🧐What I Learned Last Week
Week ending Friday August 12, 2022
What I Learned Last Week curates the most interesting content relating to business acquisitions, operations, entrepreneurship, finance, and more. WILLW is a publication of The Business Inquirer.
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Hello Friends!
This issue of The Business Inquirer is brought to you by Dealfeed.io - Online Businesses from Top Brokers.
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📰 Articles
Jesse Sunquist describes himself as a “spouse funded searcher.” He’s been at it for a year now and wrote a great post about his learnings so far.
Its really really difficult to get any deal done
Your search criteria can (and should) change
Search is so personal; don’t waste your time comparing yourself to others
This is not a solo pursuit; your network is your lifeline
Reflections after 1 year of searching full time
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David LaMore of the Maverick newsletter shares his tips for improving your networking skills and how it helped him raise acquisition capital.
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Andrew Pierno at XO Capital just published a post-mortem on a failed acquisition. He highlights some of the mistakes they made and how you can avoid them.
At the tail end of last week, we finalized our sale of Sentiment Investor (SI). It's in much better hands now with a team that can execute on the vision. SI was a tough one for us. We had a bad transition when we bought it, lost 100% of the customer base in that process and then rewrote it, and effectively shelved it. It was a delight working with the group that bought it from us and I have full confidence they're going to make much better use of it than we did.
How Not To Buy A Bad Deal & Our 2nd Sale!
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Foothill Ventures writes about the importance of conducting customer reference checks in VC investing and how to make the process as painless as possible. The same applies to M&A.
The most invasive due diligence step that VCs have to do before pulling the trigger on a new investment is the customer interview.
On the one hand, this is often the most valuable information an investor can get: it is very difficult to replace an actual customer giving direct feedback on how they chose to work with Company X, what competitors they considered, how their experience has been, etc.
🧵 Twitter
The LOI is the tip of the spear in your acquisition journey. Make sure it’s sharp…
A good primer on Qualified Small Business Stock…
I think about this often when looking at business listings…
Another reminder that time kills deals…
The dreaded personal guarantee…
🤔 Thoughts, Events, Other
Podcast Appearance
Recently I had the pleasure of being a guest on the Beyond 8 Figures podcast with A.J. Lawrence. It's a quick, free-flowing conversation that I would encourage you to check out and listen to.
Listen to the episode 👉 https://beyond8figures.com/podcast_episode/gain-traction-through-business-mistakes-with-roman-beylin-duedilio/
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New Marketplaces for Dealflow
A quick reminder to check the Deal Sourcing Guide by TBI for updates on all the latest marketplaces and deal origination services. It’s a living post that I continuously update.
Deal Maven - earlier this week I had a chance to connect with Raleigh Williams who launched Deal Maven. It’s a partial buyout marketplace where buyers and sellers can buy and sell a fraction of a business. It’s a competitor to BitsForDigits with a focus on the US market.
tupelo - I also had a chance to catch up with George Wellmer. George is the co-founder of Ennerate which automates SBA valuations. In addition, he recently launched tupelo to disrupt BizBuySell. They are starting with a focus on plumbing & HVAC businesses and expanding from there. Looks like tupelo is YC funded. Pretty cool.
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Gurus
I’m seeing more and more “gurus” come out of the woodwork trying to teach people how to buy and sell businesses. Just remember the great saying by George Bernard Shaw: “Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach”
Jakob Greenfeld recently published a great newsletter post on this exact topic. It’s worth a read.
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Introductions
I get incredibly nervous when a podcast or webinar host asks me to introduce myself. How far back do I go? What’s relevant and what’s not? How much do I share?
Harvard Business Review has a short, helpful guide that can help anyone perfect their intro.
A Simple Way to Introduce Yourself
🛠 Tools & Resources
I want to share some tools & resources that I have found helpful. Please note that some of these may contain affiliate links. This means that I may receive compensation if you sign-up and use them.
Cerebro Capital - Cerebro has a network of 1,500+ lenders who can provide debt financing for your acquisition, refi, etc. $500k minimum.
X5 Deals - Proprietary deal sourcing. They do the outreach and send you relevant, actionable deals directly into your inbox.
Curators - Proprietary deal sourcing. You need targets that fit your investment criteria, and Curators delivers week after week - we even update your personalized database on a daily basis with new information on best-fit targets.
BizNexus - Proprietary deal flow, deal aggregator, and exit prep. Local Boston company and I consider the founder (Adam Ray) a friend.
PrivSource - Deal aggregator for lower and middle-market listings.
Kumo - Find every deal in one complete platform. Spend less time sourcing deals and more time closing them. Kumo aggregates 180K+ business listings into one easy-to-use platform.
The Website Flip - a newsletter that sends content sites for sale to your email inbox. They send deals each Wednesday and Friday.
ProjectionHub - Access to 50+ CPA-developed financial projection templates. 25% discount using code “duedilio” at checkout.
Logology - Best automated logo & brand identity tool I’ve come across.
DeepBench - Access a cutting-edge expert network. $200 discount.
OpenPhone - The best VoIP phone solution that I have found. I use this for DueDilio. You get a $20 credit if you sign-up.
Eloquens - Knowledge marketplace. I’ve purchased a few templates from them.
Deal Flow Scout - Peer-to-peer deal flow exchange. Free, open, transparent.
Deal Sourcing Guide - A directory I put together of online marketplaces, brokers, DFY deal flow, and more.
That’s all for this issue of What I Learned Last Week!
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Important Disclaimer: This newsletter is provided for informational & educational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as legal, business, investment, or tax advice. This newsletter may link to other websites and certain information contained herein has been obtained from third-party sources. While taken from sources believed to be reliable, it has not been independently verified. The Business Inquirer makes no representations about the enduring accuracy of the information or its appropriateness for a given situation. References to any companies, securities, listings, investments, or digital assets are for illustrative purposes only and do not constitute an investment recommendation or offer to provide investment advisory services. Charts and graphs provided within are for informational purposes solely and should not be relied upon when making any business, tax, or investment decisions. Content in this newsletter speaks only as of the date indicated. Any projections, estimates, forecasts, targets, prospects and/or opinions expressed in these materials are subject to change without notice and may differ or be contrary to opinions expressed by others.