Adapting Your Business Model for a More Attractive Sale
Your business success didn’t come overnight. After working hard to become satisfied with what you’ve accomplished, you’re now ready to move on. You’re thinking more seriously about selling your business and believe the time is right to get the most value from it.
But what if you could get even more value from your business by taking your operations in a new direction? That’s right — changing your current business model just might make your already successful company even more attractive to buyers.
Change can make people uncomfortable, especially if you’ve operated in one way for a long time and your business is profitable. But your business model is where the value of your company is created, delivered, and captured.
It makes sense, then, that changing your business model could attract more potential buyers. In the process, you can create a more competitive process for the sale, enabling you to command a higher price and more favorable terms.
The experienced and knowledgeable business brokers at Sunbelt Business Brokers work with small and medium businesses to maximize their value. You can get a jump on the process of selling your business by using Sunbelt Business Brokers’ business valuation calculator to estimate your company’s current value.
Consider these steps to adapt your business model to potentially increase your company’s value and make it more attractive when selling your business.
Assessing Current Business Model
As the founder and owner of your business, you might feel you’re very much in touch with your business model and don’t need to assess it. However, identifying your company’s strengths and weaknesses lays the groundwork for improving the company and innovating for future growth.
Consider taking these five steps to assess your current business model:
- Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of your business
- Ask for feedback from customers, employees, suppliers, and partners
- Do a deep dive into your company’s performance data
- Benchmark against your competitors
- Identify where you can improve and innovate
By regularly assessing your business model, you can more readily recognize shifts that impact your company’s performance or present opportunities for growth.
Implementing Changes
With a clear, revised vision of your company, you can decide how you intend to implement your changes. These plans should focus on two groups of people: customers and employees. Test your new model in a “sandbox” outside your existing business model.
When ready, your launch should include:
- Training and education for employees
- New systems, tools, and technology
- Changes to policies and procedures
- Communications for new and existing clients
- Rebranding if needed
After launch, give the new business model at least six months to work through the changes before listing your company for sale.
Enhancing Value Proposition
Reinventing your business model can enhance your company’s value proposition. All buyers will want to see how profitable your company has been. However, your new business model can deliver even more value to a potential buyer by:
- Demonstrating how the business can continue to operate without you
- Presenting growth projections/li>
- Showing how the new model is set up to explore new markets/li>
- Highlighting how your company’s unique value proposition fits in the model/li>
Your value proposition differentiates you from competitors, making your business more attractive to buy.
Consider a Business Broker to Adapt Your Business Model
When selling your business, a business broker can help you find value in your company that you might not have recognized previously. At Sunbelt Business Brokers, we can get you from listed to closed with more value than you anticipated.
If you’re ready to talk about adapting your business model, get in touch with us today.
