Identifying and Transitioning Key Seller-Client Relationships?

October 02, 2025

by a searcher from University of Pennsylvania - The Wharton School in Denver, CO, USA

Two part question: In a lot of small to mid size B2B businesses, especially ones with recurring revenue streams, I've found there tends to be some level of customer concentration. Obviously the seller will have prioritized building a relationship with these key customers (i.e. customers with large contracts or large recurring bills) and a risk to buying a business like this is assessing the extent to which the client relationship depends on the seller being present in the business. That is, if the seller leaves is there a good chance some of these large customers will leave as well. Q1: (pre-acquisition) Any tips/advice on how to identify how crucial the sellers presence is to retaining key client relationships/business (especially when a seller is hesitant to introducing a potential buyer to a key client before closing on the sale)? Q2: (post-acquisition) Any tips/advice on how to transition key client relationships from the seller to you (the buyer)? Also, any strategies that folks have tried that did not work well?

Reply by a lender
from The University of Michigan in District of Columbia, USA

^redacted‌, thanks for pinging me. Where I've seen this really go wrong is when the seller is leaving the business but not retiring. Even with seller notes and non-competes in place, there are sellers that will leave, start a competing business (with your money) and then take those clients. For me, it always starts with really scrubbing the seller, their motivations to sell and what they plan to do afterwards. After that, joint meetings with the seller and those key relationships are important. I would also evaluate the company's infrastructure that will encourage a client to stay beyond just the draw of one person i.e., contracts, team bench, switching costs, etc.

Reply by a searcher
from Purdue University in Tarrant County, TX, USA

Pre acquisition, ask the sellers or the customers (if available) to define the value they get from the business. If the answer is they are reliable, always there for me, really nice to deal with or 100% qualitative...that equals risk. If the answer is we get a quantifiable 3X ROI each year, we have tons of other processes tied to this, we couldn't deliver our product to customers without it, etc., you have much more predictable stability. Post acquisition, don't rush to tell them why things are better now or make knee jerk commitments - continue to tie it back to the value.

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