Selling a business while running it can feel like an impossible task. There are only so many hours in the day, and yet, you must attend to potential buyers just as diligently as your customers. Forced to rush or delay your exit, you might be tempted to accept a lesser offer to get the deal done.
Yes, acquisitions are hard work, but you don’t have to do everything yourself. Delegate your sale to our M&A team. Where before we’d guide you, now we can execute on your behalf, leaving you more time to hit the business goals that boost your valuation. Check out how it works in our guide below.
Take More Off Your Plate
You might have heard of our Guided by Acquire program, originally developed for large SaaS companies that we recently extended to agencies. Under the program, you get an M&A advisor to help navigate the acquisition process and find the right buyer and deal. Your M&A advisor can also help draft documents, connect you with strategic acquirers, recast your financials – even create your listing.
“I participated in the (Guided By Acquire) program and had an amazing experience working with Ebony! She was knowledgeable, reliable, went above and beyond to get my deal in front of the right buyers. Her efforts resulted in a smooth acquisition for both myself and the buyers.”
Stuart Faught, 5-star Trustpilot review
Getting you 80 percent ready to sell means you’re fielding buyer inquiries in days, not weeks. We’ll continue to score your business and acquisition readiness. You’ll still get your acquisition plan, and you’re still in the driving seat. But instead of acting on our recommendations, we’ll help executing your plan swiftly so all you need to do is fill in any gaps.
Free Time to Smash Growth Goals
Over 1,000s of acquisitions, we’ve learned that time can get in the way of your exit. You’re probably too busy running your businesses to lose time and brain space for your acquisition. Not everyone knows how to speak confidently about themselves or their businesses, at least not in ways that maximize buyer appeal, and that adds stress while deducting time and mental energy from your day-to-day.
“The hands-on support from Emiley Noonan was unexpected (especially with experience on other platforms) and she was very knowledgeable, well-informed, supportive, and showed up to the call having spent some time going through our profile which made the whole thing a much better investment of time.”
Dave Lawrence, 5-star Trustpilot review
That drain on your mental and physical reserves can drive you to sell when you’re not quite ready. Your business might not get the attention or valuation it deserves. Or worse, you might spend so long preparing for your exit that you neglect growth, dashing your hopes for a higher asking price.
By delegating most of your acquisition to our M&A and finance teams, you free up time to hit growth goals while we focus on your exit. Your M&A advisor will manage the entire process, ensuring you’re ready to sell with maximum impact and have everything a buyer wants to see.
Get Buyer-Ready in Half the Time
Buyers are just as busy scouting new acquisition targets as you are running your company. The easier you make their job, the warmer they’ll be, the more flexible around your deal. But can you afford to trade your time for a buyer’s? Even when there are no guarantees you’ll get acquired?
“Ky especially was incredible to work with. He understands that this is not simply a transaction and that there are humans on both side of the deal. He worked diligently with myself and my buyer (as well as a dozen or so other candidates) to make sure this made sense on all ends and was a win for all parties.”
Bobby Dimovski, 5-star Trustpilot review
You no longer face this dilemma when selling on Acquire.com. Your M&A advisor will create or optimize your acquisition documents, ensuring everything is consistently formatted according to buyer preferences. We know what buyers want to see. Helping you helps them, so everyone benefits.
What Can We Do for You?
Almost everything! Our service begins with our first conversation and doesn’t end until the closing payment lands in your bank account. All we ask is that you help fill any knowledge gaps about you and your business and approve action plans. It’s on us to deliver the right buyer and deal.
Rather than list all the services under Guided by Acquire, which you can read on our webpage, here’s a snapshot of the new, expanded services you now get included for no extra cost.
Confidential Information Memorandum (CIM)
The confidential information memorandum, or CIM, is an anonymized, executive summary of your business. It describes your business, growth opportunities, and reasons for selling, and is often the first document a buyer wants to see once your financials have piqued their interest.
The CIM Is Your Elevator Pitch
At startup sizes of $100k and over, the CIM is often the buyer’s preferred method of reviewing a business (as opposed to just the listing). They follow typical formats and structures, making it easy for buyers to find things that matter to them. Not having one is a disadvantage because it forces buyers to seek the information elsewhere, either from you, the listing, or other sources, slowing them down.
