fishing with a bobber. You put the line in the water with some bait on it and hope there are fish down there that will bite on it. A BLS is a fishing spot. Thousands of other businesses for sale are fishing there also. Your task is to pick the right spots, use better bait, and be good at finessing the line when buyers bite.

You can also put a big FOR SALE sign on the front of your building and hope a qualified buyer will drive by and see it, then give you a call. You can also advertise in your local newspaper under “Business Opportunities,” or in your industry newsletter or magazine. All these outlets are designed to create inbound leads. To complicate matters, you may be trying to generate interest without tipping your hat to employees, customers, or suppliers that you are selling the business. That can be tricky.

Here are some best practices for listing on the BLS:

  1. Use the info from your Teaser (Step 3) to write the
  2. Unless you don’t care if everyone knows you are selling, don’t disclose the name of your
  3. Provide your general location (region/state), but not your street Note whether the business can be readily relocated anywhere, or serves a geographic market (city, county, state, or region).
  4. The headline should state the nature of the business and why it is an attractive Example:

Profitable and Growing Manufacturer of Personal Fitness Equipment for the Home Market

  1. The subheading should highlight the strength and durability of the Example:
  • Years Operating History, Robust Sales and Distribution Channels, Thousands of Repeat Customers
  1. State the asking price, or price If the price is negotiable, state that in the body of the ad. Some BLS allow you to post a price range, because price is often a function of terms. Buyers that pay all-cash expect the low end of the range. Buyers that want seller financing or earn out expect the high end of the range. (We’ll discuss this more in Step 11.)
  2. Some BLS’s have a field called “Reason for Selling”. Keep the answer short, like “retiring,” or “family ”
  3. The business summary section should be contextual and information rich, as opposed to flowery hype. Focus on the strengths of the business, like repeat customers, recurring revenue, high margins, patents and trademarks, loyal staff with long tenue, Don’t focus on what your business is…that can be stated in one or two sentences. Focus on why someone should be interested in buying it over other opportunities.
  4. State whether you are offering seller It’s usually an important consideration for most buyers. Don’t discuss specific terms, simply state, “seller financing available, terms are flexible.”
  5. Include a 3-year financial summary of revenue and earnings. Remember the lesson from Step 2 on Seller Discretionary Provide an accurate picture of how much money the business makes, and how much money the owners keep year in and year out.

Note: If you have little or no revenue, or your numbers are not good, or they are in decline, don’t sweat it and don’t hide it! If it’s a distressed situation, say so. Some buyers look for those opportunities. Your problems might be their gain. Highlight the upside for a new owner. Some buyers will have the capability of turning things around quickly if you have created assets and attributes that present the right buyer with a good opportunity.

  1. Some BLS allow you to provide expected revenue and earnings for the current year or next year. If the business is on a good growth trajectory, highlight that by stating how much revenues and earnings are expected to increase as a
  2. Include the appropriate contact Some BLS allow for blind contact, meaning the seller’s name and contact information is not revealed in the ad. You will get an email from interested parties and decide whether to reveal your name and the name of your business. (More on this in Step 9, Buyer Qualification.) Some BLS require the seller’s name and number be published. In that case, use a trusted intermediary, like your attorney, accountant, broker, or other advisor. You can also use a pseudonym or alias. Set up a generic email account at Gmail or Yahoo to receive the leads. Use a phone answering service to receive calls that doesn’t disclose the name of your business.
  3. If the BLS enables it, include a Find a compelling image that represents your industry or line of business. One that attracts the eye and sparks the imagination. If your sale is not confidential, include a picture of your building or logo.
  4. Most BLS allow you to choose one or more categories to be listed Use as many related categories as the listing allows. Make it easy for buyers to find your listing when searching for a specific type of business.
  5. Buyer Prescreening Info: some BLS allow you to stipulate certain information the buyer must enter to contact you, such as time frame for buying, amount of money they expect to put down, and professional Do NOT require any information – most buyers will either pass on inquiring or enter inaccurate information. The BLS is not the place to qualify buyers. You will qualify them later (Step 9).
  6. Disclosure documents: Some BLS allow you to upload your Selling Memorandum (Step 4) and NDA (Step 5). Do NOT do These docs create unnecessary obstacles for buyers who are simply in the “shopping” stage. Get their interest first. Make it super easy for them to inquire. Then qualify them. Remember, you are fishing. It’s hard to know what kind of fish are down there until you hook them and bring them to the surface. Then you decide whether to throw them back and keep fishing, or boat them and weigh them.
  7. Don’t buy the upgrades (yet). Most BLS try to entice you to upgrade to ‘showcase ad’ or ‘bolding’ or ‘featured’ or `above the fold placement’ or `email blasts’. Test the response first before buying any upgrades.
  1. Listing Duration and Costs: Most BLS charge per Most give price breaks for listing for longer periods. You could easily spend several thousand dollars for these BLS platforms. Choose wisely!
  2. Track views, clicks and responses, then tweak the listing as Ideally, you will do A/B testing, which means you will post one headline and summary on one BLS and another headline and summary on a different BLS. Then track which listing provides the best inquiries.

