1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,520 I couldn't even tell you. I know it's between it's between Baltimore and DC. 2 00:00:06,040 --> 00:00:08,040 Nice. Where are you from originally? 3 00:00:08,040 --> 00:00:11,200 Originally from Long Island, New York. 4 00:00:11,200 --> 00:00:12,720 Rhode Island, New York? 5 00:00:12,720 --> 00:00:14,040 No, Long Island. 6 00:00:14,040 --> 00:00:16,360 Oh, Long Island. I was like, I had not heard of that. 7 00:00:17,520 --> 00:00:18,800 Long Island, New York. I got you. 8 00:00:18,800 --> 00:00:21,160 All right. Welcome in to Visions Pros. 9 00:00:21,600 --> 00:00:24,000 So what got you? Jackson Calame, I'm your show host. 10 00:00:24,000 --> 00:00:27,280 We will be doing interviews for visionary entrepreneurs and guest 11 00:00:27,280 --> 00:00:30,120 leaders who are building fantastic visions out there. 12 00:00:40,920 --> 00:00:43,920 And welcome into a special edition of Vision Pros Live. 13 00:00:44,720 --> 00:00:48,480 I am going to be bringing on a guest named Alan Gregory. 14 00:00:48,840 --> 00:00:53,760 Alan specializes in helping businesses with the sale of their ventures 15 00:00:53,760 --> 00:00:58,640 and making sure they are teed up to be able to sell their their business. 16 00:00:59,000 --> 00:01:01,760 Because most businesses, when they get to that stage, just aren't ready. 17 00:01:01,760 --> 00:01:03,800 They don't have it all put together. They haven't thought about that. 18 00:01:03,800 --> 00:01:08,560 So whether you're in the beginning, you know, and thinking of Stephen Covey, 19 00:01:08,760 --> 00:01:13,400 begin with the end in mind or you're facing the reality that you may want 20 00:01:13,400 --> 00:01:16,120 to sell your business sooner than later, this is going to be a great discussion. 21 00:01:16,600 --> 00:01:22,320 I'm excited to see what types of theories Alan presents, what types of, 22 00:01:22,320 --> 00:01:26,480 you know, red flags could exist in your business as you get ready to sell 23 00:01:26,480 --> 00:01:29,960 and what types of what types of people you should be turning to to help 24 00:01:29,960 --> 00:01:32,280 with the process of making sure that you sell and sell well. 25 00:01:32,280 --> 00:01:36,000 Without further ado, I rather before getting him on a quick shout out 26 00:01:36,000 --> 00:01:39,160 to our sponsors, Epiphany and AbleHealth.US. 27 00:01:39,160 --> 00:01:41,360 Both are up here in this corner. 28 00:01:41,880 --> 00:01:43,600 Definitely feel free to check out their websites. 29 00:01:43,600 --> 00:01:47,000 And of course, on the opposite side, we'd love to see you contribute 30 00:01:47,000 --> 00:01:49,840 to the water project or some other means. 31 00:01:49,840 --> 00:01:53,400 The more we give, usually the more we get in life or the next, 32 00:01:53,400 --> 00:01:54,400 if you believe in that. 33 00:01:54,400 --> 00:01:57,720 So with that said, without further ado, Alan, thank you so much for being 34 00:01:57,720 --> 00:02:01,480 on the show and we look forward to diving into the subject and opening 35 00:02:01,480 --> 00:02:03,480 the eyes of entrepreneurs everywhere. Appreciate you, man. 36 00:02:03,880 --> 00:02:05,280 Absolutely. Thanks for having me. 37 00:02:06,040 --> 00:02:11,520 Yes, sir. All right. So with that said, one of the things that you earned 38 00:02:11,520 --> 00:02:17,400 fairly recently is a it says you became a certified exit planning advisor 39 00:02:17,400 --> 00:02:19,760 through the Exit Planning Institute. 40 00:02:20,080 --> 00:02:26,320 Tell us as much as you can about your background before you got to that stage. 41 00:02:26,320 --> 00:02:30,200 And then let's transition into talking about what you've learned from that 42 00:02:30,200 --> 00:02:32,520 institute, what qualifies that institute, et cetera. 43 00:02:32,520 --> 00:02:36,200 But where did you what were you doing before becoming a certified 44 00:02:36,200 --> 00:02:37,200 exit planning advisor? 45 00:02:37,840 --> 00:02:41,760 So when I graduated high school in 1998, I know that's a long time ago. 46 00:02:41,760 --> 00:02:43,840 The 19 are you one of the young folks, right? 47 00:02:43,840 --> 00:02:46,560 So I graduated high school in 1998. 48 00:02:46,560 --> 00:02:50,800 I had a lot of sales jobs from then until about 2003, 2003. 49 00:02:50,800 --> 00:02:54,280 I went to corporate America and I was a customer service representative. 50 00:02:54,680 --> 00:02:56,960 They decided they were going to move the service center. 51 00:02:56,960 --> 00:03:01,120 So I became a marketing analyst for that same company from 2005 to 2008. 52 00:03:01,640 --> 00:03:05,600 The reason I left corporate America is because I read Rich Dad, Poor Dad 53 00:03:05,600 --> 00:03:09,720 cover to cover twice in 2007 over the Thanksgiving holiday. 54 00:03:09,720 --> 00:03:12,240 So four days read the book twice, cover to cover. 55 00:03:12,240 --> 00:03:17,360 And right immediately, I became a digital marketing consultant because I already had 56 00:03:17,360 --> 00:03:19,760 some of that background from the stuff that I was doing before. 57 00:03:20,080 --> 00:03:24,160 So when 2020 came, the pandemic hit, everybody decided they were going to reinvent 58 00:03:24,160 --> 00:03:25,760 themselves, me especially, obviously. 59 00:03:26,160 --> 00:03:29,280 And I saw an ad that came across that talked about buying businesses and 60 00:03:29,280 --> 00:03:30,360 consulting for equity. 61 00:03:30,600 --> 00:03:31,920 And I had been doing retainers. 62 00:03:31,920 --> 00:03:36,280 So, you know, monthly retainers, weekly retainers, hourly retainers for 12 years 63 00:03:36,320 --> 00:03:38,960 doing ads and funnels and emails and stuff for people. 64 00:03:39,160 --> 00:03:40,960 And it was just time for me to do something that I could do. 65 00:03:40,960 --> 00:03:44,040 And it was just time for me to do something different and bigger and better. 66 00:03:44,360 --> 00:03:48,040 So I got involved in the mergers and acquisitions space and we started reaching 67 00:03:48,040 --> 00:03:51,040 out to business owners that potentially wanted to sell their business through the 68 00:03:51,040 --> 00:03:55,160 conventional means, which most of these guys are doing cold calls, cold emails, 69 00:03:55,200 --> 00:03:58,440 LinkedIn DMs, direct mail letters and stuff like that. 70 00:03:58,720 --> 00:04:01,800 We were doing that and we were contacting a lot of different people. 71 00:04:02,040 --> 00:04:06,080 But the one thing that happens so often, I would say 90% of the time, business 72 00:04:06,080 --> 00:04:07,960 owners are not ready to sell their business. 73 00:04:07,960 --> 00:04:11,880 So my colleagues have this next mentality, some of them did anyway, not to talk bad 74 00:04:11,880 --> 00:04:14,440 about any of them, but a lot of them did have this next mentality. 75 00:04:14,440 --> 00:04:17,800 So if they're not ready to sell right now, then we don't want to talk to them. 76 00:04:17,800 --> 00:04:20,040 We only want to talk to people that want to sell right now. 77 00:04:20,360 --> 00:04:23,880 And I'm like, as a marketer and a consultant, that didn't make sense to me. 78 00:04:24,920 --> 00:04:29,480 So I decided I was going to go and get myself certified in exit planning, because 79 00:04:29,760 --> 00:04:32,760 when I'm coming across people and I potentially want to buy their business, 80 00:04:32,960 --> 00:04:36,720 they're going to be more comfortable with me if they know that I have their best 81 00:04:36,720 --> 00:04:41,760 interest in mind by trying to help them do it the right way, not this whole shark 82 00:04:41,760 --> 00:04:45,160 thing where I'm just trying to like, quote unquote, steal your business from you. 83 00:04:45,360 --> 00:04:47,440 So that's how I kind of got to where I am now. 84 00:04:47,840 --> 00:04:48,560 I care. 85 00:04:48,560 --> 00:04:49,840 Like I want to do this the right way. 86 00:04:50,240 --> 00:04:52,880 And EPI has been around, I believe it's for 20 years. 87 00:04:53,320 --> 00:04:58,040 Chris Snyder is the one who he acquired it, which is an interesting thing, because 88 00:04:58,040 --> 00:04:59,560 he acquired it from someone else. 89 00:04:59,560 --> 00:05:03,440 I don't remember the name of the guy before that, but Chris and Scott Snyder 90 00:05:03,440 --> 00:05:06,640 are the father and son team that own this business. 91 00:05:06,640 --> 00:05:08,480 So it was like a family business. 92 00:05:08,720 --> 00:05:12,400 And Chris, not recently, I would say maybe a few years ago, but he had been working 93 00:05:12,640 --> 00:05:17,080 in the exit planning Institute and he used all the exit planning Institute's 94 00:05:18,640 --> 00:05:23,400 presentations and words and methodologies to take himself through an exit. 95 00:05:23,400 --> 00:05:27,560 So now this father and son team, the son is actually running it now and he's 96 00:05:27,560 --> 00:05:30,040 working on his exit to have someone else take it over. 97 00:05:30,040 --> 00:05:33,360 So they're constantly doing the same stuff that they're teaching. 98 00:05:33,360 --> 00:05:36,000 So that's why I thought it was a good idea for me to learn from them. 99 00:05:36,000 --> 00:05:37,480 And I do the same stuff myself. 100 00:05:38,520 --> 00:05:39,360 That's smart, man. 101 00:05:39,360 --> 00:05:43,600 You kind of, you covered a lot of important factors that I hope people evaluate 102 00:05:43,800 --> 00:05:45,600 as they consider who they might want to work with. 103 00:05:46,360 --> 00:05:51,880 It actually reminds me of my first realtor when I was the first time home buyer. 