How can you sell that?  Is there really value to sell even though your services are what customers buy?

You may be wondering how you could ever sell your business, especially if your personal expertise in making a product or providing a service is what makes your business successful and unique.  There are ways to build that expertise into the business, but those choices are driven by your personal goals and what you hope to get out of the business one day. The best way to answer these questions and decide what to do is to begin thinking about the end of the business and work backwards.

Preparing to exit a business, whether by selling it, retiring, or handing it over to family, is called succession planning.  Many business owners are so caught up in the day-to-day activities of running the business that they don’t make plans for how they will eventually exit the business. 

It may help to begin thinking about your exit strategy by asking the following questions:

• Your involvement in the business must end one day – what do you hope to take away from that?
• Why did you start the business in the first place?  Have your goals changed since then?
• When do you want to retire?  Do you have enough retirement funds?
• Once you leave the business, how important will it be to you for the business reputation and quality to be maintained?
• If you plan to leave a family legacy, are those family members involved in the business today?

Once you've answered those questions, you will have established some personal goals and objectives for your exit strategy.  Your next step is to determine how to accomplish those goals.  Sometimes it helps to think in terms of leaving the business right this minute, in order to help you see what special knowledge and skills are making your business unique.

• If the owner(s) were to suddenly and unexpected become disabled or die today, who would take over the business? 
• Is everything in place to enable the new person to run it without any assistance from the owners?
• Are there certain skills or knowledge that the owners have that need to be taught to the new owners?
• Which skills or processes make this business different from all its competitors?
• How can those unique skills or processes be documented and taught to a new owner?
• Are key knowledge points documented anywhere, such as a list of potential contacts for sales, a list of repeat customers, effective marketing strategies that have been used, unique manufacturing or customer service techniques that are used, and so on?
• What happens if you or a partner wants to leave the business? 
• Has a buy out agreement been established? 
• What skills or expertise would have to be replaced? 
• Is there any knowledge or skills that must be transferred to the business before the partner leaves?
• Have you considered a non-compete agreement over a specified period of time after separation?

The SCWBC can help you think through your exit strategy, set personal goals, create a strategy for getting there, and figure out how to build your intrinsic skills and knowledge into the business.  The sooner you start your succession planning, the more time you will have to make sure all the key pieces are in place to enable to you to take away from the business what you want from it. Request a consultation with a business coach to get started.