Oddly (or sadly) enough, we noticed that some people were trying to promote the sale of a dental practice on…you guessed it…Kijiji.ca. Now, I get it: it’s a form of classified advertising. And it’s cheap or even free. And there are lots of prospective dentist purchasers out there. But who do you think trolls around Kijiji looking for practices for sale? And don’t you think you’re missing the bigger picture when it comes to selling in this format?
There’s a lot more to advertising the sale of a dental practice than Kijiji.ca. Let’s face it: everyone knows buyers. But we know SERIOUS buyers (those who put their money where their mouth is). We see them close deals. We see them pay sellers. We see them hire professionals to help out. Not everyone does this. So how do we weed out tire kicker purchasers from the rest?
It’s simple: we know them or we will find out quickly enough who they are. You could also take the time, money and effort to discover if someone is serious, but that’s not your job and you may not be very good at it. Leave it to the professionals…
So what do we do to market your practice properly? We take our time (at least 2 weeks) to promote your practice, confidentially at first, and leverage our network. We send out advertisements through our websites (www.DentalPlace.ca and www.DentistLawyers.ca), through Oral Health, and through our email list. That’s just what we do online. For offline stuff, we reach out to dentists we know who are looking to buy. We also reach out to professionals (e.g. accountants, bankers, insurance brokers) who serve dentist and who know buyers. Then we conduct an open house, put together the Letter of Intent (which contains the key terms upon which the selling dentist is willing and prepared to sell), and stick around for due diligence. So tell me something: who else can do these things other than an experienced dental law firm? The answer: real estate salespeople. However, do you really want to be giving them 10% of the purchase price to pay for these marketing services? Think about it…
You have only ONE opportunity to sell your dental practice. Make it count. If you’re the seller, you want to have a smooth transition, avoiding pitfalls (like reductions to the purchase price based on your active patient count, bad lease, not having staff or associates on contract, etc.), and to get the most money for your practice. At the same time, you want to save money by not paying 10% commissions or huge amounts of lifetime capital gains (when you sell the shares of your professional corporation).
Bottom line: you have one chance to sell. Put together the best possible team to sell your practice to achieve your goals (most money, most savings, least headaches, etc.).