104 00:05:52,400 --> 00:05:52,760 Right. 105 00:05:52,760 --> 00:05:57,400 There was, we got, we had so many realtors that I went through, because I'm, I'm, I 106 00:05:57,400 --> 00:06:01,040 don't want to say difficult on my research though, you know, like especially 107 00:06:01,040 --> 00:06:03,840 with something that of that magnitude, that's that important. 108 00:06:04,360 --> 00:06:06,680 And most realtors didn't want to deal with me. 109 00:06:07,240 --> 00:06:10,200 You know, they just, they wanted the easy lay down. 110 00:06:10,200 --> 00:06:13,240 They wanted the person who was going to listen to everything that they said. 111 00:06:13,240 --> 00:06:19,320 And like you said, ultimately, like shark me into a deal that wasn't necessarily 112 00:06:19,320 --> 00:06:20,320 in my best interest. 113 00:06:20,320 --> 00:06:24,600 And so here I come fighting back, you know, and they'd be like, well, Jackson, 114 00:06:24,600 --> 00:06:26,520 like, it's just not realistic to find. 115 00:06:26,520 --> 00:06:29,160 There aren't that many houses on the market with this criteria. 116 00:06:29,160 --> 00:06:30,960 And I said, guess what? 117 00:06:31,800 --> 00:06:33,080 I only need one. 118 00:06:33,960 --> 00:06:40,120 So you can either go on your way and not waste either of our time, or you can help 119 00:06:40,120 --> 00:06:43,800 me find my one deal because that's what I will get. 120 00:06:44,440 --> 00:06:44,800 Right. 121 00:06:44,800 --> 00:06:48,480 So the, the gentleman that ended up working with Monte Maldine, shout out to 122 00:06:48,480 --> 00:06:52,400 him from Keller Williams, who's become one of my great friends in life. 123 00:06:52,400 --> 00:06:56,360 He understood the value of being there for us along the process and helping us 124 00:06:56,360 --> 00:06:57,880 understand what we didn't understand. 125 00:06:57,880 --> 00:07:04,800 So, like you said, rather than going to a shark tank style situation where it's 126 00:07:04,800 --> 00:07:10,200 rushed and hasty, and they're only picking out the ones who are already perfectly 127 00:07:10,200 --> 00:07:14,360 qualified, so to speak, it sounds like you've set up a system where people can 128 00:07:14,360 --> 00:07:19,880 come in and learn about the exit process prior to the rush. 129 00:07:19,880 --> 00:07:24,080 And kind of get themselves ready so that they can sell their business for as much 130 00:07:24,080 --> 00:07:28,320 as possible while, while having a little bit more control and calm in the process. 131 00:07:28,320 --> 00:07:29,080 Did I get that right? 132 00:07:29,400 --> 00:07:30,160 Absolutely. 133 00:07:30,200 --> 00:07:30,720 Yep. 134 00:07:31,080 --> 00:07:31,600 Okay, man. 135 00:07:31,920 --> 00:07:34,240 Well, let's, let's dive into some of those aspects. 136 00:07:34,240 --> 00:07:35,680 I read some of it on your LinkedIn. 137 00:07:35,720 --> 00:07:39,200 If anybody wants to reach out to Alan via LinkedIn and connect with them there, of 138 00:07:39,200 --> 00:07:43,640 course, and your about section, it talked about establishing a realistic valuation 139 00:07:43,640 --> 00:07:47,320 for your business, evaluating deal structures that can get funded in today's 140 00:07:47,320 --> 00:07:51,560 lending environment and pitching the deal to people that you're connected to and 141 00:07:51,560 --> 00:07:54,880 some other aspects, but walk me through a little bit of the process. 142 00:07:54,880 --> 00:08:00,800 If I were interested in selling my business in the future, when is the ideal 143 00:08:00,800 --> 00:08:02,840 time to talk to you? 144 00:08:02,880 --> 00:08:05,440 What should I have prepared on my end? 145 00:08:06,000 --> 00:08:07,720 And yeah, where do we go? 146 00:08:08,280 --> 00:08:12,920 So the ideal thing to do, and a lot of people don't do this, they wake up one 147 00:08:12,920 --> 00:08:15,880 day and then they decide they're going to sell their business, and they're like, 148 00:08:15,880 --> 00:08:18,360 decide they're going to sell their business, but they have been thinking 149 00:08:18,360 --> 00:08:19,480 about it for three years. 150 00:08:19,880 --> 00:08:22,040 Don't contact me the day you decide to sell. 151 00:08:22,280 --> 00:08:26,080 Contact me the three years before when you're thinking about selling. 152 00:08:26,600 --> 00:08:27,520 Huge difference. 153 00:08:27,560 --> 00:08:29,280 Most people don't do that. 154 00:08:29,520 --> 00:08:31,120 So that's, that's one of the first things. 155 00:08:31,400 --> 00:08:34,240 And in terms of the things that you need to understand in terms of selling your 156 00:08:34,240 --> 00:08:37,880 business, it is so important for you to have a realistic valuation. 157 00:08:38,280 --> 00:08:41,760 And a lot of people say, well, my business does a million dollars a year. 158 00:08:41,840 --> 00:08:43,240 It's worth in revenue. 159 00:08:43,240 --> 00:08:46,680 I'll be mentioning that in revenue, they think it's worth a million dollars. 160 00:08:47,120 --> 00:08:48,080 That is not true. 161 00:08:48,440 --> 00:08:52,120 Your, your valuation is going to be based on your profits. 162 00:08:52,240 --> 00:08:56,680 So if you do a hundred thousand dollars a year in profits on that million dollar 163 00:08:56,680 --> 00:09:00,440 business, theoretically, you're going to get a three X multiple, which means we 164 00:09:00,440 --> 00:09:04,880 just multiply a hundred thousand dollars, your profits by three, and that's what 165 00:09:04,880 --> 00:09:06,120 your business is actually worth. 166 00:09:06,120 --> 00:09:09,840 Now, of course, this is some people want to say, well, that's doesn't work for me. 167 00:09:09,840 --> 00:09:14,680 Look, that's just the numbers we're coming up with now, theoretically, as an example. 168 00:09:14,680 --> 00:09:15,800 That's kind of what that looks like. 169 00:09:15,840 --> 00:09:17,160 That's one of the first things we do. 170 00:09:18,200 --> 00:09:22,280 And because people, and this, this is a lot of the reasons why businesses don't 171 00:09:22,280 --> 00:09:25,760 sell because people don't understand this and they're not, they're not educated, 172 00:09:25,760 --> 00:09:28,720 which is why I'm working on a lot of different things to make that happen as well. 173 00:09:29,760 --> 00:09:30,560 Of course. 174 00:09:30,880 --> 00:09:34,880 You know, and I see a lot of business owners out there who, they don't look, 175 00:09:34,920 --> 00:09:37,040 they're not comfortable with profit and loss statements. 176 00:09:37,120 --> 00:09:38,960 They're not comfortable with income statements. 177 00:09:39,000 --> 00:09:39,480 Yep. 178 00:09:39,480 --> 00:09:44,600 You know, this probably seems like not only foreign territory, but the 179 00:09:44,600 --> 00:09:47,680 territory beyond the foreign territory. 180 00:09:48,080 --> 00:09:51,640 So I would think maybe you already have one. 181 00:09:51,640 --> 00:09:55,960 I would think that a new analogy is in store to help business owners get 182 00:09:55,960 --> 00:10:01,920 comfortable with the idea of, of exploring the unknown behind the unknown. 183 00:10:02,520 --> 00:10:06,360 But how do you, how do you help people get comfortable with the idea of 184 00:10:06,360 --> 00:10:07,760 establishing these numbers, Alan? 185 00:10:07,760 --> 00:10:11,360 So what I have people do, usually some people have an account and some don't. 186 00:10:11,560 --> 00:10:14,000 I prefer that you do so that I could just talk to them and you don't 187 00:10:14,000 --> 00:10:15,880 have to be as involved with it. 188 00:10:15,880 --> 00:10:17,120 That's the easiest way to do it. 189 00:10:17,440 --> 00:10:21,440 But ideally, if you, if you're running all your numbers on the back of a napkin 190 00:10:21,440 --> 00:10:26,840 or in like a notebook or a legal pad, I can't really help you because I'm not 191 00:10:26,840 --> 00:10:30,320 going to go through all that to try to fix it up and then like, that's a job 192 00:10:30,320 --> 00:10:33,720 for me just to even try to like understand what your business is worth. 193 00:10:33,920 --> 00:10:37,400 So it's very important that you at least have quick books on it. 194 00:10:37,400 --> 00:10:40,480 I'm not going to tell you that you have to have quick books or Microsoft money 195 00:10:40,480 --> 00:10:45,160 or whatever you use something, and you don't necessarily have to know, you 196 00:10:45,160 --> 00:10:48,080 know, how to run everything with your income statements and your profit and 197 00:10:48,080 --> 00:10:51,520 loss statements and all that stuff, but you need to have them available when 198 00:10:51,520 --> 00:10:54,920 someone like me, whether it be an on the exit planning side where I'm talking 199 00:10:54,920 --> 00:10:57,040 about you helping you exit your business. 200 00:10:57,280 --> 00:11:00,960 Or if I'm the buyer where I'm thinking about buying your business, the things 201 00:11:00,960 --> 00:11:04,320 that you need to have in place, I want to tell this to everybody very bluntly 202 00:11:04,320 --> 00:11:07,560 that you absolutely have to have your profit and loss, well, I'm sorry, income 203 00:11:07,560 --> 00:11:08,640 statements and balance sheets. 204 00:11:08,640 --> 00:11:09,920 You absolutely have to have. 205 00:11:10,280 --> 00:11:10,680 Right. 206 00:11:10,680 --> 00:11:13,160 So income statement and P and L it's, it's the same thing. 207 00:11:13,440 --> 00:11:15,760 Your balance sheet, you absolutely have to have that. 208 00:11:15,760 --> 00:11:19,240 Those are the first two things you need to talk to me or an M and A person 209 00:11:19,240 --> 00:11:21,000 or whatever, you absolutely have to have that. 210 00:11:21,240 --> 00:11:24,600 The next thing you would like to have is your cashflow statement. 