Selling Your Business - Your M&A Advisor's Number 1 Job

Many business owners are tempted to sell their own business especially after receiving an unsolicited inquiry from a potential buyer. Why not save what could be a very expensive Success Fee from your broker or M&A advisor?

Think about the last time you bought a new car. Did you walk into the dealership, look at the sticker price, and then instruct the salesman, "This is great, I'll take it." Of course not. You negotiated for a better deal. A good advisor sets up a bidding competition among several buyers. A business owner managing his business sale can normally process one buyer at a time, thus no competition, no reason for the single buyer to offer a competitive price and terms, and no reason to behave during due diligence (think of price adjustments during the later stages of the process).

A good M&A process involves bringing several buyers to the table simultaneously. This is especially important when you are attempting to sell for strategic value like our last software company client. We had a 40% price improvement between the initial offers and the final competitive bid winner. That's earning your fee!

Dave Kauppi is a Merger and Acquisition Advisor and President of MidMarket Capital, providing business broker and investment banking services to owners in the sale of information technology, software, and other technology based companies. Dave is also the editor of the Exit Strategist Newsletter and author of the Book Selling your Software Company - An Insider's Guide to Achieving Strategic Value