Republished with permission from Built to Sell Inc.

For your business to be valuable – and sellable one day – you need some way to generate sales after you’re gone.  Many business owners hire a superstar salesperson to replace themselves as a rainmaker but that’s a trap.

By replacing yourself with a single salesperson, you’re simply trading a dependency on you to   dependence on a sales rep, and your business will be no more sellable as a result. When we analyzed the users of The Sellability Score, a self-assessment test business owners use to understand how to drive up the value of their company, we found that businesses who could easily replace their top salesperson are more than twice as likely to get an offer to buy their business than those companies who are overly reliant on a single salesperson.

To be as valuable as possible, your company needs a sales team – not just a single salesperson. But how do you build an entire sales team? Wouldn’t it be more prudent to hire a sales rep first?  The answer is no. Hiring a single sales rep will only keep your business reliant on one person. You need a team and the faster the better. Here are three tips for building a sales team on a shoestring:

1. Charge up front

Sales reps are expensive to find and train, so in order to avoid running out of cash before they are fully ramped up, consider switching your customer billing cycle to charging some or all of your bill up front. If you stagger your billing, you can simply ask for a larger portion of your payment up front. If half your customers agree to the larger deposit, you’ll have more cash to build your sales team and more time for them to train up.

You might also consider switching to a subscription or service contract model as most people are used to paying for subscriptions up front. Try for an annual contract with an incentive for full payment in advance. For example, if you charged $1,000 per month for a maintenance contract but offered clients a $10,000/year option provided they paid up front, you would have ten thousand dollars in the bank for each contract sold. If a fully ramped up sales rep is able to sell ten service contracts a month, would it be reasonable to assume a new rep could sell three per month? If so, a new rep should be able to quickly get to the point where they are covering their monthly cost to you.

2. Carve territory into small chunks

Sales territory is an asset of your company and, like giving candy to a baby, it is easy to offer and hard to take back. Carve up your market into sales territories that provide enough opportunity for each rep to make money.  It’s okay to leave a territory unfilled for years, so avoid the temptation to give the territory to another rep, as it will become impossible to take back when you’re ready to fill the position.

3. Hire a second rep as quickly as possible

If at all possible, start by hiring two sales people, not just one. Sales people thrive on competition, and in order to be a sellable company, you need to be able to demonstrate to a buyer that your sales are driven by a sales team and not just a high performing salesperson. If you’re charging up front or on a subscription model, you should be able to quickly get to the point where each sales rep is at least covering their costs to you.

Replacing yourself as your company’s rainmaker is the right strategy; but avoid trading a dependency on you to dependence on a superstar sales rep. Instead, hire a sales team and watch your company – and its value – grow exponentially.

*The Sellability Score is a cloud-based software tool that allows a business owner to assess the “sellability” of their company. The researchers at The Sellability Score analyze the data from 2300 companies around the globe in order to understand trends in the business market, with a particular focus on the liquidity of privately held businesses. 

Why not find out now if your business is sellable?

This free online tool is the only no-risk step you can take to determine if your business is ready to get full value. Fast-track your analysis by taking advantage of this free, no-obligation free online tool.

This Sellability Score you instantly receive is a critical component to any business owner’s complete financial plan and is something that, until now, we have only made available to existing clients.

However, we recognized that there is value in knowing in advance of working with a financial planner whether or not your largest asset is ready to be exchanged for your retirement nest egg. Our view is that you are better to learn more about your businesses sellability today and find out how your business scores on the eight key attributes so that you can ensure you obtain full value.

If your business part of your retirement plan, finding out your sellability score will be the best 10 min. you could ever spend working “on” your business.

Take the Quiz here: The Business Sellability Audit

For more free information on Creating A Business Owner’s Dream Financial Plan, you can listen to a free, eight part series we did exclusively for business owners. The show is also available to subscribe to for free via iTunes.

Republished with permission from Built to Sell Inc.

Whether you’re planning to sell your company sometime soon or sometime in the future; now is the time to ensure that your business isn’t all about you. From the latest Sellability Score* research involving 2300 companies from around the globe, here are two key factors that are linked to the probability of getting an offer for your business when it’s time to sell.

Photo by: Tom Martin licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic

#1: You’re almost twice as likely to get an offer if your business can survive the “hit-by-a-bus” test.

If you were out of action for three months and unable to work, would your business keep running smoothly? The more your staff and customers need you, the less valuable your company will be to a potential acquirer. One good way to start making your business more independent is to begin spending less time at the office.  Start by not working evenings or weekends, and don’t reply if employees call. Once they get the picture, the best ones will start making more decisions independently. The shift will also expose your weakest employees, the ones that need training or that need to find another job. As for you, it might come as a shock to find out how much your business has become such an essential part of you; but if you’re going to sell your business one day, you need to look at it as an inanimate economic engine, not as something that defines who you are.

#2: Companies with a management team (as opposed to a sole manager) are getting offers at almost twice the rate.

If you don’t have a management team, hiring a 2iC is a good first move. A second-in-command can help you balance the demands of running your company and advance your targeted exit time.

Here’s a four-step plan for hiring a 2iC, thanks to advice from Silicon-Valley-based Bob Sutton, author of Good Boss, Bad Boss. 

1: Identify someone internally. “The research is clear,” says Sutton. “Unless things are totally screwed up, internal candidates have a strong tendency to outperform external leaders.”

2: Give your 2iC prospect(s) a special project, one that allows them to demonstrate their leadership skills to you and the rest of your team. If your candidate or one of your candidates excels, it will be clear to your team why he or she was selected.

3: Communicate your choice. If you pick a 2iC from an internal pool, explain your choice to the rest of your team. At the same time, wrap your arms around those you passed over and make it clear how much you value their contribution.

4: Shift from manager to coach. “The transition from manager to coach is a gradual evolution where the goal is to ask more questions, spend more time listening, and spend less time talking and directing,” says Sutton.

*The Sellability Score is a cloud-based software tool that allows a business owner to assess the “sellability” of their company. The researchers at The Sellability Score analyze the data from 2300 companies in a variety of countries to understand trends in the business market, with a special focus on the liquidity of privately held businesses.

Why not find out now if your business is sellable?

This free online tool is the only no-risk step you can take to determine if your business is ready to get full value. Fast-track your analysis by taking advantage of this free, no-obligation free online tool.

This Sellability Score you instantly receive is a critical component to any business owner’s complete financial plan and is something that, until now, we have only made available to existing clients.

However, we recognized that there is value in knowing in advance of working with a financial planner whether or not your largest asset is ready to be exchanged for your retirement nest egg. Our view is that you are better to learn more about your businesses sellability today and find out how your business scores on the eight key attributes so that you can ensure you obtain full value.

If your business part of your retirement plan, finding out your sellability score will be the best 10 min. you could ever spend working “on” your business.

Take the Quiz here: The Business Sellability Audit

For more free information on Creating A Business Owner’s Dream Financial Plan, you can listen to a free, eight part series we did exclusively for business owners. The show is also available to subscribe to for free via iTunes.