211 00:11:24,920 --> 00:11:27,920 Then you want to have three years of tax returns and you want to have 212 00:11:27,920 --> 00:11:29,240 your business bank account stuff. 213 00:11:29,480 --> 00:11:33,920 If you've got all that stuff neatly put together, 90% of business owners don't, 214 00:11:33,920 --> 00:11:38,120 but I want to talk to you about what you need to do in terms of you selling 215 00:11:38,120 --> 00:11:41,800 your business or passing it on, or even getting it evaluated for a different 216 00:11:41,800 --> 00:11:42,040 reason. 217 00:11:42,040 --> 00:11:43,320 You may be going through a divorce. 218 00:11:43,800 --> 00:11:46,840 You may be thinking about selling off a portion of your business. 219 00:11:47,160 --> 00:11:48,920 You need to have all these things put together. 220 00:11:48,960 --> 00:11:51,280 Most people unfortunately don't. 221 00:11:52,160 --> 00:11:52,680 Okay. 222 00:11:53,240 --> 00:11:53,840 All right. 223 00:11:55,000 --> 00:12:00,760 So there's, there's lots of different ways to, to create the 224 00:12:00,760 --> 00:12:02,200 valuation for your business. 225 00:12:02,240 --> 00:12:03,120 There's different theories. 226 00:12:03,120 --> 00:12:06,200 One of them, the other one I look at though on the, on the flip side 227 00:12:06,200 --> 00:12:11,600 as a startup guy is Facebook acquired a small company called Instagram, right? 228 00:12:11,640 --> 00:12:14,520 Their acquisition was a $1 billion acquisition. 229 00:12:16,360 --> 00:12:23,240 They were not, they were not doing 350 million in profit, you know, at the, at 230 00:12:23,240 --> 00:12:24,320 the time of that acquisition. 231 00:12:24,320 --> 00:12:30,280 So how do you make space for acquisitions of that magnitude with the theories that 232 00:12:30,280 --> 00:12:34,960 you're also bringing to small businesses and how do these processes harmonize? 233 00:12:35,600 --> 00:12:39,400 So the larger the business, the larger the multiple, we're usually looking at my, 234 00:12:39,440 --> 00:12:43,400 my team and I, we're usually looking at businesses from $2 million in revenue to 235 00:12:43,400 --> 00:12:44,840 about $10 million in revenue. 236 00:12:45,240 --> 00:12:48,760 And although Facebook didn't buy Instagram for three X, I'm sure they bought 237 00:12:48,760 --> 00:12:49,920 it for a lot more than that. 238 00:12:50,400 --> 00:12:52,480 There was, there's a specific type of buyer. 239 00:12:52,480 --> 00:12:54,000 They were a strategic buyer. 240 00:12:54,360 --> 00:12:57,440 So they bought it knowing what they'd be able to do with it. 241 00:12:57,440 --> 00:13:00,960 And that's the reason they gave it the valuation they did because they knew they 242 00:13:00,960 --> 00:13:02,400 could take, okay, it's a billion. 243 00:13:02,600 --> 00:13:03,960 We can push this to a hundred. 244 00:13:04,640 --> 00:13:05,280 That's perfect. 245 00:13:05,320 --> 00:13:07,040 That's, that's why they bought it like that. 246 00:13:07,320 --> 00:13:09,520 And that kind of brings me to this other part of this. 247 00:13:09,800 --> 00:13:11,640 There are different types of buyers. 248 00:13:11,920 --> 00:13:15,440 So you have a strategic buyer, kind of like Facebook and Instagram, then you've 249 00:13:15,440 --> 00:13:17,120 got PE firms, private equity. 250 00:13:17,120 --> 00:13:18,360 Everybody's heard of those. 251 00:13:18,640 --> 00:13:20,160 Then you've got competitors, right? 252 00:13:20,160 --> 00:13:25,040 So let's just say you have a landscaping company or an HVAC company and you're in 253 00:13:25,040 --> 00:13:29,360 Baltimore, Maryland, but somebody in DC wants to buy your business because they 254 00:13:29,360 --> 00:13:31,320 want to have a footprint in your area. 255 00:13:31,320 --> 00:13:33,040 That's a comp, that's a competitor. 256 00:13:33,400 --> 00:13:34,560 They would buy your business as well. 257 00:13:35,440 --> 00:13:35,920 Exactly. 258 00:13:35,920 --> 00:13:39,080 Then you have other people like myself that are entrepreneurs. 259 00:13:39,360 --> 00:13:42,400 We come in and we're very flexible with how we deal with the business. 260 00:13:42,400 --> 00:13:45,960 Because if you think about it, a competitor is probably not going to keep 261 00:13:45,960 --> 00:13:50,240 your employees in place, neither is a PE firm and probably neither is a strategic 262 00:13:50,240 --> 00:13:53,840 buyer, but as an entrepreneur, that's going to be flexible and is really trying 263 00:13:53,840 --> 00:13:57,120 to help you preserve your legacy and create a legacy. 264 00:13:57,400 --> 00:14:00,440 We're going to look at things like, do you want to keep the name of the business? 265 00:14:00,720 --> 00:14:02,560 Do you want to keep your employees in place? 266 00:14:03,160 --> 00:14:06,680 How flexible do you want to be with the payments for us to buy this business? 267 00:14:06,680 --> 00:14:08,360 Do you want them to be monthly? 268 00:14:08,360 --> 00:14:09,640 Do you want them to be quarterly? 269 00:14:09,640 --> 00:14:11,440 Do you want them to be all in one shot? 270 00:14:11,760 --> 00:14:15,160 Very, very rare, by the way, doesn't happen very often, but those are the 271 00:14:15,160 --> 00:14:18,440 things that we can be flexible with as acquisition entrepreneurs. 272 00:14:20,400 --> 00:14:20,920 Definitely. 273 00:14:20,920 --> 00:14:27,920 So part of your process is the education component of understanding what your 274 00:14:27,920 --> 00:14:29,320 business is worth and valued at. 275 00:14:29,320 --> 00:14:33,600 I would again, add for anybody who's listening to this, I think Alan would 276 00:14:33,600 --> 00:14:38,040 support this, make sure that you're getting opinions from multiple perspectives 277 00:14:38,600 --> 00:14:39,480 in the process. 278 00:14:40,760 --> 00:14:45,160 And it's also helpful to be aware of as well, what types of businesses 279 00:14:45,640 --> 00:14:47,400 Alan prefers to work with. 280 00:14:47,400 --> 00:14:50,720 You mentioned a threshold from 2 million to 6 million. 281 00:14:50,720 --> 00:14:51,400 Was that accurate? 282 00:14:51,400 --> 00:14:52,240 Did I get that right? 283 00:14:52,600 --> 00:14:53,280 Two to 10. 284 00:14:53,760 --> 00:14:54,560 Two to 10 million. 285 00:14:54,560 --> 00:14:55,040 Okay. 286 00:14:55,040 --> 00:14:58,800 So if you've got a business that's producing revenues or profits from 2 287 00:14:58,800 --> 00:15:03,240 million to 10 million revenue, revenue to two from 2 million to 10 million. 288 00:15:04,080 --> 00:15:10,400 And you've learned about these different types of people who buy 289 00:15:10,400 --> 00:15:15,200 businesses, then you definitely want to consider talking to him about his 290 00:15:15,200 --> 00:15:19,960 strategies and again, make sure to evaluate multiple firms who can help 291 00:15:19,960 --> 00:15:21,160 you with this process. 292 00:15:22,040 --> 00:15:23,960 Let's look at some of the other things that you're helping with. 293 00:15:23,960 --> 00:15:27,640 This is pitch your deal to your consortium of qualified acquisition 294 00:15:27,640 --> 00:15:32,600 entrepreneurs that will be a safe pair of hands to guide your enterprise. 295 00:15:32,840 --> 00:15:36,360 So what does that mean to come when I come to you, Alan, I have the 296 00:15:36,360 --> 00:15:41,800 opportunity to pitch the deal to a consortium of acquisition entrepreneurs 297 00:15:41,800 --> 00:15:42,760 who are going to guide me. 298 00:15:43,320 --> 00:15:43,920 Tell me about that. 299 00:15:43,920 --> 00:15:45,240 What is that? 300 00:15:45,240 --> 00:15:48,040 So the way that that works is we're going to go back to the valuation. 301 00:15:48,040 --> 00:15:50,520 So the first thing I'm going to need from you is your income statement 302 00:15:50,520 --> 00:15:51,320 and your balance sheet. 303 00:15:51,720 --> 00:15:55,320 I'm going to run them through a calculator and give you evaluation of, 304 00:15:55,560 --> 00:15:57,920 and this is where I think I'm a little bit different than like a business 305 00:15:57,920 --> 00:15:59,240 broker or some of these other guys. 306 00:15:59,640 --> 00:16:04,200 We give you evaluation based on what we would buy the business at today. 307 00:16:04,680 --> 00:16:05,000 So, right. 308 00:16:05,000 --> 00:16:08,840 It's this realistic thing, not like, and I don't want to say made up, but kind 309 00:16:08,840 --> 00:16:10,800 of different, right? 310 00:16:10,800 --> 00:16:13,960 We give you evaluation based on what we would buy the business at today. 311 00:16:13,960 --> 00:16:16,120 And we're going to give you at least two offers. 312 00:16:16,320 --> 00:16:20,160 One of them is going to be fun versus what, what do you normally see happen 313 00:16:20,480 --> 00:16:23,680 instead of it being, instead of it being based on buying it today, what do you 314 00:16:23,680 --> 00:16:24,960 normally see happen in the market? 315 00:16:25,760 --> 00:16:29,280 Well, a lot of people, brokers, they give you like an opinion, right? 316 00:16:29,280 --> 00:16:33,240 So they just say like, okay, well, we think it's worth this much when we're 317 00:16:33,240 --> 00:16:34,880 running them through our calculator. 318 00:16:35,120 --> 00:16:38,320 I'm specifically coming back to you with the intention of buying your 319 00:16:38,320 --> 00:16:40,760 business at this price today. 320 00:16:41,000 --> 00:16:44,360 Most brokers, most other people are not, they're not giving it that level. 