How much does an e-commerce business valuation cost in Australia?

The short answer

Across the wider market, full valuation reports in Australia typically run $5,000–$15,000+ at traditional firms, and most firms quote privately rather than publish a price. E-commerce matters often sit toward the upper half of that band, because the evidence-gathering is more involved than the absence of a shopfront might suggest: platform dependency, traffic-source concentration and inventory verification replace the lease review and plant schedule a bricks-and-mortar valuation would otherwise need.

Oliver Group's fixed fees for e-commerce valuations

Oliver Group's fees are set by the annual turnover of the business: a Small Business Valuation is $1,495 + GST for turnover under $2 million, a Medium Business Valuation is $2,495 + GST for turnover between $2 million and $10 million, and a Large Business Valuation is $3,495 + GST for turnover over $10 million. Retrospective valuation dates are +$495 each and additional entities are +$795 each. Fees are fixed at engagement and never contingent on the outcome the report reaches. A single-entity store valued at a current date carries no surcharges at all. For small-business reports a draft is delivered in 2 business days and for medium-business reports in 3 business days, and the delivery date for a Large Business Valuation is agreed before commencement. Delivery time starts once payment and all required information have been received.

Why 'no premises' does not mean 'less work'

A bricks-and-mortar business has a lease to review, plant and equipment to schedule, and a location to assess. An e-commerce business has none of that: but the absence of those items does not shrink the scope, it relocates it. In place of a lease review, the valuer needs to understand platform dependency and the terms under which the business trades on it. In place of a plant and equipment schedule, the valuer needs to verify inventory: landed cost, condition, and what is sitting in transit or in an obsolescence risk zone. In place of assessing a physical location, the valuer needs to assess where the traffic and the customer relationship actually sit, and whether either is transferable. The evidence-gathering is different in kind, not smaller in size.

The platform-dependency driver

The single biggest scope driver in an e-commerce valuation is how concentrated the business is on one channel. A store selling through its own Shopify site with an owned email list and diversified organic traffic carries a materially different risk profile to a business that generates most of its revenue through a single Amazon seller account. Account-suspension risk is real and has to be assessed on the evidence: has the account had policy strikes, IP complaints, or performance notices; is the seller account in the individual's name or the entity's name; and, critically for a related-party transfer or a sale, is the channel relationship itself transferable, or does the buyer effectively need to build a new seller history from zero. Where marketplace concentration is high, the methodology has to weight this risk explicitly, usually through a higher discount rate or a more conservative maintainable-earnings figure rather than through a footnote.

Traffic mix and customer-acquisition cost as evidence

For a physical retailer, footfall and repeat trade are largely observable. For an e-commerce business, the equivalent evidence is the traffic mix: what proportion of revenue is paid (and therefore stops the moment ad spend stops) versus organic, direct, or email-driven (and therefore more likely to persist under different ownership). A business generating most of its revenue from paid search or paid social has a maintainable-earnings position that looks very different once acquisition costs are properly normalised against a realistic, sustained spend level, not the spend level in a single strong quarter. Ad-account history matters too: a long, stable account with consistent return-on-ad-spend is different evidence to a recently created account or one with a history of suspensions. Ownership of the email list, and its engagement metrics, is often the strongest piece of evidence for a defensible, channel-independent revenue base, because an owned list transfers with the business in a way that a rented audience on someone else's platform does not.

Inventory verification: the e-commerce stocktake

A traditional retail valuation includes a stocktake. The e-commerce equivalent is inventory verification, and it is more involved than it sounds. Landed cost has to be checked against actual supplier invoices, freight and duty, not just the unit cost quoted in a spreadsheet, because landed-cost errors compound directly into gross margin, which flows straight through to maintainable earnings. Obsolescence risk needs assessing for seasonal or trend-driven stock, private-label ranges with long reorder lead times, and anything sitting in aged inventory reports. Pre-paid stock in transit, increasingly common with overseas private-label manufacturing, needs to be identified and treated correctly, since it can otherwise inflate or understate the asset base depending on how it has been booked. None of this is optional analysis; it is the working evidence that supports (or does not support) the earnings and net asset figures the rest of the valuation depends on.

What pushes an e-commerce matter into a higher package

Only turnover. Marketplace concentration, private-label inventory, paid-traffic dependency and platform risk all change what the analysis has to test, and none of them change the fee. A store turning over under $2 million pays the same fixed fee whether it sells on one channel or four. Tell us about the channels at scoping so the revenue-quality work is scoped properly, not so we can reprice it. The features below change how much analysis the file needs, not what you pay, with one exception: each additional entity is +$795.

• ·Multi-marketplace operations: Amazon, eBay, Shopify and wholesale channels each need separate revenue-quality and dependency analysis
• ·Private-label products with overseas supply chains: landed cost, MOQ commitments and supplier concentration all need evidencing
• ·Aggregator-comparable questions: where a founder is benchmarking against FBA-aggregator acquisition multiples, the comparables need genuine scrutiny, not a like-for-like assumption
• ·High paid-traffic dependency: normalising acquisition cost against a sustainable spend level takes more analysis than a predominantly organic store
• ·Recent platform account issues: any suspension, strike or policy dispute history needs to be factored into the risk position
• ·Multiple entities or brands trading under one operating structure

What to send us first

Delivery time starts once payment and all required information have been received, so it pays to have the evidence ready. Come prepared with platform account history and any policy notices, traffic and ad-account reporting for at least the past 12 months, inventory and landed-cost records, and email-list or CRM engagement data if you hold it: the clearer this evidence is going in, the more efficiently the engagement runs, and the more supportable the resulting position.

What complexity changes, and where to go next

For a single-platform store with clean records and a straightforward purpose, the engagement proceeds normally. A multi-marketplace or private-label operation pays the same turnover-based fixed fee, for the same scope of report: what changes is the amount of analysis and the time it takes to get the information complete. One limit applies at every package: the fixed fee does not cover a cross-check of the conclusion against a second or third methodology, expert witness work or tax advice. For the full market landscape, free calculators, broker appraisals, accountant letters, desktop estimates and formal reports, see the pricing guide in our resources library. Oliver Group prepares independent valuations only; we are not a registered tax agent and do not provide tax, legal or financial advice: your accountant applies the report in their domain, including how it supports any CGT position. What we provide is a fee you know before you start, for a number the evidence defends.