Most business owners sell a business once in a lifetime so experience is not on the side of the seller.  My best analogy to selling your business is like selling your house, but on adrenaline.  Your house may carry some emotional connection, but nothing like your business.  You have emotionally, physically, financially, and socially surrounded yourself around this business and letting it go can be more emotionally challenging than you might think.  Then add to it the relationship with your employees, vendors, supplies, etc. and it can be a roller coaster ride.  That being said, selling a business is similar in selling your house when it comes to getting it spruced up before you market it. 

If you have decided to sell your business then please look around, with an objective eye and put together a list of the things that need to be cleaned up.  What worked for me was having a friend come over and tell me what he… thought I needed to do.  Be prepared for answers that you don’t want when asking other’s opinions, but they are much more honest with what they see.  I have heard that a messy house makes it a “home” (bla, bla, bla - usually said by lazy people) but in business, a mess makes the business look bad.  Think about the restaurant that has trash out front, the retail stores that have so much stuff packed inside that you can’t walk around, and the service company who constantly says, “that paperwork is around here someone if I can only find it.”  All of these are signs of a poorly managed company.

When you want to sell your business CLEAN IT UP.  I know your busy and you know where everything is and in which pile, but you have 7 seconds to make a first impression.   No new business owner wants to come into a business and clean it up without some type of discounted price.  Take the time to give a good impression and appearance is the easiest and cheapest way to do that.  The first step is to get a big trash can that can be taken to the shredding company and start going through every desk, all files, and all cabinets (and that means yours too).  You will be amazed at what you find and memories of successes and failures will be relived, I promise.   Just like when you do a spring cleaning at your house and clean out the attic and closets, you will feel lighter and happier when you throw all the old crap away.  Box up what you need to save but throw away as much as possible.      

Once you are done with the office paperwork then move to the warehouse, showroom, and offices themselves.  Paint the walls, fix the holes, repair the doors, fix the alarm, replace the broken glass, clean the carpet, are you getting the picture yet?  Then move to the outside and look at your signage, logo, company shirts, trucks, and equipment.  You are trying to sell the assets of your company so make them look as good as possible.  It is not unreasonable to wash your car before you put it up for sale so do the same for your business.  There is a very good return on the time invested so make the time and just do it!

This entry was posted on Monday, July 20th, 2009 at 9:25 am and is filed under Sell Your Business, Exit and Answers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.