321 00:16:44,360 --> 00:16:47,320 They're just saying, okay, well, based on this and based on this, this is 322 00:16:47,320 --> 00:16:48,600 what we think it's worth. 323 00:16:48,960 --> 00:16:51,400 You're doing a more thorough audit is what it sounds like. 324 00:16:51,720 --> 00:16:51,960 Okay. 325 00:16:51,960 --> 00:16:52,040 Yeah. 326 00:16:52,040 --> 00:16:57,400 There's this more thorough, but ours is very specific in the fact that we know 327 00:16:57,400 --> 00:17:00,160 what we would buy the business at today based on some of the things we talked 328 00:17:00,160 --> 00:17:04,080 about, so we don't just need your P and L and your balance sheet. 329 00:17:04,360 --> 00:17:07,480 We also want to know a SWOT analysis, a basic SWOT analysis. 330 00:17:07,480 --> 00:17:10,080 Strength, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. 331 00:17:10,560 --> 00:17:15,240 How you bring in customers, what kind of revenue you have, is any of it recurring? 332 00:17:15,480 --> 00:17:18,640 What kind of team do you have in place and all those things, those things. 333 00:17:18,640 --> 00:17:21,840 And although it doesn't take us long to run these numbers, we can run these 334 00:17:21,840 --> 00:17:25,600 numbers in two days, maybe three days and get it back to you as soon as possible. 335 00:17:25,920 --> 00:17:28,120 But going back to the pitch part, we're talking about the pitch. 336 00:17:28,320 --> 00:17:31,920 So the first part is that I want to review your numbers and put them 337 00:17:31,920 --> 00:17:34,440 through this calculator to let you know what we buy it at. 338 00:17:34,840 --> 00:17:36,920 Then I'm going to take it to, I've got a couple of things that I want to 339 00:17:36,920 --> 00:17:40,560 take it to, I've got 600 people that are in this group that know me very well. 340 00:17:40,560 --> 00:17:41,760 I'm one of the leaders of this group. 341 00:17:42,120 --> 00:17:44,000 And I say, guys, I've got this deal. 342 00:17:44,120 --> 00:17:45,200 Here's what it looks like. 343 00:17:45,440 --> 00:17:48,080 Who's interested in potentially working with me on this deal? 344 00:17:48,440 --> 00:17:49,960 A couple of people will raise their hand. 345 00:17:50,240 --> 00:17:53,480 We'll get on another call with the seller, which I've actually just did one 346 00:17:53,480 --> 00:17:57,080 of these not too long ago, three weeks ago, and then we'll talk about, okay, 347 00:17:57,280 --> 00:17:58,560 here's what we think it's worth. 348 00:17:58,560 --> 00:18:01,440 And if this doesn't happen as fast as I'm talking about it, usually we 349 00:18:01,440 --> 00:18:02,440 have to build some rapport. 350 00:18:02,440 --> 00:18:06,440 I'm just giving you the Cliff Notes version of it, but we'll talk through it. 351 00:18:06,440 --> 00:18:09,760 And we say, okay, well, based on this, we think it's worth this. 352 00:18:09,960 --> 00:18:12,280 Here's one way we could structure the deal this way. 353 00:18:12,520 --> 00:18:14,640 And here's another way we could structure the deal this way. 354 00:18:14,880 --> 00:18:16,400 Which one of these do you like better? 355 00:18:16,400 --> 00:18:20,200 We give them the either or, and most people are going to pick one, but some 356 00:18:20,200 --> 00:18:22,640 people are going to kind of push back a little and say, Hey, I think it's 357 00:18:22,640 --> 00:18:24,120 worth a little more this. 358 00:18:24,120 --> 00:18:27,080 And then that's when we kind of go through the whole negotiation process. 359 00:18:27,280 --> 00:18:28,560 But that's what it looks like in a nutshell. 360 00:18:29,280 --> 00:18:29,760 Okay. 361 00:18:30,200 --> 00:18:30,680 Gotcha. 362 00:18:30,680 --> 00:18:35,600 So they, they go through that process with the acquisition entrepreneurs. 363 00:18:35,600 --> 00:18:39,240 Um, are these the people that are going to potentially buy the business from 364 00:18:39,240 --> 00:18:41,880 them or are these just further guidance counselors? 365 00:18:42,440 --> 00:18:42,720 Right. 366 00:18:42,720 --> 00:18:46,120 So I, I serve as kind of like the front man and the pitch man. 367 00:18:46,400 --> 00:18:49,280 And I bring the deals to the people that have more experience in 368 00:18:49,280 --> 00:18:50,560 buying businesses than I do. 369 00:18:50,800 --> 00:18:55,120 So all these guys that I'd be and girls that I'd be potentially bringing to you 370 00:18:55,120 --> 00:18:58,760 that want to buy your business have bought multiple businesses in the past. 371 00:18:59,640 --> 00:19:00,120 Okay. 372 00:19:00,520 --> 00:19:00,960 Awesome. 373 00:19:00,960 --> 00:19:03,080 So it's kind of like a mini shark tank. 374 00:19:03,240 --> 00:19:04,640 Um, we're just not on TV. 375 00:19:04,640 --> 00:19:05,040 Yep. 376 00:19:05,960 --> 00:19:06,560 Okay. 377 00:19:06,880 --> 00:19:07,440 Interesting. 378 00:19:07,440 --> 00:19:11,120 And so you're, you're like preparing people for their shark takings, 379 00:19:11,200 --> 00:19:12,880 shark tank experience. 380 00:19:13,280 --> 00:19:13,600 Yep. 381 00:19:14,400 --> 00:19:14,880 Okay. 382 00:19:14,960 --> 00:19:15,600 I got you. 383 00:19:15,600 --> 00:19:19,280 Um, so what types of businesses do you prefer to work with Alan? 384 00:19:20,000 --> 00:19:23,520 Well, because I have a digital marketing background, I actually prefer digital 385 00:19:23,520 --> 00:19:25,920 marketing agencies and e-comm stores. 386 00:19:26,160 --> 00:19:28,880 And I'll tell you two quick stories about deals that I'm actually currently 387 00:19:28,880 --> 00:19:30,400 working on a young lady. 388 00:19:30,400 --> 00:19:33,200 I sent a LinkedIn direct message to in April. 389 00:19:33,200 --> 00:19:37,040 Contacted me back in July and said, Hey, can we have a talk? 390 00:19:37,280 --> 00:19:38,320 So I sat with her. 391 00:19:38,320 --> 00:19:39,120 I talked to her. 392 00:19:39,120 --> 00:19:43,920 She was on for about 45 minutes and she is very interested in selling her business. 393 00:19:43,920 --> 00:19:45,280 So she's motivated. 394 00:19:45,280 --> 00:19:48,880 We're always looking for someone who's motivated to sell like in real estate, 395 00:19:48,880 --> 00:19:49,760 the same kind of thing. 396 00:19:50,000 --> 00:19:51,280 And she's motivated to sell. 397 00:19:51,280 --> 00:19:52,240 She's got her reason. 398 00:19:52,240 --> 00:19:53,120 She's got her team. 399 00:19:53,120 --> 00:19:54,320 She's got everything in place. 400 00:19:54,560 --> 00:19:57,680 And I'm like, okay, well, this isn't really an exit planning engagement 401 00:19:57,680 --> 00:20:01,360 because you want to sell your business when in the next 18 months. 402 00:20:01,360 --> 00:20:03,680 She's like, yeah, but I want to exit in this way. 403 00:20:03,680 --> 00:20:07,520 That's not like you're going to buy my business today and I'm going tomorrow. 404 00:20:07,680 --> 00:20:10,720 I want to be involved for the next 18 months during this transition. 405 00:20:11,040 --> 00:20:12,240 So we're talking about that. 406 00:20:12,240 --> 00:20:13,280 I talked to her about that. 407 00:20:13,520 --> 00:20:18,080 I brought in one partner and we had great before we talked again about certain 408 00:20:18,080 --> 00:20:19,600 things that we need to talk about that. 409 00:20:19,600 --> 00:20:21,040 I brought in another partner. 410 00:20:21,040 --> 00:20:24,320 So now there's three partners, two partners and myself in this deal. 411 00:20:24,560 --> 00:20:26,000 And we're going back and forth with her. 412 00:20:26,000 --> 00:20:28,560 Now we got our P and L, we got our balance sheet. 413 00:20:28,560 --> 00:20:31,120 We're going through itemized things now. 414 00:20:31,120 --> 00:20:33,120 So we want to know about her owner's compensation. 415 00:20:33,120 --> 00:20:35,120 We want to know about her revenue by month. 416 00:20:35,120 --> 00:20:37,760 We want to know what she pays her teams and all this stuff. 417 00:20:37,760 --> 00:20:40,000 So this stuff is all coming together like in real time. 418 00:20:40,000 --> 00:20:43,520 So probably I'll have another meeting with her in the next week or two. 419 00:20:43,520 --> 00:20:46,080 So that's one deal, digital marketing agencies. 420 00:20:46,320 --> 00:20:48,240 The other one is e-comm stores. 421 00:20:48,560 --> 00:20:52,480 Now what's interesting about this is that I'm, I post on Facebook and LinkedIn. 422 00:20:52,480 --> 00:20:53,520 So people reach out to me. 423 00:20:53,520 --> 00:20:55,520 I don't have to do a lot of outbound. 424 00:20:55,520 --> 00:20:57,200 More people started to come to me now. 425 00:20:57,200 --> 00:20:59,520 Especially with me doing podcasts and stuff like that. 426 00:20:59,760 --> 00:21:03,760 So a gentleman came to me and said, Hey, Alan, do you want to buy an e-comm store? 427 00:21:04,000 --> 00:21:06,160 I said, well, that's not really our business. 428 00:21:06,160 --> 00:21:08,480 We really want to get into the business. 429 00:21:08,720 --> 00:21:11,280 And if I was going to buy an e-comm store, I don't want one. 430 00:21:11,280 --> 00:21:12,800 I want 10, 20, 40. 431 00:21:13,040 --> 00:21:14,560 That immediately piqued his interest. 432 00:21:14,560 --> 00:21:16,000 He's like, wait, you want to buy that many? 433 00:21:16,000 --> 00:21:17,360 I'm like, yeah, let's talk about it. 434 00:21:17,600 --> 00:21:18,960 So he got on the phone with me. 435 00:21:19,200 --> 00:21:19,920 He vetted me. 436 00:21:19,920 --> 00:21:20,720 I vetted him. 437 00:21:21,440 --> 00:21:24,480 And we said, okay, this is what you want to do with your business. 