Straight talk time – buckle up!
Some businesses are really hurting right now. If this is you, make the moves you know you need to make in the back of your mind to survive.
If things are stable or growing, consider yourself lucky, keep it up, and do not take your eye off the ball.
Are you an owner / future seller? Check out our 2025 Seller Guide for what to expect
Are you a prospective buyer? Do not miss Straight Talk for Buyers
First, know that there is always a market for quality businesses
Key? A defensible, market-based valuation. Organized financials. Preparation.
Keep in mind – every buyer wants to know:
- – How much cash does the business generate?
- – How do I grow it?
- – What is the asking price based on?
- – Are there trained employees who will stay?
- – What is the seller’s role?
15 Owner Actions
- Take your Google my Business profile SERIOUSLY. It is the #1 thing many owners can do to improve their business at zero cost. This means:
- – This means updating updating it weekly (takes 2 min)
- – Responding to reviews
- – Asking for reviews from happy customers
- – Adding pictures AND video
2. Look at your online presence across the board. Do you have a business profile on Facebook? Can you add videos on Youtube? Does it make sense to have a profile on HomeAdvisor, Angie’s List, Nextdoor, Yelp, your local Chamber, and on and on? Is your business on Bing? Why not? There are so many online platforms, get your business on them
- – Own your business reputation online
- – Potential customers are looking for solutions to their problems…can they find you?
- – If we Googled your business right now..what would we find?
3. Let’s be real..as owners, most of us have little time to carefully look at our expenses, especially recurring ones. Often, we are too busy chasing sales wins and putting out fires
- – Take your P&L for the last 3 years (minimum) and carefully look at every expense line as a % of sales. What is increasing? Do not skip anything
- – Software & tools are eating up more revenue – do you need / use each software?
- – Look at vendors like insurance, marketing firms, bookkeeping, CPAs, legal – have you shopped costs? Challenge your vendors – make them work FOR YOU
4. If your business is challenged – make the cuts, IMMEDIATELY, you know you need to make to survive. This means:
- – Terminations
- – Reducing hours
- – Carefully review capacity (and overcapacity) of your team and expense footprint
- – If you have to cut 5% of revenue today, what actions would you take? 20%?
5. Have you asked your employees for their ideas to SAVE $? Why not? They probably have some thoughts..
- – Give bonuses for finding savings
- – Engage and reinforce a fighting team spirit
6. Along these lines, have you asked your employees for their ideas to GROW? Why not? They probably have some thoughts..
- – Give bonuses for wins
- – Engage and reinforce a winning team spirit
7. Let’s say you offer pricey landscape design & build projects that cost $30k – $250k+. Could you “chunk” your offerings and services to make them easier for potential customers to consume? For example, what about offering a “spring consult” to offer a homeowner for $500?
- – The sharpest owners have these kinds of offers / tiers on their site and sprinkled throughout their digital presence
8. Thank your past customers. Give them something of value, for free. It could be as simple as an email or call with ideas
9. When was the last time you benchmarked your offering against your competitors? Think about:
- – Response time to your initial outreach
- – Estimate / pricing process
- – Estimate / pricing deliverable
- – Pricing
- – Presentation & communication
10. Clean and freshen up your physical space. It sounds silly, but this will mentally signal and trigger to your employees that details matter. Your customers will pick up on it too, believe me
11. Do you have documented processes for estimates? Setting up a new customer? Completing a job? You should..
12. Write a guide, case study, share a checklist with past customers and/or prospects
13. Are there partnership opportunities for your business? Could you pay referral fees to others for new business? Consider this as a strategy, implement, iterate and learn
14. Engage in an industry association! These are a wealth of ideas, vendor input, best practices, camaraderie, and support
15. Get a FREE mentor or coach through your local SCORE chapter
- – When is the last time you learned something new to improve your business?
- – SCORE and other groups have incredibly helpful workshops on marketing, sales, web presence, tax savings, pricing, exporting, business planning, core bookkeeping, and more. I’ve attended several..they are excellent
As always, thank you for reading.
At Washington Business Brokers we are experts in valuation, optimizing a business for sale, buyer identification and qualification, negotiation, deal structuring, and closing.
If you would like to better understand the value of your business or learn more about the process of confidentially selling:
call or text 206.703.3555
email info@wabusinessbrokers.com
or schedule time for an exploratory, free consult
100% confidential, always.
When the time is right for you, we will be proud to partner and advise on your fair deal.
