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Acquiring Minds

Will Smith

Buying a business is an amazing path for many successful entrepreneurs. Learn how to buy a business from the entrepreneurs who have already done it. 2x per week: stories, insights, & valuable advice about acquisition entrepreneurship. Hosted by Will Smith, who is on his own path to acquire a business. Also on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@AcquiringMinds Sign up for episode summaries at: https://acquiringminds.co

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Top 10 Acquiring Minds Episodes

Best episodes ranked by Goodpods Users most listened

A primer on lead gen businesses from Jaime Arias, who bought a 14-year-old biz that generates online leads for dentists.

Topics in Jaime's interview:

  • Choosing self-funded over a traditional search fund
  • Buying tiny sites on Flippa
  • The opportunity with "old" internet businesses
  • 3 types of sellers on Flippa
  • Using BuiltWith to generate proprietary outreach list
  • About Patients4you
  • Lowering acquisition targets from $750k - $1m cash flow to $200k - $400k
  • "Rank & Rent" model for local lead gen
  • What are you really buying with a lead gen business?
  • Lead brokers
  • SEO vs. PPC for lead gen
  • Isn't Google Ads too competitive already for local lead gen?
  • Getting comfortable with Google algorithm risk
  • Why Patients4you is an agency more than a lead gen website
  • Deal terms
  • Using BizBuySell for digital businesses
  • Centurica
  • How he's growing Patients4you
  • Slow feedback loop of local lead gen businesses

Reach Jaime at:

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

play

09/07/22 • 72 min

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08/30/22 • 86 min

Sam Turner is 3 acquisitions into a 5-year plan to buy HVAC businesses across the UK that together cash flow £6m/yr.

Topics in Sam's interview:

  • How the businesses he buys are run and by whom
  • Buying without the benefit of an SBA loan
  • Why HVAC?
  • Why buying small business is more appealing than real estate
  • Harbour Club with Jeremy Harbour
  • The value in acquiring businesses in a highly-fragmented industry
  • Deal structure for his first acquisition
  • Sam's goal for revenue/EBITDA/multiple and his own wealth
  • Buying small vs. buying big
  • Buying an HVAC with mostly new construction vs. maintenance revenue
  • White collar people buying blue collar businesses

Reach Sam at:

  • sam DOT turner AT advantos DOT com
  • LinkedIn

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

play

08/30/22 • 86 min

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08/23/22 • 54 min

Kevin Swenson shares his story of buying a $3m real estate appraisal firm as a platform to roll up the fragmented space.

Topics from Kevin's interview:

  • Why the real estate appraisal industry?
  • How to add value as the entrepreneur doing a roll-up
  • Roll-up dynamics
  • Appraisal businesses vs. appraisal management companies
  • Story of his acquisition, the platform business
  • The "Your Sure Thing" philosophy
  • Buying in an industry where you DON'T have experience
  • The nature of real estate service businesses
  • How to mitigate risk when buying a real estate service business
  • Acquisition opportunities in real estate services beyond appraisal
  • How it's going since the real estate market slowed
  • Pivoting a roll-up strategy to react to the market

Reach Kevin at:

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

play

08/23/22 • 54 min

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08/16/22 • 73 min

Ramon Van Meer bought an ecommerce business doing $30k/mo. A few tweaks & months later, it was up to $400k per month.

Topics in Ramon's interview:

  • What to look for in an underperforming ecommerce business
  • How to quickly improve an ecommerce business
  • The effect of turning on paid advertising
  • The true nature of running an ecommerce business
  • The power of niches
  • User experience buying a digital business versus an offline business
  • Who should buy versus build
  • How to make money in content
  • Growing a content site from scratch to a $9m sale in 2.5 years
  • The dangerous temptation of buying too many businesses
  • Buying a YouTube channel
  • Decline of a YouTube channel business immediately after acquiring it
  • SBA loan for a YouTube channel acquisition
  • Buying a SaaS business

Reach Roman at:

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

Links & mentions:

play

08/16/22 • 73 min

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Jason Cline left corporate at age 50 to buy a flower distribution business (in cash). SDE is up 3x after just one year.

Topics in Jason's interview:

  • Pivoting from 20+ years in corporate to SMB ownership
  • 3 criteria for what business to buy
  • Buying a business in cash (no SBA loan)
  • The business of flower distribution
  • Selling to big retailers like 7-Eleven & Circle K
  • How to detect growth potential in a distribution business
  • 2 ways to retain drivers in distribution/route businesses
  • Distribution businesses are really car businesses
  • Scan-based trading
  • 2 key techniques Jason used to transition successfully into the business
  • Working "in" the business for the first 6 months
  • Testing changes
  • The numbers behind flower distribution
  • Ideal size of SDE for target business
  • What's more important than SDE
  • Jason's growth since acquisition and plans for expansion

Reach Jason at:

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

play

08/09/22 • 87 min

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Jordan Carter started as a part-time, generalist searcher. 3+ years later, he bought a biz doing $2.4m with 40% margins.