438 00:21:24,480 --> 00:21:29,040 You want to take your business to a higher level, not with you just being able to sell 439 00:21:29,040 --> 00:21:30,720 one e-comm store to one customer. 440 00:21:30,880 --> 00:21:34,800 You want to make this thing into something that's large and has a really good ecosystem. 441 00:21:35,040 --> 00:21:36,160 And he's like, yeah. 442 00:21:36,400 --> 00:21:40,800 I said, well, the first thing you're going to need to do is to acquire your supply chain up and down. 443 00:21:40,800 --> 00:21:44,160 You need your distributors, you need your warehouse, you need transportation and all that stuff. 444 00:21:44,400 --> 00:21:45,920 And he's like, yeah, we thought of that. 445 00:21:46,160 --> 00:21:47,840 That's not really our expertise. 446 00:21:48,000 --> 00:21:49,120 We need some help with that. 447 00:21:49,440 --> 00:21:50,880 I said, okay, no problem. 448 00:21:51,120 --> 00:21:52,160 So I brought in a partner. 449 00:21:52,160 --> 00:21:54,320 We start talking to them about that. 450 00:21:54,320 --> 00:21:56,000 We've been talking to probably about six weeks now. 451 00:21:56,000 --> 00:21:57,680 We have a weekly meeting that's ongoing. 452 00:21:57,920 --> 00:22:02,240 And now we're at the point where these guys are going to go to their suppliers and start 453 00:22:02,240 --> 00:22:07,360 finding out who they are and how much of their business is represented within those suppliers. 454 00:22:07,360 --> 00:22:11,520 So we have a leg to stand on when we go to acquire these suppliers. 455 00:22:11,840 --> 00:22:15,200 And now this is all overseas, by the way, this guy happens to be in Spain. 456 00:22:15,440 --> 00:22:20,320 And I'm talking to someone in my network who has phenomenal supply chain experience. 457 00:22:20,320 --> 00:22:23,440 And she's potentially going to be helping us with that because she's got boots on the 458 00:22:23,440 --> 00:22:24,480 ground over there. 459 00:22:24,480 --> 00:22:25,440 I'm over here. 460 00:22:25,440 --> 00:22:28,080 So I can't, I'm going to go over there, but I don't live over there. 461 00:22:28,320 --> 00:22:30,080 So that's another deal that's coming together. 462 00:22:30,080 --> 00:22:34,400 So to answer your question, the long and short of it is digital marketing and econ. 463 00:22:35,360 --> 00:22:36,800 Okay, interesting. 464 00:22:36,800 --> 00:22:42,880 So we've dove into a lot of areas of business and selling businesses. 465 00:22:43,680 --> 00:22:46,080 You know, the niche you you're going after. 466 00:22:46,080 --> 00:22:50,400 So let's bridge some of the gaps in this, these series of questions. 467 00:22:50,400 --> 00:22:55,440 So who should be listening today, Alan, why should they listen to you specifically? 468 00:22:56,160 --> 00:22:59,040 And what do you think they're going to get out of the rest of today show? 469 00:23:00,320 --> 00:23:05,760 So the people that should be listening are people that have a mindset toward the future 470 00:23:06,400 --> 00:23:10,560 are people that get into a business and realize they're not one of the people that say, 471 00:23:10,880 --> 00:23:12,480 I'm going to die at my desk. 472 00:23:12,480 --> 00:23:13,840 There are very few of those people. 473 00:23:13,840 --> 00:23:16,640 People tend to say that, but that's not really the truth. 474 00:23:16,960 --> 00:23:21,360 If you're an entrepreneur and you know that you're going to have, like, like most people 475 00:23:21,360 --> 00:23:23,040 have multiple jobs in this day and age, right? 476 00:23:23,040 --> 00:23:27,360 So if you're going to have a job that you stay at for five years or seven years or 10 477 00:23:27,360 --> 00:23:31,040 years, it's probably not longer than that, especially in 2023, you're probably going 478 00:23:31,040 --> 00:23:32,480 to do the same thing in your business. 479 00:23:32,480 --> 00:23:36,640 If you own a business today and you say, I'm not going to sell it. 480 00:23:36,640 --> 00:23:37,520 This is my baby. 481 00:23:37,520 --> 00:23:42,000 I want you to think twice about that, because that's not absolutely true. 482 00:23:42,000 --> 00:23:46,000 Unfortunately, you're going to have to exit that business for one of a couple of reasons, 483 00:23:46,320 --> 00:23:51,760 death, disease, divorce, disability, or you get bored and disillusioned or you have a 484 00:23:51,760 --> 00:23:52,560 partner dispute. 485 00:23:52,880 --> 00:23:57,200 Any of these reasons are could be reasons that you potentially exit your business. 486 00:23:57,440 --> 00:24:02,480 And it is so important for you to have things in place now so that if any of those tragedies 487 00:24:02,480 --> 00:24:05,120 may befall you, you're in place to do that. 488 00:24:05,120 --> 00:24:09,760 Those are the people that are think are forward thinking and understand that kind of thing. 489 00:24:09,760 --> 00:24:12,160 Those are the people who should listen. 490 00:24:12,160 --> 00:24:16,400 The reason why you should listen to me is because I consider myself a little bit of 491 00:24:16,400 --> 00:24:17,120 a unicorn. 492 00:24:17,680 --> 00:24:20,000 I am emergence and acquisitions guy. 493 00:24:20,000 --> 00:24:22,880 I'm an exit planner, and I'm also a marketer. 494 00:24:23,200 --> 00:24:25,760 Very few people have all three going on. 495 00:24:25,760 --> 00:24:28,080 I know a lot of people that are in M&A and marketing. 496 00:24:28,320 --> 00:24:32,160 I know a lot of people that are in M&A and exit planning, but I don't know anybody 497 00:24:32,160 --> 00:24:33,600 that's in all three. 498 00:24:33,600 --> 00:24:37,120 So the reason you should be listening to me is because one, I'm in all three. 499 00:24:37,120 --> 00:24:40,560 Two, I actually care because there's a process to this, guys. 500 00:24:40,560 --> 00:24:44,160 Like if you're going to think about selling your business, you want to work with somebody 501 00:24:44,160 --> 00:24:48,960 who is going to help you plan the exit, take you through the liquidity event, meaning that 502 00:24:48,960 --> 00:24:51,360 you asked somebody actually bought your business from you. 503 00:24:51,600 --> 00:24:55,680 And then the next part, which we haven't even talked about yet, Jackson, is wealth management. 504 00:24:56,000 --> 00:24:57,120 Think about this. 505 00:24:57,120 --> 00:25:02,560 If I help you plan your exit and that takes 24, 36 months, and then I actually take you 506 00:25:02,560 --> 00:25:06,240 to somebody who's going to buy your business for more than $20,000. 507 00:25:06,240 --> 00:25:10,240 That's for more than what we talked about originally three years ago, assuming that 508 00:25:10,240 --> 00:25:11,520 we talked three years ago. 509 00:25:11,520 --> 00:25:14,320 Your business is sold, let's just say it's sold for $10 million. 510 00:25:14,320 --> 00:25:20,880 If you get $10 million in your hand, chances are you may not do what you need to do with 511 00:25:20,880 --> 00:25:21,440 it. 512 00:25:21,440 --> 00:25:24,720 And if you don't have the proper tax planning in place, it's going to go, you're going to 513 00:25:24,720 --> 00:25:26,080 have half of that anyway. 514 00:25:26,080 --> 00:25:31,840 But the idea is that you get the planning first, the liquidity event, and the wealth 515 00:25:31,840 --> 00:25:36,800 management to take you toward the future, because as an M&A person, if you sell your 516 00:25:36,800 --> 00:25:40,080 business to me, I don't want you to just kind of like take your money and run. 517 00:25:40,080 --> 00:25:44,480 I would want you to potentially take some of that money and let me work it in another 518 00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:46,000 deal that I'm trying to work on. 519 00:25:46,000 --> 00:25:50,880 So this whole life cycle, this holistic, comprehensive thing is what I do. 520 00:25:50,880 --> 00:25:54,000 And it's like I said before, I actually care about this. 521 00:25:54,000 --> 00:25:55,040 I'm not a shark. 522 00:25:55,040 --> 00:25:57,360 I play with the sharks, but I'm not a shark. 523 00:25:57,360 --> 00:26:02,000 I want to help you actually create a legacy and preserve it so that you can do something 524 00:26:02,000 --> 00:26:06,560 significant for your family and your grandchildren's grandchildren know who you are. 525 00:26:07,600 --> 00:26:10,240 Let's talk about that for 15 seconds. 526 00:26:11,200 --> 00:26:12,800 What's your vision, Alan? 527 00:26:14,160 --> 00:26:22,800 My vision is every person that I help sell their business decides that they want to create 528 00:26:22,800 --> 00:26:26,000 a trust fund for their children and grandchildren. 529 00:26:26,000 --> 00:26:26,800 Interesting. 530 00:26:27,360 --> 00:26:28,560 So follow up question. 531 00:26:29,200 --> 00:26:30,720 Why is that important to you? 532 00:26:32,160 --> 00:26:32,720 Okay. 533 00:26:32,720 --> 00:26:39,760 So my mom passed last year in February and I love her dearly, but she worked 30 years 534 00:26:39,760 --> 00:26:47,280 at a job and was only able to leave $20,000 between myself, my sister and my brother. 535 00:26:48,160 --> 00:26:50,240 That's not something I want to happen to anybody. 536 00:26:50,240 --> 00:26:55,360 I'm not saying anything bad about people that work at a job, but if you have a business 537 00:26:55,360 --> 00:27:01,120 you have, there's something more to you if you have a business because you're serving. 538 00:27:01,120 --> 00:27:04,080 It's not like you just go to a job and collect the check and walk away. 539 00:27:04,080 --> 00:27:08,640 If you have a business you want to serve people and chances are you want to leave something 540 00:27:08,640 --> 00:27:10,240 more for your children. 