By Brett Kaufman. 8 years using relationships to build sales pipelines, from political fundraising to a 7 figure business to running matchmaking for two communities. Over 1,000 introductions facilitated.

A business broker buyer database should track more than industry, deal size and geography. Add the fields that tell you whether a buyer can still close: dated proof of funds, the lender, who else has to say yes, every teaser they saw and why they passed, how fast they answer, and when you last really talked.

Here is the morning. You sign a $1.4M EBITDA landscaping company. You filter the database for landscaping, $1M to $2M EBITDA, the Southeast. It returns 212 buyers. Every one of them said, at some point, that they wanted this. The filter cannot tell you which of them still can.

I am not a broker. I run matchmaking for two communities and have made over 1,000 introductions, and a match list built on what people said they wanted once has the same flaw. This page is the template: 16 fields, most of them dated, that sit on top of criteria.

What does a typical buyer database track?

Most track the NDA and the criteria, and stop there. Gregory Kovsky of IBA describes the standard in best practices for finding a buyer: each buyer in the database has a confidentiality agreement on file and has defined the businesses they want by industry, transaction size and geographic location. He also reports that historically 20 to 25% of companies IBA represents are bought by a buyer already in that database.

That is a strong reason to keep a database. It is also the eligibility layer only. It answers who fits. It does not answer who closes.

Why are criteria not enough?

Criteria are a snapshot, and your listings run long. The IBBA and M&A Source Market Pulse for Q2 2026 put Main Street deals at six to 10 months from engagement to close. A buyer’s lender, partner and appetite can all change inside one of your listings.

The IBBA’s own description of a serious business buyer, by Michael Fekkes, reads like a list of missing fields. A lender prequalification letter. A detailed plan to finance the entire transaction. A partner, spouse or investor who has been consulted in advance and agrees. Professional advisors on standby. And a buyer who understands that a quick no is far better than a slow no. Most databases hold none of that in a place you can sort.

Business broker buyer database template: the 16 fields

Keep your criteria columns. Add these. Examples are illustrative.

Field	What goes in it	Example
Buyer type	Individual, searcher, independent sponsor, PE add on, strategic	Searcher, self funded
Source	How they reached you	Referred by a CPA
Proof of funds	What you have seen, and its date	Bank statement, Aug 12
Lender	Name and approved amount	SBA 7(a) lender, $3M
Equity source	Own cash, investors, fund	Two investors committed
Other decision makers	Who else must say yes	Spouse, one investor
Advisors	Attorney, CPA, quality of earnings firm	Named, ready
Teasers sent	Each deal and date	4 since March
Pass reasons	Their words, per deal	Too much customer concentration
Offers made	Deal, price, outcome	LOI on the pool company, lost on terms
Closed with you	Deals and year	None yet
Reply speed	Typical time to answer a teaser	Same day
Last real conversation	Date and what was said	Oct 3, narrowed to commercial only
Criteria confirmed	Date criteria were last checked	Oct 3
Open promise	What you owe them, what they owe you	You owe them the lender intro
Next reason to call	A real trigger, not a calendar date	A closing in their sector

On the lender field: the SBA says the maximum 7(a) loan is $5 million, and changes of ownership are an eligible use. A buyer whose financing runs through 7(a) has a ceiling you should know before you call them about a larger listing.

Which fields matter most?

The three with dates: proof of funds, criteria confirmed, and last real conversation. Everything else is only as good as those dates.

My rule of thumb, as an illustration: if criteria were confirmed more than six months ago, the first call to that buyer is a two minute check, not a confidential pitch. The sort order for first calls is covered in which buyer to call first when a listing hits. This page is about having the inputs that sort needs.

How do pass reasons make the database smarter?

Pass reasons are criteria the buyer never wrote on the form. A buyer who says “HVAC, $1M to $3M EBITDA” and then passes on three deals for owner dependence has told you the real filter. Log it in their words.

Offers made works the same way. The buyer who lost your last deal on terms, not price, is one of the warmest names you have. What to say to them, and when, is in how brokers keep their buyer list warm between listings.

How do you keep the dated fields true?

Short routine, run weekly.

1. After every buyer call, update two cells. Last real conversation and criteria confirmed. Nothing else is required.
2. When a teaser goes out, log who saw it. When they answer, log the reply time and the pass reason.
3. Once a month, sort by criteria confirmed, oldest first. Send the top ten a two line check: “Still commercial landscaping in Georgia? Lender still at $3M?”
4. When a bid loses, log the offer. Then call within a week and ask what they want next.
5. Clear the open promise column every Friday. Done, or rescheduled with a date.

Where does a buyer database break?

It never taps you on the shoulder. Illustrative math: 600 buyers with three dated fields each is 1,800 dates. Each one is only as current as the last time someone typed it. The database cannot see that a buyer posted about closing an acquisition, that you texted her from your phone last week, or that you promised a lender intro in March.

The rest of the broker side, from sellers to co brokers, is in the business broker relationship playbook.

Here is how I would run it

Keep the database as the record. Put the daily question somewhere that answers it for you: which buyer to text today, and why.

That is what FRONT OF MIND does. It opens on your 10 minutes for today. Each person has one line on why today: they posted, a follow up is due, a pipeline deal has been quiet 7 days, you met at an event and never followed up, they are going cold. Posts only show when they are confirmed to belong to that person. Every draft is a text style message, 40 words max. Nothing sends without your tap, and it learns from your edits. When a listing signs, ask Liala out loud “who do I know buying landscaping in Georgia” and get the right buyers with why.

It runs in your phone browser and saves to your home screen. There is no native iPhone app yet. Your contacts are encrypted. No one on our team looks at them. Export and delete anytime.

If FRONT OF MIND doesn’t surface people in your network worth reaching out to within 72 hours, we’ll refund you. No questions asked.

Start free with your first 25 contacts, then $29 a month, and see which buyer comes up first.

See how it works