Information For Business Brokers & Agents: Frequently Asked Questions

BizBen.com is an online marketplace that matches business buyers with sellers of existing businesses for sale. In addition, BizBen offers resources, articles, live workshops, online webinars, a syndicated blog, and a podcast on the topic of buying and selling small to mid-sized businesses.

There is no cost to search and find businesses for sale. To advertise a business for sale on BizBen there are many different programs to sell a business.  In addition there are no costs to research resouces, read any literature, or utilize the tools to buy or sell a business on BizBen. BizBen is advertising supported with over 1200 California business brokers, agents, business owners, and small business advisors who advertise daily on BizBen.com

Yes, for business brokers and agents we have our very successful Fast Track ads, and our Gold and Silver advertising and marketing programs (that incorporate our Fast Track ad programs, etc) that were specially designed for business brokers and agents who wanted a more advanced way to reach business buyers, and business owners trying to sell a business. These special advertising and marketing programs are limited to a certain number of brokers and agents per county to ensure their success in these programs. Brokers and agents utilize these programs to: place articles on BizBen, promote workshops, utilize the BizBen syndicated small business blog to write about industry topics, participate in online webinars and podcasts to promote their services.

Yes you have full control 24/7 to log into your advertising account and add new listings/ads, revise any ads/listings, make ads inactive or delete them - bottomline you have full control over your advertising account on BizBen. Not only do you have full control to add or revise any of your listings at anytime, but you are also getting the lowest advertising rate to do so.

To make sure important emails sent to you from BizBen don't end up into your email program's spam folder make sure you put these email addresses into you address book: services@bizben.com, bizbendailyreports@bizben.com, and emailreports@bizben.com.  If you can put anything being emailed from @bizben.com also will assure you get all our important emails sent to you.

Listing a business or opportunity on BizBen.com is very economical. You have several options for selling your business, and one is sure to fit your budget. To see the costs and programs for individual ads go to our sell a business page. For brokers and agents with mutiple listings (ads) please refer to our multiple listings ad rates page.

To assure quality listings, we review every new listing being posted on BizBen. Your ad will appear immediately in the New Listings section while we make sure your new ad is placed in the appropriate areas and catagories on BizBen making it easier for potential buyers to find and contact you about your business for sale. Unlike other webites your ad on BizBen usually only takes between 30 minutes to 3 hours (depending on the number of new listings being posted at the time) to get reviewed and fully distributed into our network!

First you want to include as much possible information as possible (as much as confidentiality will allow provided that it is important) in your ad - talk about the history of the business, where its at now, and the potential in the future. Buyers also want to know about: lease factors, number of employees, geographic area, competitive factors, etc. We have found the advertisers who write a comprehensive ad are usually the ones who get the best response from the most number of motivated buyers.

You can update and modify your BizBen business for sale ad at any time - 24/7. To do so, go to the Advertising Log In page and enter your User Name & Password. You will then see your advertising account where you can revise your ad, see your advertising stats, emails received concerning your ad and other important data.

You determine the time period of your ad (Standard or Fast Track) you select one, two, or a three month run. You can "turn-off" your ad at anytime by making it inactive if you want to turn off your ad if lets say you are in escrow and you want to limit or eliminate calls or emails for a period of time.

Yes you should. Why waste anyones time and have them call you and waste your time if the price isn't close to what buyers are searching for. Also have someone assist you to realistically figure out the adjusted net income of the business (for the previous three years) - this is one of the most important numbers to potential buyers (and usually the price of the business is some multiple of this number). Some of the more successful business for sale ads on BizBen include in the long description field the last three years of these numbers: Gross Sales, Adjusted Net Income, Inventory Amounts, Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable (if any), working capital required for a new buyer, etc. Put some effort into this information - it will make the sale of a business much faster and easier on everyone.

Surveys have found that the national average is approximately six months from your decision to sell to the actual closing. Advertising a business for sale on BizBen usually takes between one to three months from start to finish. The amount of time it will take to sell your business may vary significantly from this average depending upon a number of factors. These factors include deal structure, the time of year, the true value of the business versus the asking price, the size of the business and the local market. The most important factors are usually price and the ability to effectively locate qualified, motivated business buyers. Also very important is the level of exposure you give your listing - make sure you review the BizBen Fast Track advertising program - designed for those looking to sell a business quicker and with usually a much higher response from buyers.

You can remove your ad at anytime by logging into your advertising account and the making your ad "inactive" or deleting it.

Only very basic information about your business should be disclosed to a buyer prior to their signing a non-disclosure agreement ("NDA"). An NDA can help protect the confidentiality of any information given to a buyer. Once an NDA is signed, the buyer can be given additional financial and operational information about the company in order to make an informed offer for the business. After an offer is accepted, a significant amount of detailed information will be required during the due diligence process ranging from a review of incorporation papers and other legal documents to a thorough review of accounting work papers and meetings with key employees.

In our opinion if you don't utilize the services of an escrow company, you are asking for trouble later on down the road. The escrow fee should be looked at as insurance that the deal will run smoother and items that are respresented by all parties are documented. I have heard too many horror stories from buyers, sellers, and brokers/agents who wanted to save a little money or figured they didn't need to involve a escrow service to close their deal and got burned later on for not doing so.

No there are no membership or initiation fees to join BizBen to advertise. When brokers or agents first start up or come back with us we charge three months of advertising upfront and then the plan goes on a monthly autopay thereafter. Advertisers (brokers and agents) can cancel anytime after their initial three month advertising run.