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- Common Challenges to Selling a Business: Business Owner Insights (1/25/24)
- Considering Selling Your Business in 2024? (12/13/23)
- 12 Ideas to Attract and Keep Employees (11/13/23)
- Hope is Not a Strategy…and Private Equity Isn’t Your Escape Route (10/11/23)
- How to Successfully Sell Your Business to an Employee (9/25/23)
The Negotiator
"I've messed things up with my last two buyers...will you negotiate with this next buyer for me?" You bet! One of the most valuable services that a business broker provides is that we negotiate on behalf of the buyer and seller. As transaction brokers, we filter out the stress and buffer any criticism. I'll explain:
A buyer and seller are fundamentally at odds on a transaction. Generally, what is good for the seller is bad for the buyer (and vice versa). This can be worked out most of the time, but not if the buyer makes comments that insult the seller such as wondering why the asking price is so high; or if the seller implies that the buyer is a cheapskate who is trying to steal his life's work for pennies on the dollar. It's easy to get sideways and let emotions kill any hope of a deal.
When you have an unbiased transaction broker in the middle negotiating for you, the facts and figures drive the conversation. Emotional responses are filtered and buffered by the broker so that they don't enter into the equation. This allows both sides to focus on the deal itself and it fosters proper communication about price, structure, terms, and transition.
I have heard of exceptions in which buyers and sellers negotiate directly and successfully - it IS possible. It's just not probable. There are far more epic failures than there are successes. While most of the time business brokers find buyers for clients, they can also help when you have sourced the buyer yourself. My advice is this: If you have someone (an employee or outside third party, perhaps) who is interested in buying your business, contact a business broker right away. Your investment in brokerage services is generally based on the amount of work involved -- your return on that investment is measured in terms of your own stress level and successful deal closing.
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