“Our Business is doing great without a website, so why should we invest in having a website?”
We’re seeing this quite often right now. Does this sound like you?
You’re a boomer who owns a business; maybe something passed on by your parents or something you built with your own sweat equity. You’re looking to retire in the next 5-10 years, so you think you’ll just leave getting a new website for the new owner.
Remember, the value that you create between now and when you sell your business will help you negotiate the best price, and determine what financial freedom you’ll have in retirement.
You’ve probably thought about getting a website, but at the same time, why not just let the next guy take care of it?
This way, it’ll be built the way he or she wants it, rather than having to change it from how you build it now. Some of these ideas sound like they make perfect sense, but take a moment to consider what they sound like from your future business buyer’s perspective.
Consider the buyer who will acquire your business like someone looking for their first home:
Remember, your future buyer will quite possibly be young, early in his or her career, and ready to create his or her own legacy. Maybe they’ve worked in your industry for a few years and are ready to make a name for themselves.
If they are only a few years out of college, they’re tied to their phone; they use Google, not a phone book. If they need to find a phone number, they’re going to research your potential competition online.
For them, buying your business is very similar to buying a first house.
1) Your website is the ‘Finished Basement’ on your business listing.
Remember when you were buying your first house? The real estate listings often had a line that said “Unspoiled Basement.” This is a cliche way of saying, “Nothing’s done in the basement.”. For some people, this was appealing because they could customize the basement of their dreams, but for other people, this line reads as “Storage space that’s going to cost money to build out after your down payment, legal fees, transfer costs, and taxes, it’s going to be a long while before this works they way you’d like it to.”
In other words, most people would take some finished area in the basement, even if it needed a coat of paint and the carpets had to be redone rather than completely open and “unspoiled.”
If your business doesn’t have a website, the purchaser will factor in a guess for the time and money necessary for a brand new website since, in your purchaser’s mind, a website is essential for any business. It’s much better to offer a website included in the package, even though they recognize it might need some tweaks to realign it with where they would like to take the business.
2) Your website is your online ‘Curb Appeal’.
If someone is looking to buy XYZ plumbing in Woodstock, Ontario, and they do a Google search for “Woodstock Ontario Plumber” but can’t find XYZ, then they will assume that people online aren’t finding your business.
Your purchaser is asking themselves how a NEW customer would find your business so the person purchasing your business can grow it to be worth more than they’ve paid.
Even if you’ve built great long-term relationships with your customers, the challenge is that YOU have built great long-term relationships. They haven’t yet. And while they may be using your business name, if your golf buddy knows you’ve retired, he may consider his other options for suppliers.
Right, wrong, or otherwise, this could be your purchaser’s perception.
Also, if the clientele you’ve built includes your best friend from high school, the lady who first connected you with the Chamber of Commerce 32 years ago, and your bowling team, your peers are in the same stage as you. They may end up retiring in the Muskokas or spending winters snowbirding in a warmer climate, so the purchase is focused on where new clients will come from.
3) Your Website needs to have a time-tested foundation.
The thing we all have and need more of is time. Your purchaser is likely savvy with the online world and probably understands that you can’t get a website up today and be on the first page of Google tomorrow… most Google ranking takes 60-90 days from launch. Hopefully, you’re on something better than page 10. From there, it takes time, blog posts, and revisions so Google sees fresh content and lots of traffic to move up the ranks to page 1.
If you were looking at two houses for your first home, and one was 30 years old with a cracked foundation, but the other was 50 years old and has never had a crack, on that factor alone, you’re likely to choose the one that stood up better over time.
Your purchaser will not only see the cost and time involved in getting the website live, but they’re also going to know that it takes time for that website to produce results. If you offer them a website with a history of producing results, you’ll satisfy their concerns before they realize they have any concerns.
4) What will appeal to a ‘First-Time’ buyer for your business?
Here is what your business listing would look like to receive top-dollar:
• Included in the business is a well-established, 5-year-old website with quarterly revisions to the content and can be sustained with monthly costs less than a utility payment or an insurance premium. This includes initial updates/adjustments to the website in your first month of business at no additional cost.
• Purchase a business that appears on the first page of Google for searches about “Plumbers, Plumbing and Plumbing Leaks” in Woodstock, Ontario.
• Excellent on-going relationship with website designer who looks after website updates, Email technical support with customized business emails (so they don’t have to research a designer to make future changes.)
• Generates X new clients every month for the past 12 months.