A report from IBIS World on business valuation firms in the US said 98% of business owners did not know the value of their company. The fact that most business owners don’t know the value of their business surprises me.

I’ve been working with businesses of all shapes and sizes for 37 years, and I used to assume that all business leaders knew the value of their company. After all, this is their biggest asset. Even the public companies I’ve worked with thought they knew their value … then the company sold at seven times the share price. For closely-held companies, there are even more unknowns.

How can that be?

Simple. We put our heads in the sand and don’t put pencil to paper to analyze business valuation in a logical way. We’ve been using back-of-the-napkin calculations which we thought made sense. But now we have access to real data – the kind of data that can give us a more accurate picture.

Conducting a business valuation is one of the best ways to start off the new year. Some avoid this, thinking it’s too daunting to gather all the info needed. But with new technology, the process is much easier and more affordable than it’s been in the past.

The value of such a report can easily be worth millions to you, depending on your size and growth potential. If you act to implement the recommended improvements, the value down the road is incredible. 82% of all business owners that knew the value of their business at least 18 months before a sale increased their sale price by at least 14%.

If you don’t have a snapshot value of your company, you are leaving money on the table. I highly recommend getting a valuation done. Invest and get a baseline. Use the information to make actionable plans to increase valuation.

You can easily increase the value of your business 15% per year by knowing your starting point and applying growth principles. That’s a hell of a return.