At this point, you’ve spent months building your micro-SaaS startup in public and acquired a good number of users; life is good. But after a while, a thought keeps tugging at the back of your mind: should I sell now or wait a little longer?

You’re not alone. Most founders desire to sell their businesses. Some even dream of selling before they start building the project. But when’s the right time to sell? There’s no perfect time. However, from working with many founders to help them facilitate the sale of their startups, there are a few indicators that you may be ready to sell your business. 

Let’s explore how to know you’re ready to sell.

Factors to Consider when Timing The Sale of your Micro-SaaS

Founders with multiple exits will tell you that if you wait for the perfect moment, it’ll never come. Rather, the right questions you should be asking are: Is my startup sellable? What are buyers looking for when shopping for a micro-SaaS? How can I prepare the business when I’m ready?

Let’s dive deeper into the signs that you may be ready to listen to offers.

Market conditions

The market is one of the top factors to consider when deciding if the time is right for you to sell your micro-startup.

There are periods when investors are massively pouring capital into certain niches. A few years ago, it was crypto, NFTs, and blockchain startups. Before then, investors were buying up ecommerce and dropshipping businesses. If you built any of these businesses and wanted to sell at the time, you’d have gotten really lucrative offers with high valuations.

Currently, SaaS, fintech, and AI startups are in high demand. Selling your micro-SaaS in a time such as now can almost guarantee you’ll get competitive offers at a higher valuation. 

Business performance

Another indicator you may be ready to sell your business is that your book is clean and your finances are in a good place. That means the business’s financial data isn’t scattered all over the place, you’ve got predictable recurring revenue, a low churn rate, a reliable customer acquisition engine, and your business is profitable or showing signs of growth.

Once you’re in such a position, you don’t need to wait longer; buyers will be more than happy to talk business with you.

READ: How to value and sell a mobile app

Stagnant growth

While business growth is an indicator you’re ready to exit your micro-SaaS, reaching a growth ceiling is also a sign you may be ready to sell. This doesn’t mean your business can’t grow; it only means you’ve gotten to a point where your business can’t grow without a bigger team, external funding, or more resources. 

While this might be an indicator that you may be ready to sell, you will likely not get a premium valuation or lots of interest for your business. Also, it may take longer for you to sell, as buyers love to see constant growth.

Lots of buyer interests

If you’re getting unsolicited offers from potential buyers, this may just be the best signal that the time may be right to sell your business. 

Even if you’re still excited about the project and not keen on selling, you may want to begin finding your business’s valuation. A couple of other things you could do during this stage to ensure you’re ready should you get a tempting offer are to begin preparing for a takeover by creating a standard operating procedure (SOP) and organising your financials.

Your business has autonomy

One clear sign you’re ready to exit your micro-SaaS startup is that it runs without you: your marketing engine runs without you, customer support is well taken care of, etc. Perhaps you’ve built a system where you don’t have to work on the business 24/7 or hired others to work in it. 

Also, as mentioned earlier, you’ve created a detailed SOP, and anyone can run the business without your oversight. When this is the case, you’re ready to sell your business.

READ: Where to buy and sell ecommerce stores

You’re burnt out

49% of startup founders consider quitting their startup. The reason is that many indiehackers juggle multiple roles in the business: product design, development, marketing, sales, customer support, name it. To make it worse, they may be doing these for multiple micro-SaaS products with little to no external support. If this is you, burnout may be inevitable, and it may be a clear sign that you’re ready to exit your business.

You’ve got other exciting business ideas to explore

If you’re like most micro-SaaS founders, your mind’s buzzing with ideas and/or you’re likely running multiple projects at the same time: you could be building two or more micro-SaaS apps, running an agency while developing your micro-SaaS product, or building a side project while working a 9-5. 

If you become bored with your micro-SaaS or the project no longer fulfills you or aligns with your goals, that’s a telltale sign you’re ready to exit your business.

You need capital to diversify your income

Your micro-startup is an asset, and like all investments, it carries risks. The business could be doing well now, and in a few months or years, you could have bigger competitors with massive budgets that will eat you up. So if you’ve got other projects you’d like to embark on or alternative investments that seem more appealing to you, selling your startup may be a wise decision.

Where can you sell your micro-SaaS startup?

There are several ways you can sell your micro-SaaS business. 

One of them is by directly selling to interested buyers who reach out to you via emails and DMs. However, the issue with this is that you may not attract lots of interest or the best deal. But there’s a better way to go about it.

A more effective way of selling your business is by listing it on a startup marketplace like Microns.io for free. On marketplaces, there are large pools of buyers who will be interested in learning about (and buying) your project. Another benefit of listing your startup on Microns.io is that the typical deal cycle is around 30 days or less. 

You may also be able to use a brokerage service; however, unless your business has a decent valuation, brokers may not be willing to touch it. Plus, their fees may be too much.

What to do before selling your micro-startup

Here are a few things you can do when you’re convinced you’re going to sell your micro-startup.

Find the value of your business

Once you start getting negotiation requests for your business or if you just know you’re ready to sell, the first thing to do is to find your business’s valuation. 

A range of factors determines what your startup will sell for. A similar business selling for a certain price doesn’t mean yours will cost the same amount. So ensure you thoroughly investigate what people will be willing to pay for your micro-startup. 

You can then determine two prices at which you’d be interested in entering into negotiations: the first is your ideal selling price, and the other is the minimum price at which you’d be willing to walk away.

Begin tidying things up

When you’re ready to sell, and you’ve determined your business’s value, it’s time to do some homekeeping. A few of the things you can do include creating a standard operating procedure (SOP) so that your buyer or whoever will run the business can carry on without needing much handholding.

You also need to start easing yourself out of the business. No one wants to buy a startup that can’t run without its founder. That could mean hiring someone else to take on certain tasks in the business. Also, review contracts with employees, freelancers, and vendors, and ensure things are clearly stated on dotted lines. Gather your financial statements and monthly business reports.

The benefit of doing these is that they not only make the sale easy, but they can also increase your business’s valuation.

Prepare a deal structure

Another step worth considering when preparing your business for sale is the kind of deal you’ll be open to. While some buyers will have liquidity to pay full in cash upfront, others may want an earn-out structure or something else. So you have to consider if you’d be open to accepting earn-out deals and the minimum percentage you’ll be willing to take.

Observe market conditions

Micro-SaaS might be the hot-button topic right now, and a few months down the line, we could all be raving about something else. So you want to keep an eye out for what’s going on in the market, and if the time’s still right for you to sell your micro-business.

List your business on Microns

When all is said and done, list your startup on our marketplace to gauge interest. Some of the reasons why you should list your business on our marketplace are that you’ll expand your pool of potential buyers and you’ll get a lot more competitive offers.

Final thoughts

If you’re planning to sell your business, list it on our marketplace: this guide will show you the step-by-step process of listing your startup. There are lots of hungry buyers who’d be delighted to learn about your business. Also, it’s free to do so, you’ll get competitive offers, and you’re likely to sell your business very fast; a lot of the businesses are sold within 30 days.