541 00:27:11,360 --> 00:27:11,840 Right. 542 00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:13,040 Absolutely. 543 00:27:13,040 --> 00:27:19,520 So that makes sense from your own personal background, but why do you care about others? 544 00:27:20,800 --> 00:27:24,800 Well, this is interesting because every time I've tried to do something, 545 00:27:24,800 --> 00:27:28,160 selfishly, it never really worked out. 546 00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:29,360 And I've got to admit it. 547 00:27:29,360 --> 00:27:30,160 I'll give you that. 548 00:27:30,160 --> 00:27:32,960 At least you admit that you've done things selfishly, right? 549 00:27:32,960 --> 00:27:33,520 Yes. 550 00:27:33,520 --> 00:27:37,360 I've done a lot of things selfishly and they rarely work out. 551 00:27:37,360 --> 00:27:41,760 And I've got personal examples that I don't want to go through, but just in general, 552 00:27:41,760 --> 00:27:48,560 when I think about other people and I bring people in my vision and the universe, God 553 00:27:48,560 --> 00:27:51,680 or whatever you want to call it, gives me more energy to do it. 554 00:27:51,680 --> 00:27:55,040 Because if I'm just doing it for me, it doesn't matter that much. 555 00:27:55,040 --> 00:27:58,160 How much money does one person actually need? 556 00:27:58,160 --> 00:28:04,000 But if you're supporting a family or a community or a world, I wouldn't go that far, but just 557 00:28:04,000 --> 00:28:09,200 going out there, you have more energy to do more because then that's why you're going 558 00:28:09,200 --> 00:28:12,720 to be able to do more because you have that energy to do and it's given to you from the 559 00:28:12,720 --> 00:28:13,200 universe. 560 00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:14,160 Nice. 561 00:28:14,160 --> 00:28:15,200 I love that. 562 00:28:15,200 --> 00:28:15,680 That's fair. 563 00:28:16,800 --> 00:28:18,720 So let's talk about powerful lessons. 564 00:28:18,720 --> 00:28:22,640 What powerful lesson can other visionaries learn from your experience, your personal 565 00:28:22,640 --> 00:28:23,280 experience? 566 00:28:23,280 --> 00:28:25,520 Oh, my personal experience. 567 00:28:25,520 --> 00:28:32,080 So although I left my job in 2008 and became a digital marketing consultant, I wouldn't 568 00:28:32,080 --> 00:28:38,000 advise that for everyone because it doesn't work for everybody that way, right? 569 00:28:38,000 --> 00:28:40,880 I had an entrepreneurial spirit from when I was very young. 570 00:28:40,880 --> 00:28:46,240 And that's not to say that I didn't have my struggles from 2008 to 2011 because between 571 00:28:46,240 --> 00:28:50,560 2008 and 2011, I bought every course I could buy. 572 00:28:50,560 --> 00:28:53,040 I had no money. 573 00:28:53,040 --> 00:28:55,040 I ran out of all my credit cards. 574 00:28:55,040 --> 00:28:57,040 I slept on other friends' couches. 575 00:28:57,040 --> 00:28:59,040 It was really bad for a time. 576 00:28:59,040 --> 00:29:04,720 And if you don't have the strength to allow yourself to go through something that's that 577 00:29:04,720 --> 00:29:09,680 hurtful, because it can be, then you're probably going to have a tough time really being an 578 00:29:09,680 --> 00:29:10,240 entrepreneur. 579 00:29:10,240 --> 00:29:14,560 And you should listen to someone like myself who's been through some of the hard times 580 00:29:14,560 --> 00:29:17,360 and, yes, as an entrepreneur, you fail. 581 00:29:17,360 --> 00:29:19,360 You're going to fail. 582 00:29:19,360 --> 00:29:21,360 And if you don't fail, you didn't really try. 583 00:29:21,360 --> 00:29:25,120 So listening to someone who just only tells you about the good things and under the bad 584 00:29:25,120 --> 00:29:27,760 things, those probably aren't the right people. 585 00:29:27,760 --> 00:29:28,560 Interesting. 586 00:29:28,560 --> 00:29:33,760 So who are some of these mentors then who shared some of the bad things with you? 587 00:29:33,760 --> 00:29:36,960 I mean, are some of the ones that seem to be more transparent in the market? 588 00:29:36,960 --> 00:29:37,360 Right. 589 00:29:37,360 --> 00:29:41,200 So the people that I'm working with now, I can give you a couple of names right off the 590 00:29:41,200 --> 00:29:46,560 back, Carl Allen and Roland Fraser are my two top mentors in the mergers and acquisitions 591 00:29:46,560 --> 00:29:46,960 space. 592 00:29:46,960 --> 00:29:51,760 I also listen a lot to Cody Sanchez because she puts out a ton of content. 593 00:29:51,760 --> 00:29:54,560 And I listen to Alex Hormozzi as well. 594 00:29:54,560 --> 00:29:55,760 So those four people. 595 00:29:55,760 --> 00:29:59,760 Now, I'm not in Cody's or Alex's courses. 596 00:29:59,760 --> 00:30:03,760 I'm actually in the mastermind with Roland Fraser and Carl Allen. 597 00:30:03,760 --> 00:30:06,160 Like, I paid my money to get into these things. 598 00:30:06,160 --> 00:30:10,960 And when I tell you that, I have acquisition entrepreneurs who can help me with my work, 599 00:30:10,960 --> 00:30:16,880 who could potentially buy your business, I can send out a link or a chat or whatever 600 00:30:16,880 --> 00:30:18,800 in both of those communities. 601 00:30:18,800 --> 00:30:21,840 And I say, I've got a deal that has this, this, this, and this. 602 00:30:21,840 --> 00:30:24,800 I got the P&L. I got the incomes. 603 00:30:24,800 --> 00:30:25,760 I got the balance sheet. 604 00:30:25,760 --> 00:30:27,280 I ran it through my calculator. 605 00:30:27,280 --> 00:30:29,200 Who wants to work with me on this deal? 606 00:30:29,200 --> 00:30:31,280 I said 500 or 600. 607 00:30:31,280 --> 00:30:32,960 That's just in Carl Allen's group. 608 00:30:32,960 --> 00:30:36,240 There's another thousand or so that are enrolled in Fraser's group. 609 00:30:36,240 --> 00:30:39,920 And because I'm doing these things like this, people tend to see me. 610 00:30:39,920 --> 00:30:41,920 So they're like, okay, Allen, you're the real deal. 611 00:30:41,920 --> 00:30:45,680 So those are the people that have worked the best for me. 612 00:30:45,680 --> 00:30:46,720 That's awesome, man. 613 00:30:46,720 --> 00:30:51,200 And to validate a lot of what you're talking about, like Alex Hermosy, for instance, 614 00:30:52,080 --> 00:30:57,040 you don't necessarily need to be in his group in order to extract the majority of the value 615 00:30:57,040 --> 00:31:00,160 that he puts out into the world, because he's a giver. 616 00:31:00,160 --> 00:31:04,400 He's constantly exposing more and more about what he does. 617 00:31:04,400 --> 00:31:09,440 And he may expose it all, but the value of purchasing 618 00:31:09,440 --> 00:31:13,440 and deciding to be in a group with an entrepreneur like that is you get the certainty, 619 00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:21,120 the security that you're being given the path from A to Z in a linear format. 620 00:31:21,760 --> 00:31:25,440 And you've done that now with, it sounds like with Carl Allen and Roland Fraser, 621 00:31:25,440 --> 00:31:27,920 is you have that path clearly there. 622 00:31:27,920 --> 00:31:30,640 You can call them or you can text them. 623 00:31:30,640 --> 00:31:34,160 You can hit their support email and find out what's going on. 624 00:31:34,160 --> 00:31:40,560 But also they have a vested interest in seeing you succeed because you're on the inner circle. 625 00:31:41,520 --> 00:31:44,240 So, and at the same time, these circles expand. 626 00:31:44,240 --> 00:31:47,680 We got micro circles and we've got macro circles. 627 00:31:47,680 --> 00:31:50,640 We got circles that are larger, circles that are more intimate. 628 00:31:52,080 --> 00:31:56,640 And each one of us is building that, well, it's really called a sphere of influence. 629 00:31:57,600 --> 00:32:00,960 So you've got your sphere of influence building as well, which is pretty awesome. 630 00:32:00,960 --> 00:32:04,960 And once somebody's in, I hadn't thought too much about that process of, 631 00:32:04,960 --> 00:32:11,440 okay, the person who sells with you, I didn't know that you were also helping them on the 632 00:32:11,440 --> 00:32:17,120 post acquisition phase of, hey, here's what you can do with that investment. 633 00:32:17,120 --> 00:32:20,240 But that's also why it's so important to have long-term friendships 634 00:32:20,960 --> 00:32:22,800 in these situations and to come in. 635 00:32:22,800 --> 00:32:27,360 So if you're wanting to get to know Allen, understand that the goal is not a quick win. 636 00:32:27,360 --> 00:32:34,160 It's to be able to take the law of abundance, the wealth, and allow it to compound upon itself 637 00:32:34,160 --> 00:32:36,080 as you continue to build a relationship together. 638 00:32:36,080 --> 00:32:40,400 So I'm glad you brought that forward as one of the main points. 639 00:32:40,400 --> 00:32:47,440 So how do you envision that building in the rest of 2023 and going into 2024? 640 00:32:48,240 --> 00:32:52,400 So the best thing about what I'm doing now is, like I told you before, most of these guys, 641 00:32:52,400 --> 00:32:55,200 they're behind the scenes kind of people. 642 00:32:55,200 --> 00:32:57,760 They're not really front-facing people that they don't like to be on podcasts. 643 00:32:57,760 --> 00:32:59,760 They don't like to do events and masterminds and stuff. 644 00:33:00,240 --> 00:33:05,680 And what's going to propel me to my vision, which is helping everybody else do what I talked about 645 00:33:05,680 --> 00:33:08,160 today, is being on these kinds of things. 