Notice I said “best” and not “most”. Getting the most inquiries is not the right measure since many of those inquiries might be tire kickers and service providers trying to sell you stuff. The goal is to get inquiries from serious and qualified buyers, not lookie loos and salespeople. Each week you should review the results of your listings and make adjustments to the content. When you are satisfied with the response rate, consider upgrading on the BLS that is providing the best inquires.

Tools and Tips

There are no shortages of BLS outlets. A listing of many of them are included in the back of this guide. It’s beyond the scope of this guide to compare them all because there are too many variables depending upon your location, type of business, size of business, and budget. BLS sites also come and go. You’ll need to do some research on which ones are most appropriate for your business.

The largest BLS as of this writing is BizBuySell. They also own BizQuest. Between the two of them, they have the most listings and attract the most buyers looking for opportunities priced less than two million dollars. BizBuySell also provides a robust set of best practices and tips for creating a good listing. Finally, don’t forget to look into advertising opportunities in your local newspaper and industry newsletter or magazine. The more targeted the outlet, the better your response is likely to be.

A few tips on why listings get poor response:

  • It’s long-winded and Too much meaningless information. Don’t bury the lead. Include the salient facts and figures. You’re not selling a “dream” you’re selling assets.
  • Doesn’t include The first thing buyers want to know is how much revenue is being generated and how much in earnings is being retained year-in and year-out. If you don’t have revenue, then make it very clear that the opportunity is intellectual property or other assets that will be of value to the right buyer.
  • Nothing The ad reads like every other Mom and Pop shop on the block. Highlight the strengths of the business. What makes it special?
  • No general location Many buyers are looking to buy a business in their area. They will skip right over listings that are not in their area or don’t provide their location. For all they know the business could be in Russia.
  • The business requires YOU or specialized skills to run it. After reading the ad, it’s apparent to the buyer that YOU are the You sell graphic design services, or programming services, or other services that only you or someone like you can perform.
  • Wreaks of desperation. Words like “must sell,” “best offer,” or “no reasonable offer refused,” signal to the buyer that the business is probably worthless. They would be better off starting one from scratch than buying yours.
  • No photos or poor-quality The image used to represent the opportunity is dull or lifeless. It needs to inspire. It needs to communicate the essence of the business and the size of the opportunity. If you’re selling a pizza shop, for example, the image should be a mouth-watering pizza that makes anyone viewing it instantly hungry.
  • Grossly overpriced in proportion to the financial history and If your business grossed $300,00 per year over the last three years and your price is five times that without real property or capital equipment or other apparent assets, a buyer will quickly conclude the business is overpriced. Your price should be proportional to what a buyer could purchase a similar business for, or the investment required to start one like it from scratch. As discussed earlier, most buyers will do a make-versus-buy analysis.

Summary

90% of all business buyers’ prospect for opportunities online. Most browse one or more Business Listing Services. Some of them are good places to fish. Others have no fish, or the fish never bite. Do some research to determine which fishing spots are right for selling your business. BLS is an inbound marketing strategy. You are hoping buyers will contact you. In Step 8, we’ll look at best practices for outbound marketing, where you will contact them. Most importantly, create a compelling ad that presents a sound business proposition.

Most BLS are open to For Sale By Owners (FSBO). Others are designed specifically for brokers and M&A intermediaries to exchange deal flow. The ones that are best for your situation depends largely on the type and size of your opportunity. Even with FSBO, you can get listed on the broker and M&A exchanges if your business qualifies.

Examples

  • Business Listing Services
  • Sample Listing