What Happens to an Online Business When You Die?

Whatever form it takes, an online business with real value, whether from sales, subscriber revenue, advertising, or an established customer base, is an asset of the estate in the same way as any other business interest. A will can identify who should inherit the business, whether that means passing ownership to a family member, allowing a business partner to buy out the deceased's share, or directing that the business be sold and the proceeds added to the estate.

How the business is structured during the owner's lifetime makes a significant difference here. A business run through a limited company has some natural continuity built in, since the company itself continues to exist independently of any individual shareholder or director, whereas a business run as a sole trader is far more closely tied to the individual, meaning their death can have a more immediate and disruptive effect on trading.

Even where a will is clear about who should inherit an online business, the person taking over often faces an immediate practical obstacle, which is that many of the tools needed to run it, such as the website hosting account, the domain registrar, payment processing accounts, email marketing platforms, and social media accounts used for the business, are typically registered in the deceased's personal name and secured by their own login details.

This means that succession planning for an online business needs to think about more than who legally inherits it. It needs to think about how the successor will actually gain the practical ability to log in and keep things running, ideally without a gap in trading that could damage customer relationships, ongoing subscriptions, or search engine visibility that has been built up over time.

A domain name is one of the more clearly transferable digital business assets, since domain registrars generally have established processes for transferring ownership, including in the event of the registered owner's death, usually requiring a death certificate and proof of authority such as a grant of probate. Because a domain can carry significant value in its own right, particularly for an established business, it is worth identifying it clearly as a business asset in succession planning.

Other elements of an online business, such as a social media following built up over years or a customer email list, are less straightforwardly transferable, since they may sit within platforms that treat the underlying account as a personal licence rather than a business asset that can simply be handed over. This is another reason why practical continuity planning matters as much as legal ownership when it comes to online businesses.

Where an online business is not run entirely alone, for instance where there is a co-founder, a key employee, or a virtual assistant who already has some access to day to day operations, succession can be considerably smoother, since there is already someone with practical familiarity who can step in while the estate is being administered. This is worth building into any succession plan explicitly, rather than assuming a family member with no prior involvement can simply take over.

Formal arrangements such as a shareholders' agreement, in the case of a limited company, or a partnership agreement can also set out clearly what should happen to a deceased owner's share of the business, which reduces uncertainty considerably compared with relying on the will alone to resolve every question.

Because online businesses vary so much in structure, value, and the platforms they depend on, general guidance can only go so far, and the right succession plan for a small side project looks very different from the right plan for a substantial trading business. A will can and should record who should inherit the business or its value, but the practical planning around access, continuity, and business structure deserves individual professional advice, ideally well before it is needed.

If you run an online business of meaningful value, we would recommend speaking to an adviser who can look at your specific structure, platforms, and goals, alongside making sure your will clearly reflects who should inherit or benefit from the business you have built.