If you are considering selling your small business, it will be important for you to evaluate your business in order to derive a reasonable asking price. Experts recommend that you assess the business from more than one angle in order to obtain an accurate picture of how much your business is worth.

Rules of Thumb Methodology
Begin by analyzing the history of your business to determine how much profit the business has been earning in excess of your own salary and benefits. Project future data based on your specific history, as well as general market trends to establish if the past is a fair representation of the future. This is typically known as “Rules of Thumb” methodology.

Market and Industry Trends
In examining trends, it is necessary to consider such items as supplier price changes, competition, and how the particular industry is performing. Also, take a look at prices paid recently for comparable companies in similar locations. Additionally, compare your company’s year-end gross profit and operating income to other industry competitors. If your company is closer to the top of the range in profitability, you can command a higher price for your business.

Owner Benefits
Then investigate the value of your business by using the Multiple Method: a pre-determined multiple (usually between 1 and 3) multiplied by the earnings of the business. The earnings or “Owner Benefits” amount can typically be used as an effective basis. This number is the total funds that you can foresee being available from the business based on past experience. The value is derived by adding the owner’s salary and benefits to the business’s profits; then adding back non-cash expenses.

The multiple that is used is mainly based on the industry. It is usually one time the value calculated if the business owner is the entire business, such as consulting or freelance services. Businesses with a solid customer base and more than 3 years in business most likely will be worth 3 times the basis.

ROI
Another calculation that should be looked at is the Return on Investment (ROI) that a buyer could expect to receive if they purchase your business. This is calculated simply as Gain from Investment minus Cost of Investment divided by Cost of Investment.

Assets
In addition, take into consideration the value of the business’s assets. This includes inventory and equipment.

Overall, it is important to keep accurate financial records. Buyers seeking financing to purchase your business will need to present information to back up the price being paid for the business.

Denise T. Davis writes for BusinessMart.com, the fastest growing business for sale search engine helping buyers and sellers of small businesses and franchises. It has many resources to help you on your journey to start your own business, sell a business, browse businesses for sale or open a franchise.

Too many business owners are overlooking the opportunities that may arise from marketing over social networks. With the population of Internet users rising exponentially over the past few years, social marketing has become a very useful tool for most Web-based businesses, but not for small business owners. However, with most customers having a MySpace or Facebook account, why aren’t they utilizing these networks for a free way to market? The reason why this has been overlooked is due to the lack of knowledge on social marketing.

Most people don’t understand the concept of social marketing because the Internet has been moving at such a swift pace that the older generation is having a hard time keeping up with the younger generation. But as technology progresses, business owners must keep up in order to maintain high sales growth. So, here are some tips to those needing some help with the social aspects of the Internet.

First tip, define the niche that you want to communicate with on a regular basis about your business. Knowing this niche will allow you to search for various groups that may have an interest in your business

Second tip, pick the social website that is appealing to you. You do not want to pick a site that will annoy you. This is to boost your social marketing, but it should also be an enjoyable experience.

Third tip, have an address book ready to start uploading or searching for people you may want to add to your “friends” list. Once you have sent out invitations to your contacts make sure that you write them a personal note. This little note may help them remember how they know you or where they may have met you.

Fourth tip, start personalizing your profile page. You want the page to reflect you and your business. If you are trying to sell a mortgage through MySpace, it may not be wise to have crude pictures on your page. Remember that whatever you post represents you and your business.

Fifth tip, try to have a unique subdomain tied to your profile. For instance, my MySpace page has a subdomain of pitchyourbusiness. This will allow you to share your profile a bit easier in your emails or blog comments.

Here is a list of just a few of the big social websites that have the most traffic from users on a regular basis:

MySpace.com – a place where you can create your own personal page that can be modified and you can update your own personal profile while keeping in touch with your “friends.”

Facebook.com – a little more structured and it was once a tool only used by university students, but has since been open to the public. You are also allowed to have a business page that allows you to gain fans. Here is an example of the business page feature.

LinkedIn.com – generally used by business people to keep in contact with sales clients and is now being used by many headhunters and HR departments.

Friendster.com – a place where you can have a circle of friends. Similar to Facebook and Myspace, but there are some slight variations.

Hi5 – This is used by many in places around Latin America and countries like Romania or Cyprus. This is simply the same thing as Myspace.

The list goes on and on, but you can check more of them out at Wikipedia by typing in social networks. Depending on the location of your business and type of business, you may want to spend more time on a particular social networking site instead of a site based outside of your niche.

This is just the beginning of social marketing, but taking baby steps helps you build a solid foundation before you start trying to run. You want to walk before you run in online social marketing. There is a lot to grasp and simply just building a profile on some of these can be a challenge.

Bryan Kress is in his last year of Accounting and Economics & Finance studies. He has worked in a variety of industries, including farming, fast food, retail, cold calling, personal lending, and consulting. He owns three companies and hosts his own radio show. For help with your small business, check out his site, Business on the Mound.

Give it away for free. Tada! Instant dead competitor.

Two ways to do it:

• More money (“Double your money back!”)
• More time (“60-day money back guarantee… compare to our competition’s measly 30 days!”)

TIP: If you’re looking for a niche market to work, choose one where existing “competition” has easy to beat guarantees. Great way to make an immediate and _easy_ attention-grabbing splash as you enter the arena.

But what if you don’t have a back-end product? No one said back-end products have to be your own.

Join an affiliate program (free), like through the top affiliate networks listed below, and knock yourself out. Just make sure you pick good  programs to join and companies to associate with… your rep’s on the line.

• Clickbank
• Commission Junction
• Shareasale

Assumption of course is top quality/excellent service/your claims are true. Anything less, and this idea is a loser.