List a business in 11 steps
Have your numbers on hand before you start. Drafts autosave, nothing is visible to buyers until you publish, and you can unpublish at any time.
Before you start
Have three years of revenue and EBITDA, your employee count, and a rough asking price. If you have run the valuation, the flow can pull those numbers in and you skip most of the typing.
Steps 1 to 4: the facts
Name, industry, location, year founded. The name stays private if you choose a confidential listing.
Confidential or named. Most sellers with staff choose confidential; the trade-off is spelled out in its own article.
Three years of revenue and EBITDA. Estimates are acceptable at this stage — you attach statements later.
Your price, plus seller financing, transition support, asset versus share sale, and openness to an earnout. Your multiple is shown as you type.
Steps 5 to 7: the story
What it does, who buys, how it runs day to day. Plain language beats polish; buyers are scanning for durability, not adjectives.
Equipment, staff, contracts, brand, lease, inventory. Anything ticked appears as a checklist on the listing.
The moves you would make with more time or capital. These publish labeled as seller-stated, so buyers know they are unverified.
Steps 8 to 10: proof and access
The first is the cover.
P&L, balance sheet, lease, equipment schedule. Private until you release them per buyer from the deal room.
Anyone with an account, verified buyers first, or financially verified first. Each option states its reach in words — Widest reach, Fewer, qualified, Strictest sorting — and every inquiry is still delivered.
Step 11: preview and publish
The preview is the buyer’s view, not yours. Check that the confidential title still describes the business usefully, that the figures read correctly, and that the four commitments listed underneath — confidentiality, messaging rule, documents, seller-stated growth — are what you intended.
Unpublish from the listing manager any time. Conversations stay intact, and document access continues until you revoke it in the deal room.
After you publish
- Inquiries land in your inbox, each showing the buyer’s badges and capital.
- Update the listing rather than relisting — relisting resets the age buyers see.
- If inbound is thin after two weeks, the usual causes are price above range or a description that hides what the business does.