646 00:33:08,160 --> 00:33:12,800 So I've got three events, three events next month that I'm going to. 647 00:33:12,800 --> 00:33:16,800 I believe one is a mixer here in Maryland. 648 00:33:17,120 --> 00:33:22,800 Another one is, oh, I'm going to Onyx thing, Onyx and Gall. 649 00:33:22,800 --> 00:33:24,000 He's got a thing coming up. 650 00:33:24,000 --> 00:33:25,600 So I'm going to his thing. 651 00:33:25,600 --> 00:33:30,640 And then I've got a Dealmaker Live event with Carl Allen's group at the end of September. 652 00:33:30,640 --> 00:33:35,040 So next month, I'm going to be at three different events, like physical in-person events, 653 00:33:35,040 --> 00:33:41,040 because a lot of people want to hide behind their computer and just kind of type and send out cold 654 00:33:41,040 --> 00:33:41,920 emails and all this stuff. 655 00:33:41,920 --> 00:33:43,680 And I've done that and that stuff works. 656 00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:49,520 But when you combine that with this content marketing, public speaking, podcasting, being 657 00:33:49,520 --> 00:33:53,920 on other people's events, your own events, now you're going to be able to do that. 658 00:33:53,920 --> 00:33:57,840 You've got this thing because now, like you said, the law of abundance, this circle goes 659 00:33:57,840 --> 00:34:01,120 from this to this really quickly. 660 00:34:01,680 --> 00:34:05,600 So that's what's going on with me for this year and all the next year as well. 661 00:34:05,600 --> 00:34:06,400 I love it. 662 00:34:06,400 --> 00:34:09,760 There's a huge psychology to in-person events. 663 00:34:09,760 --> 00:34:14,880 And it's not something that you need to dissect the psychology or the science of, but just 664 00:34:14,880 --> 00:34:15,840 to know it. 665 00:34:15,840 --> 00:34:19,760 If you're not going to in-person events and interacting with people, you're missing out 666 00:34:19,760 --> 00:34:22,880 on a massive cash flow opportunity. 667 00:34:22,880 --> 00:34:28,640 There's just something about people being primed and ready to transact when you're physically 668 00:34:28,640 --> 00:34:29,680 in their presence. 669 00:34:30,560 --> 00:34:34,560 And a lot of that has to do with knowing how to be prepared for those events, too, knowing 670 00:34:34,560 --> 00:34:35,920 how to be set up for those events. 671 00:34:35,920 --> 00:34:43,280 But they're fantastic opportunities to move your business forward in ways that are, I 672 00:34:43,280 --> 00:34:47,760 don't want to say limited online, but just not as natural online as they are when you're 673 00:34:47,760 --> 00:34:48,320 in person. 674 00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:50,160 So that's awesome. 675 00:34:50,160 --> 00:34:50,960 All right, cool. 676 00:34:50,960 --> 00:34:52,960 What else would you like to add today? 677 00:34:52,960 --> 00:34:59,120 Let me leave the floor open for you because there's a lot about mergers, acquisitions, 678 00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:00,960 selling businesses that we haven't covered. 679 00:35:00,960 --> 00:35:01,760 What do you want to cover? 680 00:35:02,320 --> 00:35:06,400 So the main thing I want to tell people is there's four steps to this thing. 681 00:35:06,400 --> 00:35:10,480 And I mean, yes, there are more, but I'm going to break this down for you as simple as possible. 682 00:35:10,480 --> 00:35:14,960 Steps number one is standard operating procedures. 683 00:35:15,680 --> 00:35:17,680 Everybody knows what they are. 684 00:35:17,680 --> 00:35:19,040 Some people have them. 685 00:35:19,040 --> 00:35:20,080 Some people don't. 686 00:35:20,080 --> 00:35:21,760 And some people are in the middle. 687 00:35:21,760 --> 00:35:24,960 If you're going to sell your business, think about this, guys. 688 00:35:24,960 --> 00:35:29,520 If I'm going to buy your business today and you're going to walk out the door tomorrow, 689 00:35:29,520 --> 00:35:32,400 very rare, but just work with me here. 690 00:35:32,400 --> 00:35:38,080 If I don't have a training manual, your business is going to get run into the ground, which 691 00:35:38,080 --> 00:35:38,800 nobody wants. 692 00:35:38,800 --> 00:35:43,120 Like I can't, there's no value to me and there's no value to you of me doing that. 693 00:35:43,120 --> 00:35:43,360 Right. 694 00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:46,480 So you've got to have standard operating procedures in place. 695 00:35:46,480 --> 00:35:52,240 The other thing about SOPs is that if your business is relying upon you, sad to say, 696 00:35:52,240 --> 00:35:55,040 you don't have a business, you've got a job. 697 00:35:55,600 --> 00:35:58,720 And a lot of people don't like to hear that, but that's the absolute truth. 698 00:35:58,720 --> 00:36:01,280 So step number one is your SOPs. 699 00:36:01,920 --> 00:36:04,800 Step number two is succession planning. 700 00:36:04,800 --> 00:36:10,000 Succession planning just simply means, well, if I take a vacation for two weeks, is my 701 00:36:10,000 --> 00:36:11,600 business going to burn to the ground? 702 00:36:11,600 --> 00:36:11,920 Right. 703 00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:14,000 So you don't want to have that happen. 704 00:36:14,000 --> 00:36:17,760 So you also want to have a number two or number three or a number four. 705 00:36:17,760 --> 00:36:22,560 You just want to have someone that can do what you do and they don't have to be you, 706 00:36:22,560 --> 00:36:25,120 but you can, so that you can just take some time off. 707 00:36:25,120 --> 00:36:30,000 Like so many people are stuck in their businesses and I ask people, I say, Hey, could you take 708 00:36:30,000 --> 00:36:34,480 a week or like, what would happen to your business if you took a week or two week vacation 709 00:36:34,480 --> 00:36:37,760 and didn't answer emails, phone calls, texts, or anything? 710 00:36:37,760 --> 00:36:41,200 A lot of people, 80% of people tell me my business will burn to the ground. 711 00:36:41,200 --> 00:36:43,200 And I'm like, that's not a good business. 712 00:36:43,200 --> 00:36:44,400 You don't want to have that. 713 00:36:44,400 --> 00:36:47,200 So standard operating procedures, succession planning. 714 00:36:47,200 --> 00:36:52,320 The other part to succession planning is if you decide to sell the business or when you 715 00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:56,800 decide to sell the business, most investors, myself, and all the other people that I've 716 00:36:56,800 --> 00:37:01,600 talked about acquisition entrepreneurs, we don't want to run your business day to day. 717 00:37:02,240 --> 00:37:06,160 So if you don't group a number two, number three, number four, or have a management team 718 00:37:06,160 --> 00:37:11,280 in place, that business has very little value to us because we're owner investors, not owner 719 00:37:11,280 --> 00:37:12,080 managers. 720 00:37:12,080 --> 00:37:17,360 We want to come in and help the business move, but we don't want to actually be responsible 721 00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:17,920 for running it. 722 00:37:17,920 --> 00:37:19,840 So that's the succession planning part. 723 00:37:19,840 --> 00:37:23,680 The third thing is what I kind of mentioned before business finances. 724 00:37:23,680 --> 00:37:28,160 I know a lot of businesses, they're co-mingling funds and they're using this business thing 725 00:37:28,160 --> 00:37:29,520 to pay this personal thing. 726 00:37:29,520 --> 00:37:32,400 And then they've got a car in the business, but it's not really the business. 727 00:37:32,400 --> 00:37:36,320 And it's like, dude, do this the right way. 728 00:37:36,320 --> 00:37:37,040 Okay. 729 00:37:37,040 --> 00:37:40,320 Get your, get your tax returns in order. 730 00:37:40,320 --> 00:37:45,360 Keep your bank statements together, have your cashflow statement, have your income statement, 731 00:37:45,360 --> 00:37:49,200 have your balance sheets, have all that stuff in a pretty little box so that whenever you 732 00:37:49,200 --> 00:37:51,120 need it, it's available to you. 733 00:37:51,120 --> 00:37:52,320 That's number three. 734 00:37:52,320 --> 00:37:54,960 And step number four is finding the right buyer. 735 00:37:54,960 --> 00:37:59,920 So the difference between myself and a business broker is that when I talked about this whole 736 00:37:59,920 --> 00:38:03,920 holistic and comprehensive thing, where I take you through this process, a business broker 737 00:38:03,920 --> 00:38:05,520 is very transactional. 738 00:38:05,520 --> 00:38:09,200 So a business broker is just going to help you find a buyer and he's gone. 739 00:38:09,200 --> 00:38:09,680 Right. 740 00:38:09,680 --> 00:38:13,120 But finding the right buyer is hugely important. 741 00:38:13,120 --> 00:38:14,800 Like I said, there's a couple of different buyers. 742 00:38:14,800 --> 00:38:20,800 So strategic buyer, strategic buyers, competitors, you can even sell to your family or you can 743 00:38:20,800 --> 00:38:21,760 sell to employees. 744 00:38:21,760 --> 00:38:25,280 Like these, these are options that a business broker is just not going to take you through. 745 00:38:25,280 --> 00:38:29,360 All they're looking for is to find a buyer for you, for you as a seller. 746 00:38:29,360 --> 00:38:31,520 They're not looking at the other stuff. 747 00:38:31,520 --> 00:38:33,440 So those are the four steps quickly. 748 00:38:33,440 --> 00:38:37,440 I'm going to review step number one, standard operating procedures. 749 00:38:37,440 --> 00:38:40,000 Step number two, succession planning. 750 00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:42,480 Step number three, business finances. 