Topics in Jordan's interview:

  • Part-time vs. full-time searching
  • Consulting in order to generate income while searching
  • Misconceptions about how easy it is to find a business to buy
  • How much cash Jordan saved for his self-funded search
  • Generalist vs. industry-specific search
  • Using interns for search
  • Value of speaking with owners (even if they don't want to sell)
  • Optimal percentage of time to devote to deal sourcing
  • Accessing equity capital
  • Adding value to a super niche business you're completely new to
  • Growing a business 40% in 2 years after acquisition
  • Buying a grant-writing business
  • The pain of losing an LOI

Reach Jordan at:

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

Links & mentions:

play

08/02/22 • 82 min

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A deep-dive into the market for SaaS businesses with Thomas Smale, founder of leading SaaS brokerage FE International.

Topics in Thomas's interview:

  • Pros & cons of SaaS
  • SaaS valuations
  • SaaS vs. ecommerce
  • Competing with private equity for SaaS deals
  • Using an SBA loan to buy a SaaS business
  • Micro-SaaS
  • First-time buyers doing a career pivot by acquiring a business
  • Most common mistake among first-time buyers
  • Passive nature of online businesses
  • SaaS products unlikely to go zero?
  • Acquisition strategy: converting on-premise software to cloud
  • Proprietary outreach to find SaaS sellers
  • How economic climate is affecting SaaS valuations & multiples
  • Ecommerce valuations & multiples
  • Young ecommerce businesses - dangerous?
  • Advice for first-timer buyers

Reach Thomas at:

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

Links & mentions:

play

07/26/22 • 86 min

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Kinza Azmat arrived in the US at age 6, speaking little English. Today she's the new owner of a thriving RE brokerage.

Topics from Kinza's interview:

  • Becoming a business broker to learn acquisition & access deal flow
  • Thinking that finding a business to buy would be easy
  • How business brokerages generate deal flow
  • Financial & location criteria of her search
  • Unlocking deal flow by expanding geographic criteria
  • Dealing with gender, racial, and other biases in sellers
  • Tying seller note to business performance
  • The business of apartment locators
  • Competitive moats for apartment locators
  • Rebranding
  • Small business owner life vs. corporate cog life
  • Getting your spouse on board
  • Pregnant as a new owner
  • Type D and Type F reorganization
  • Following (and breaking) the Asian-American pattern
  • America as land of opportunity

Reach Kinza at:

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

Links & mentions:

play

07/19/22 • 72 min

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Lisa Forrest shares key findings from a survey of 49 entrepreneurs who bought a business after a self-funded search.

The findings discussed were based on these questions:

  • How did you find your deal?
  • Did you conduct a full-time search?
  • How long did you search before you found the deal you closed on?
  • Do you think your acquisition price valuation was fair?
  • How long did it take you to discuss valuation with the seller?
  • Did you have a competitive deal process where multiple buyers were vying for the LOI?
  • What do you think the critical success factors were in sourcing and closing your deal?
  • Did you go up or down market compared to your original expectations?

Reach Lisa at:

  • lisa DOT forrest AT liveoak DOT bank
  • LinkedIn

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

Links & mentions:

  • The report will be published at Live Oak Bank's search fund resources page... but not for 2 weeks.
  • If you can't wait, email Lisa at the address above👆 and she'll get you the raw data now.
play

07/15/22 • 29 min

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09/13/22 • 84 min

How Doug Johns overcame his reservations about being a franchisee to acquire a dream business with $1.8m EBITDA.

Topics in Doug's interview:

  • Buying a franchise vs. independent business
  • Opening your mind to a franchise
  • The many (overlooked) benefits to being a franchisee
  • Calling yourself "independent investor" instead of "searcher"
  • Running a search like a B2B sales process
  • The appeal of a deal with few addbacks
  • Why home service businesses are so appealing as acquisitions
  • Loving, rather than running from, managing people
  • Why the top home service businesses have more sophisticated funnels than the Fortune 500
  • ServiceTitan
  • Where the opportunity is when the business you buy is already well-run and mature
  • Owning a plumbing company without knowing anything about plumbing
  • The numbers of Doug's deal
  • The exact multiple is way less important than you think
  • Using ROBS to buy the business
  • Why high growth can make a business harder to finance
  • Understanding debt service coverage ratio (DSCR) thresholds
  • Doug's tip for choosing an SBA lender
  • The $500k value of Doug's appeal to the seller
  • Going to meet a seller face to face

Reach Doug at:

  • doug DOT johns AT couffley DOT com
  • LinkedIn

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

play

09/13/22 • 84 min

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FAQ

How many episodes does Acquiring Minds have?

Acquiring Minds currently has 209 episodes available.

What topics does Acquiring Minds cover?

The podcast is about Entrepreneur, Entrepreneurship, Investing, Online Business, Podcasts and Business.

What is the most popular episode on Acquiring Minds?

The episode title 'The Appeal of Lead Gen Businesses (Especially Old Ones)' is the most popular.

What is the average episode length on Acquiring Minds?

The average episode length on Acquiring Minds is 65 minutes.

How often are episodes of Acquiring Minds released?

Episodes of Acquiring Minds are typically released every 4 days.

When was the first episode of Acquiring Minds?

The first episode of Acquiring Minds was released on Apr 1, 2021.

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