Seller Lead Generation for Business Brokers: How Scout Works

The brokers who are winning in today’s market aren’t just focused on closing deals faster. They are controlling both the buyer side and the seller side of the transaction.

For over 27 years, BizBen has provided the infrastructure for the business acquisition and M&A industry to connect business buyers with the brokers who handle the business listing sales. At BizBen, we understand the business broker world better than anyone, and now we know that closing more deals starts long before a buyer enters the picture.

Traditional sales rep

One selling stage

Sales rep

Prospects, pitches & closes

↓

Stage 1

↓

Buyer / prospect

Evaluates, decides & buys

Sell a product or service directly to the end buyer. One relationship to manage.

versus

Business broker

Two selling stages

Stage 1 — acquire the listing

Business seller / owner

Wants exit, needs a broker

↓

Broker wins listing

↓

Business broker

Intermediary — sells both ways

↓

Broker sells business

↓

Stage 2 — sell the listing

Business buyer

Qualifies, evaluates & acquires

First sell the broker's value to win the listing. Then sell that business to a qualified buyer.

Key difference

A sales rep has one customer to sell to. A broker has two — they must first convince a seller to list with them, then find and close a qualified buyer.

The business broker sales cycle is unique when compared to other sales cycles. Unlike a traditional sales cycle workflow, where a sales rep sells a product directly to a prospective buyer, business brokers have to sell on two sides: first, obtaining a business listing from a seller who is ready for an exit (seller leads), then selling that deal to a buyer (buyer leads). Two sales have to occur. Two relationships to manage. One broker to manage both.

It is because of this broker pain point that we are partnering directly with DealDogs to launch Scout, BizBen’s seller lead generation platform, built specifically to address the pain points of Business Brokers and intermediaries. Scout connects brokers with hundreds of Seller leads to strengthen their pipeline, increase deal flow, and actually get more businesses under contract. BizBen has always been the marketplace brokers go to to connect with the motivated buyers needed to sell their listings. Now we are where brokers will go to find motivated sellers to gain more listings.

What is seller lead generation for business brokers?

Seller lead generation is done by finding business owners who are likely to sell and reaching them before they sell their business, or before another broker gets to them first. Sellers are often hard to find. Most owners who are interested in selling are not advertising their intent to sell because of employee confidentiality, low urgency, and lack of knowledge on how to sell. Because of this, the broker who reaches them first wins the listing.The traditional seller lead generation playbook of cold calls, direct mail, and referrals still works, but is difficult to scale. Scout, on the other hand, is far more intuitive and effective by providing advanced data like ownership tenure, license activity, and industry turnover rates paired with our AI to help you focus outreach on leads that are actually motivated to sell. Scout doesn’t just provide higher quantities of leads; it provides better leads.

How does BizBen Provide Brokers with Seller Leads?

Scout provides access to hundreds of thousands of potential seller leads, with built-in AI screening to assess seller readiness at a large scale. Brokers no longer need to spend hours chasing cold leads, but rather focus more of their time on qualified, motivated seller prospects who are more likely to get under contract. 

Why finding motivated business sellers is harder than finding buyers

Most business owners who are thinking about selling their business typically are not talking about it publicly. They're not listing their business on a marketplace or reaching out to brokers.

There are a few reasons for this. Discussing a sale openly with your business scares the employees and scares off customers. There's no upside for an owner to announce their intent to sell early, so they often sit in the consideration phase for a long time. That is, until the right broker reaches out at the right time. The only issue is that most brokers don't know who those sellers are. By the time a seller does list publicly, every broker in the market is already competing to acquire the deal.

Why now is the best time to grow your seller listing pipeline

The business brokerage is becoming more and more competitive. More brokers and intermediaries are entering the market, and the ones who see the most success are those who don’t wait for sellers to come to them. They're going out and finding them first.

Baby boomers own about half of all small businesses in the U.S., and most don't have a plan for the business after they retire. Over the next decade, these businesses will need to be passed on to a new owner. The owners know they need to exit eventually, but they haven't taken the first step, or don’t know how. That’s a massive opportunity for brokers who can find those owners before anyone else does.

Conclusion: Build your Buyer & Seller Pipeline

BizBen has always been the platform brokers go to connect with business buyers. Scout now gives brokers the other side, a way to find and reach motivated sellers. More seller leads means more listings. More listings means more deals closed. If seller sourcing is the bottleneck in your brokerage, Scout was built to solve it.