There are all sorts of people in the business of selling your company. They title themselves as Investment Bankers or Business Brokers.

They assess the company’s value and prepare the offering document – called a Confidential Information Memorandum or Offering Booklet/Prospectus, etc. They will maintain lists of targets buyers and usually send out the document (or a shorter “tickler” to assess interest and then send out the complete document).

Once the buyers’ responses are in they will helps select the 5 to 7 of interest based on their level of interest and offers. These are allowed to visit and perform a limited due diligence. Earlier a complete set of appropriate documents have been placed in a cloud-based virtual data file – to make this due diligence easier.

This process is often likened to a “horse race” and can produce the best results. Instead, you can decide to approach a select number of buyers whom you want to approach to gauge interest and then go to the “races” later.