Ask Us Anything: Business expert Simon Bedard shares when and how to plan selling your business

This month we asked Exit Advisory Group managing director Simon Bedard how to find the right balance between running your business and planning to sell it.

We sent four questions to Bedard. We hope his answers help you when you’re looking at the value of your business and preparing for a sale.

1. What sort of lead time should I work to, when it comes to selling my business? When should I start planning?

Timing a business sale is rarely straightforward because several factors influence how long the process should take. The first question most owners need to answer is what their business is actually worth. If the current valuation is below what you need to achieve your personal or financial goals, it may be wise to invest more time in strengthening the company before entering an exit process. This could involve improving profitability, reducing customer concentration, building stronger systems, or lifting performance trends to appeal to buyers. Value gaps often require deliberate effort and a realistic timeline to close.

If your business is already within an acceptable value range, the next consideration is your role in the company. Owners who are heavily involved in day-to-day operations often need to support the transition for a period of time after the sale. Buyers want stability and continuity, and it is not uncommon for working owners to stay on for one to two years. This commitment should be factored into your overall planning because it affects both the timing of the sale and your personal readiness.

On top of these issues, the transaction process itself typically takes up to 12 months to complete.This includes preparation, marketing the business, negotiating offers, and managing due diligence through to settlement. Each stage requires time and careful coordination.

For these reasons, there is no single lead time that suits every business. The right timing depends on your valuation, how involved you are in operations, and how prepared the business is for buyer scrutiny. Early planning gives you options and increases the likelihood of a successful outcome.

The bottom line is if you want to stop working in the next three to four years, you should start preparing now.

2. How do you determine the value of your business? Who can do that?

Most people think business valuation is simply a matter of taking profit and multiplying it by a number. While profit multiplied by a multiple is the basic idea, that calculation only works when you understand what drives the multiple. Buyers are not paying for last year’s result. They are paying for the confidence they have in the future earnings of the business.

Your financial performance will always be the biggest factor because it reflects what the business can produce for an investor. It is not just the level of profit that matters, but the pattern behind it. A business that delivers steady, predictable year-on-year growth is far more valuable than one that bounces around. Volatility creates doubt, and doubt reduces what buyers are willing to pay. This is also why recurring revenue, especially contracted revenue, attracts a premium. It provides certainty.

Beyond the numbers, buyers look closely at risk. They assess issues like customer or supplier concentration, reliance on the owner, and the overall strength of the operating model. These factors influence how secure the future of the business feels. Investors gravitate to companies with defensible positions and business models that are difficult to replicate. The stronger the protection around your earnings, the higher the multiple you can justify.

A reliable valuation comes from someone who understands both the financial side and how businesses in your sector actually trade. That usually means working with an experienced business valuer or a mergers and acquisitions (M&A) advisor who is active in the market. Be cautious with online self-assessment tools that claim to estimate your value from a few quick questions. True valuation requires evidence, context, and insight into buyer behaviour.

3. How do I balance running a business with planning to sell a business?

Balancing the demands of running a business with preparing to sell one can feel overwhelming, but the two are more connected than most owners realise. The improvements you make to get a business ready for buyers are often the same improvements that make it more profitable, easier to run, and far more enjoyable to own. With a decent runway, you can fix issues, strengthen systems, and build consistency, which adds value and also reduces stress in the day-to-day operations. Time is your best ally when you use it well.

One of the most important steps is to get help. Even highly skilled professionals rely on outside expertise. Doctors do not operate on themselves, lawyers do not represent themselves, and agents rarely sell their own home. Trying to manage a sale alone assumes you already know everything you need to know. Most owners do not. An experienced advisor adds value through timing, objectivity, and context. As owners we are often too close to the challenges in our business to see the bigger picture.

Good advisors also help with priority decisions. If you have fifty priorities, you have none. You should be working on one to three key initiatives that will make the biggest impact on performance and value. Knowing which levers to pull and when to pull them can make all the difference.

When the business finally goes to market, the owner’s job is to keep the business performing, while the M&A advisors handle the heavy lifting. Strong performance during a sale process has a direct influence on valuation.

Balancing both roles becomes much easier when you start early, get the right support, and focus on improvements that benefit the business today and make it more attractive tomorrow.

4. What steps should I take if I’m planning to sell? What are the must-haves before I can put my business on the market?

The first step in planning a sale is getting clear on your goals. You need to know what you want financially, personally, and in terms of timing. Some owners want a clean exit, others prefer to stay involved for a transition, and some want to sell a portion while continuing to grow the company. When you know the destination, the plan becomes much easier to design.

The next step is understanding your current valuation. This is often the moment of truth because it tells you whether the business is truly ready for market or whether more work is needed. Many owners find a gap between the value they hope for and what the business can genuinely justify. Closing that gap requires a decision. Are you prepared to invest the time, energy, and money to lift performance and reach your ideal value, or would you prefer to avoid a demanding improvement journey and accept a lower outcome. There is no right answer, only the one that aligns with your goals.

Once you have clarity, the most powerful move you can make is bringing the right advisory team in early. A skilled mergers and acquisitions (M&A) advisor helps you focus on the initiatives that matter, positions your business effectively, and guides you through the level of scrutiny buyers will apply. Owners often try to manage everything themselves, but an advisor brings objectivity, discipline, and a clear understanding of how the market behaves.

One mistake I see far too often is owners drifting into a sale because a buyer approaches them unexpectedly. It feels flattering and it feels easy, but you are stepping straight into the buyer’s process, and their process is designed to serve their interests, not yours. If you are going to do the hard work of preparing information, exposing your business to due diligence, and investing serious time into a potential deal, then make it count by speaking to a broader pool of qualified buyers. This creates competitive tension, gives you real options, and often uncovers opportunities that a single buyer could never put on the table. If you are going to sell, do it properly and run a process that gives you the best chance of achieving the outcome you deserve.

For more information, visit Exit Advisory Group