Finding the Middle Ground With an Acquirer
“Shawn Finder founded his company Autoklose and within two years had an offer on his business,” shares Sam Thompson a Minneapolis business broker and the president of M&A firm Transitions In Business. “The offer was miles from what he was expecting, yet he still stayed with the buyer. Eventually he was able to sell his business to this same buyer. Shawn explains how his business was valued using a multiple of revenue.”
Shawn Finder built email marketing platform Autoklose to $1 million in revenue when a chance encounter at a conference led to an acquisition conversation with VanillaSoft. Finder thought his company was worth much more initially than VanillaSoft did – their valuations were quite far apart and both sides had to negotiate to ultimately meet in the middle.
In this episode, you’ll learn how to:
- Finance your growth while hanging on to your equity.
- Maximize your customer retention.
- Keep your books if you want to get acquired.
- Push an acquirer hard (without jeopardizing your deal).
- Justify a higher valuation for your company.