751 00:38:42,480 --> 00:38:44,880 And step number four, finding the right buyer. 752 00:38:46,000 --> 00:38:47,280 Finding that buyer. 753 00:38:47,280 --> 00:38:48,000 Excellent, man. 754 00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:49,680 I took some notes myself on all of that. 755 00:38:49,680 --> 00:38:51,600 That was, that was awesome, Alan. 756 00:38:51,600 --> 00:38:53,600 I appreciate your expertise on the subject. 757 00:38:54,960 --> 00:38:58,800 First class business, transparently, we are not at that stage. 758 00:38:58,800 --> 00:38:59,600 We know it. 759 00:38:59,600 --> 00:39:03,680 We've got lots of standard operating procedures to streamline. 760 00:39:03,680 --> 00:39:06,880 The book, the training manual has grown immensely. 761 00:39:07,760 --> 00:39:12,560 And it's something that needs to continue to be refined for every position that we continue 762 00:39:12,560 --> 00:39:13,360 to create. 763 00:39:13,360 --> 00:39:16,240 Many of you business owners, you know what that's like. 764 00:39:16,240 --> 00:39:21,200 You know what it's like to have a process, for instance, a standard operating procedure 765 00:39:21,200 --> 00:39:26,480 created six months ago and been utilized somewhat, but you get away from it and now 766 00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:27,200 you got to update it. 767 00:39:27,200 --> 00:39:30,240 Six months down the road, that's part of the grind in the process. 768 00:39:30,240 --> 00:39:33,200 That's why it's, it's not easy to be a business owner. 769 00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:36,880 It can be simplified, but it's still a difficult process. 770 00:39:37,760 --> 00:39:38,800 The succession planning. 771 00:39:39,520 --> 00:39:41,120 No, we're also not at that stage. 772 00:39:41,120 --> 00:39:43,760 I wish I could say we're not Jackson class business. 773 00:39:44,480 --> 00:39:46,240 In many respects today, we still are. 774 00:39:47,120 --> 00:39:49,520 You know, we want to be first class business. 775 00:39:49,520 --> 00:39:55,680 We want to be where the entire operation, if I walked away for a week or two, would 776 00:39:55,680 --> 00:39:57,840 be smooth like butter and fluid. 777 00:39:57,840 --> 00:40:05,360 And we take, we, in some respects, we take opportunities to test that, you know, and 778 00:40:05,360 --> 00:40:07,520 we realized like, okay, we survived the day. 779 00:40:08,480 --> 00:40:09,680 You know, okay, cool. 780 00:40:09,680 --> 00:40:14,480 We, we survived the two days, but there was things that happened that if we let that 781 00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:18,800 faster, if I wasn't here to clean it up, you know, we would, we would be in trouble. 782 00:40:19,440 --> 00:40:23,680 You know, we would lose a client or we'd make somebody mad, et cetera, or we aren't 783 00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:26,880 comfortable with that loss, but maybe we need to learn to be comfortable. 784 00:40:26,880 --> 00:40:28,560 Um, with that loss. 785 00:40:28,560 --> 00:40:30,640 So there's lots of ways to look at it again. 786 00:40:30,640 --> 00:40:38,640 Alan's bringing up the important aspects of, of, um, what again needs to be evaluated. 787 00:40:38,640 --> 00:40:43,440 Um, you know, and, and then of course, having somebody like Alan to be able to, to 788 00:40:43,520 --> 00:40:46,560 throw these things onto and say, Hey, Alan, what do you think, man? 789 00:40:46,560 --> 00:40:49,360 What, what, what do I do to bridge these gaps? 790 00:40:49,360 --> 00:40:51,120 Um, you know, that's part of the process. 791 00:40:51,120 --> 00:40:53,840 Um, the business finances as well. 792 00:40:53,840 --> 00:40:57,760 Um, one of the things that, um, Alan talks about is profits. 793 00:40:57,760 --> 00:41:02,400 Um, and you know, if you're not in a position where your business is profitable, um, 794 00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:05,520 you're not in a position to where you're handsomely profitable and where you're in 795 00:41:05,520 --> 00:41:11,040 control over your environment of selling, you're going to have to give far more way 796 00:41:11,040 --> 00:41:16,800 than you want to, um, you know, negotiating, uh, Chris Foss, I'm a big fan of his book 797 00:41:16,800 --> 00:41:18,080 as it is narrated. 798 00:41:18,080 --> 00:41:22,640 Um, I won't dive into the details of what I mean by that, but the, um, the, um, 799 00:41:22,640 --> 00:41:28,800 he talks about how the person who has the least to lose wins the negotiation, which 800 00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:34,800 is a basic, basically saying you can suck at negotiating, but if you don't care 801 00:41:34,800 --> 00:41:36,560 about losing, you're going to win. 802 00:41:36,560 --> 00:41:42,320 Um, and so with your business model, if you have the finances you need and you 803 00:41:42,320 --> 00:41:47,440 don't need to sell your business, you're going to make more than if you have 804 00:41:47,440 --> 00:41:50,000 yourself in a position where you feel like you need to sell. 805 00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:53,520 Now you're willing to sacrifice in order to get some type of return. 806 00:41:53,520 --> 00:41:58,800 Um, and the sooner you get ahead of that framework, the better, the sooner you're 807 00:41:58,800 --> 00:42:00,960 planning with these aspects in mind, the better. 808 00:42:00,960 --> 00:42:04,960 And then lastly, it's finding the right buyer, um, right. 809 00:42:04,960 --> 00:42:09,280 Having somebody creative by your side to be able to showcase your business. 810 00:42:09,280 --> 00:42:11,280 Um, you know, it's just like selling your house. 811 00:42:11,280 --> 00:42:13,360 Um, that's what your realtor is supposed to do. 812 00:42:13,360 --> 00:42:16,800 They're supposed to be out there looking for the buyers, attracting them, 813 00:42:16,800 --> 00:42:21,840 getting your, uh, your home listed on different applications, but also digging 814 00:42:21,840 --> 00:42:23,360 in their own personal network. 815 00:42:23,360 --> 00:42:27,600 That's usually where the, the great realtors end up finding the deals is they 816 00:42:27,600 --> 00:42:31,200 know who to turn to in the market, which the other, which are the other great 817 00:42:31,200 --> 00:42:36,080 realtors out there who have constant buyers in their portfolio who are ready 818 00:42:36,080 --> 00:42:38,080 to pick up that home like that. 819 00:42:38,080 --> 00:42:41,920 And that's where people like Alan come into play is he's constantly building 820 00:42:41,920 --> 00:42:44,320 his portfolio of people playing with the game. 821 00:42:44,320 --> 00:42:46,880 Of buying and selling businesses. 822 00:42:46,880 --> 00:42:48,160 So, man, I'm impressed. 823 00:42:48,160 --> 00:42:50,400 I'm grateful for all that you threw down today. 824 00:42:50,400 --> 00:42:55,040 Um, and I know that our vision pros who are building with that futuristic 825 00:42:55,040 --> 00:42:59,200 mindset of someday, you know, I'm going to want to sell this. 826 00:42:59,200 --> 00:43:03,120 Um, and so I better start preparing myself now for that day to transpire. 827 00:43:03,120 --> 00:43:04,000 Man, you threw down. 828 00:43:04,000 --> 00:43:04,960 I appreciate you, Alan. 829 00:43:04,960 --> 00:43:05,600 Very good. 830 00:43:05,600 --> 00:43:06,160 Thank you. 831 00:43:06,160 --> 00:43:06,720 Thank you. 832 00:43:06,720 --> 00:43:07,280 Thank you. 833 00:43:07,280 --> 00:43:07,760 Absolutely. 834 00:43:07,760 --> 00:43:08,400 Vision pros. 835 00:43:08,400 --> 00:43:11,280 We will actually see you later today, um, on another episode. 836 00:43:11,280 --> 00:43:13,280 Um, Alan, I'm so glad you're here. 837 00:43:13,280 --> 00:43:14,880 We're going to have a special episode. 838 00:43:14,880 --> 00:43:17,120 Um, Alan, thanks for coming in for this special show. 839 00:43:17,120 --> 00:43:20,880 If you want to reach out to Alan, please do so on his LinkedIn. 840 00:43:20,880 --> 00:43:22,880 I'm sure you can find him elsewhere. 841 00:43:22,880 --> 00:43:25,680 Um, we've, we've got the, uh, the link to his website. 842 00:43:25,680 --> 00:43:27,520 That'll be in the show notes as well. 843 00:43:27,520 --> 00:43:33,680 It's, uh, work with Alan.com and, uh, you know, make sure you, you let him know 844 00:43:33,680 --> 00:43:37,520 that you came from vision pros live if you work with him and, uh, Alan, we 845 00:43:37,520 --> 00:43:39,520 look forward to hosting you again in the future, my friend. 846 00:43:39,520 --> 00:43:40,320 Thank you. 847 00:43:40,320 --> 00:43:41,440 Thanks for having me. 848 00:43:41,440 --> 00:43:41,920 Absolutely. 849 00:43:41,920 --> 00:43:42,560 Vision pros. 850 00:43:42,560 --> 00:43:43,760 Thank you for being here today. 851 00:43:45,200 --> 00:43:45,760 Cool. 852 00:43:47,200 --> 00:43:48,320 Thank you for being here today. 853 00:43:48,320 --> 00:43:50,800 I'm really happy that you tuned into vision pros live. 854 00:43:50,800 --> 00:43:55,200 I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions as these episodes continue to 855 00:43:55,200 --> 00:43:55,680 move forward. 856 00:43:55,680 --> 00:43:57,360 This is going to get more and more fun. 857 00:43:57,360 --> 00:43:59,200 We'll have more and more engagement as well. 858 00:43:59,200 --> 00:44:02,720 We'll invite people to participate in the show and thank you for giving us 859 00:44:02,720 --> 00:44:03,680 your time and attention. 860 00:44:03,680 --> 00:44:13,680 Excellent time building out.