We’ll Create Your CIM For You
Jump on a quick 15-minute call with our in-house writer, answer a few quick questions about your business, and we’ll draft and design a CIM for you. No need to find an early AM or late PM slot to shift focus away from growing your business to writing about it. It’s on us.
Financial Recast (Calculating True Earnings Potential)
Why Adjust Your P&L in a Recast?
Your profit and loss (P&L) statement probably includes one-off or discretionary expenses like your salary or a company car. A buyer might allocate that spend to other things. As a result, your P&L statement may not reflect your business’s true earnings potential, which could impact your valuation.
Get Your Free Recast in 48 Hours
To give buyers a clearer picture of your business’s earnings potential, our finance team will perform a financial recast. In short, this separates real business expenses from incidental, personal, or other non-business expenses. The adjusted P&L may then give a better financial outlook and valuation.
It takes around two business days to recast your financials, and all we ask for is your P&L statement split by month for at least three years (or longer if you have it). Then leave it up to our finance team to do the analysis and adjustments before uploading the recast P&L to your listing.
Strategic Outreach
The Challenge of Attracting Strategic Buyers
The strategic buyer is something of a golden ticket. Strategics often make headlines for their founder-friendly terms and generous payments. That said, getting on their radar is challenging, especially if your business is small. You might not have the right connections or pitch, which often means paying investment bankers to make introductions with no guarantee of a deal.
How We Connect You to Strategic Opportunities
We’ve built an extensive network of strategic acquirers, and where there’s business alignment, whether in vertical or horizontal acquisition opportunities, we’ll connect them to you. All strategic buyer outreach includes your CIM and comes from our CEO, Andrew Gazdecki, for credibility. Anyone interested will get a personal introduction. An offer may soon follow.
Building the Best Listing
Is the Listing Process a Chore?
Your listing is the first thing a buyer sees, so you want it to be the best it can be. For some, this can feel like a chore. There are a lot of questions to answer and documents to upload. Plus, you might not find the right words to explain why buyers should acquire your business or which features to focus on first.
Skip the Forms With a Phone Call
You might not know what buyers typically look for in a listing, but we do. Lean on us when you’re growing impatient with how to craft a compelling listing. We can usually identify the key selling points about a business within 15 minutes of speaking to its founder. Don’t think you need to be on the phone or doing admin in the wee hours just to get some buyer attention. Let us do the hard work for you.
Getting You the Best Offers
How Much Interest Will You Get?
Expect 50-plus buyer inquiries in your first two weeks of listing. That’s the average under Guided by Acquire. How do we drive that much interest in your business? By optimizing your listing, recasting your financials, and creating a strategic pricing strategy, deal schedule, and CIM. Everything outlined above.
How We Help You Manage Buyer Interest
While chatting to buyers about selling your business might sound exciting – and it is – it’s also time-consuming. Not every buyer will be a good match, but you must treat them equally. That’s not easy when you’ve got 50-plus people all demanding information from you.
Your M&A advisor solves this problem by, one, creating a living Q&A that answers common buyer questions and evolves with each new inquiry, and two, by liaising with buyers on your behalf. They’ll keep buyers accountable and evaluate their suitability, creating a shortlist of promising candidates.
Focus on Offers, Not Process
Your M&A advisor stack-ranks buyers and offers according to your acquisition goals. Then you’re free to focus on what matters – picking the best deal – and not the selection process. You still retain full control and your advisor will urge you to get on calls with the buyer before making a final decision, but without having to work through the false starts.
Helping You Change Your Life Through Acquisition
Selling a business changes your life in more ways than one. Money is just the beginning. It also changes you as a person. Imagine that feeling of getting acquired. That stamp of approval, the feeling of joining a club that only the staunchest and most diligent entrepreneurs can access. You’re likely to emerge more confident about yourself, in your abilities, and be ready to move on to bigger things.
Helping you realize your ambitions is our life’s work. Your success is our success. By celebrating all acquisitions, big and small, we’re saying that we want to help you get acquired. So next time you wish you had more time to sell your business, don’t shelve the idea for some future date. Get in touch with our M&A team and we’ll start working on your exit today.
The content on this site is not intended to provide legal, financial or M&A advice. It is for information purposes only, and any links provided are for your convenience. Please seek the services of an M&A professional before entering into any M&A transaction. It is not Acquire’s intention to solicit or interfere with any established relationship you may have with any M&A professional.