The process of marketing a business can fall into six stages:

• Find the potential buyers by type, e.g. suppliers, customers, competitors, private equity funds.
• From these then list possible buyers.
• Approach the possible buyers, perhaps using an intermediary to ensure anonymity at this stage of the process.
• Sign a confidentiality agreement to protect the information that you will be revealing.
• Send out a sales memorandum which will include the timetable.
• Based on the response draw up a short list of buyers to negotiate with, rejecting any that do not have the funds available to complete a transaction.