Posted by John Concrane on August 18, 2019 in Business
Self business selling and buying? There are several websites where you can sell your business or buy a working business. Businesses are bought and sold every day, maybe you want to enter a new market or you want to exit a market. Maybe you think your business will expand to a new level with another owner and you reached the ceiling of how high you can expand it. Let’s see some successful business deals and discuss a little about places where you can buy or sell a business.
Any business can be sold! Even websites, that are not really businesses, can be sold for a lot of money. Ars Technica was founded by Ken Fisher, in 1998 and quickly became one of the top and most authoritative blogs with the technology industry. The site provided a great amount of news and sometimes reviews on their chosen niche. The website was purchased by Conde Nast Publications for $25 Million in 2008, a decade since the year it was founded. Weblogs Inc was created by Brian Alvey and Jason Calcanis in 2003, with the help of an investment from Mark Cuban. In the early days the business was initially set up for professional readership, they also had a number of other websites running alongside Weblogs, in fact there were approximately a dozen websites in total. Weblogs was purchased in 2005 by AOL to the tidy sum of $25 Million.
Tips for buying a business: The better financials you have, the higher the chances you have of selling your business. In my case, it took me a long time to clear up my financials so I could present my business to buyers. Unfortunately, it wasn’t really well-structured. I didn’t have much experience, and I needed to call an accountant to help me present everything better and in a smooth way to potential buyers. Also, remember not to include personal purchases or any activities that don’t include your business. Keep your numbers clear and simple; it will help you sell your business faster and smarter. Many people make this mistake and include their personal expenses inside their business and even keep their business’ money in their personal bank account. This is all a huge mess because if a buyer wants your business, it would have to see all your bank information to see what’s going on. So, keep business and personal expenses separate. Ideally, set the base for twelve months of just transactions related to the business to make your finances clearer, making it easier for you to sell your online business. See extra info at Sell a business.
Looking for more of a side-hustle rather than a full-time business to take over? Start with SideProjectors. It’s the marketplace to go to if you’re looking for something to do on the side of your 9-5 job and there are usually online businesses or projects for sale here at more accessible price points. SideProjectors is also a great place for sellers to go to list those projects that they put a little bit of time and effort into but didn’t totally build out into a fully-fledged business so they can get a little bit of a return on their investment. Never leave a side project abandoned again, just use SideProjectors to transfer the assets and operations to someone willing to pick up the task. SideProjectors does not handle any part of the sales process, they just help connect buyers and sellers, so it’s important to thoroughly conduct your own due diligence if you choose to buy or sell on their platform. This also means that they don’t offer an escrow service so it’s up to buyers and sellers to work out their own payment strategy.
Speaking of Shopify stores, back in November 2017 Shopify officially launched Exchange after testing the model on their website (subdomain exchange.shopify.com to be exact). Model is very simple in this marketplace. You can buy established stores and starter stores that are based only on Shopify. So if you are into dropshipping, for example, this could be the perfect gateway! Why? In these listings you already have almost everything laid out, and in some cases, even the inventory is stocked up! Although you can theoretically get your foot in the door by buying a low-value store with $500, and there are a few stores priced that low. I wouldn’t recommend it. Usually, what I’ve seen, stores that make some sense are priced at $7,000, all the way up to $2.5 million (highest I’ve seen on the time of creation of this post). Out of all the marketplaces listed here, this one is the newest.
eBay is one of the most-recognized online marketplaces in the world. Ebay offers a “Quick Start” guide showing merchants how to start selling in 4 easy steps. This marketplace offers sellers to list the first 50 items per month for free. Merchants can create a “My eBay” page from which to answer questions and view sales information Ebay offers information on listing your products with the eBay catalog, the Fashion Categories, and Sports Card Accessories to name a few. Ebay also offers business consultation (for free), a Business Efficiency Guide, and Seller Development Resources, which is a program eBay designed to assist merchants in successfully selling their product.
BizForSell is number #1 Go to for business sellers, business brokers and buyers. bizforsell.com is one of the biggest and most reliable business selling marketplaces in the world. We aim to solve the unique problems business sellers, business brokers and buyers have to face while selling or buying bussiness. BizForSell works as a hub for business brokers as well. Business sellers can search and contact business brokers on the website to assist them with the selling process or business brokers can post advertisements themselves to find buyers of their clients’ business. All the related stakeholders can help each other this way through BizForSell connection. Source: https://www.bizforsell.com.