I couldn't even tell you. I know it's between it's between Baltimore and DC.
Nice. Where are you from originally?
Originally from Long Island, New York.
Rhode Island, New York?
No, Long Island.
Oh, Long Island. I was like, I had not heard of that.
Long Island, New York. I got you.
All right. Welcome in to Visions Pros.
So what got you? Jackson Calame, I'm your show host.
We will be doing interviews for visionary entrepreneurs and guest
leaders who are building fantastic visions out there.
And welcome into a special edition of Vision Pros Live.
I am going to be bringing on a guest named Alan Gregory.
Alan specializes in helping businesses with the sale of their ventures
and making sure they are teed up to be able to sell their their business.
Because most businesses, when they get to that stage, just aren't ready.
They don't have it all put together. They haven't thought about that.
So whether you're in the beginning, you know, and thinking of Stephen Covey,
begin with the end in mind or you're facing the reality that you may want
to sell your business sooner than later, this is going to be a great discussion.
I'm excited to see what types of theories Alan presents, what types of,
you know, red flags could exist in your business as you get ready to sell
and what types of what types of people you should be turning to to help
with the process of making sure that you sell and sell well.
Without further ado, I rather before getting him on a quick shout out
to our sponsors, Epiphany and AbleHealth.US.
Both are up here in this corner.
Definitely feel free to check out their websites.
And of course, on the opposite side, we'd love to see you contribute
to the water project or some other means.
The more we give, usually the more we get in life or the next,
if you believe in that.
So with that said, without further ado, Alan, thank you so much for being
on the show and we look forward to diving into the subject and opening
the eyes of entrepreneurs everywhere. Appreciate you, man.
Absolutely. Thanks for having me.
Yes, sir. All right. So with that said, one of the things that you earned
fairly recently is a it says you became a certified exit planning advisor
through the Exit Planning Institute.
Tell us as much as you can about your background before you got to that stage.
And then let's transition into talking about what you've learned from that
institute, what qualifies that institute, et cetera.
But where did you what were you doing before becoming a certified
exit planning advisor?
So when I graduated high school in 1998, I know that's a long time ago.
The 19 are you one of the young folks, right?
So I graduated high school in 1998.
I had a lot of sales jobs from then until about 2003, 2003.
I went to corporate America and I was a customer service representative.
They decided they were going to move the service center.
So I became a marketing analyst for that same company from 2005 to 2008.
The reason I left corporate America is because I read Rich Dad, Poor Dad
cover to cover twice in 2007 over the Thanksgiving holiday.
So four days read the book twice, cover to cover.
And right immediately, I became a digital marketing consultant because I already had
some of that background from the stuff that I was doing before.
So when 2020 came, the pandemic hit, everybody decided they were going to reinvent
themselves, me especially, obviously.
And I saw an ad that came across that talked about buying businesses and
consulting for equity.
And I had been doing retainers.
So, you know, monthly retainers, weekly retainers, hourly retainers for 12 years
doing ads and funnels and emails and stuff for people.
And it was just time for me to do something that I could do.
And it was just time for me to do something different and bigger and better.
So I got involved in the mergers and acquisitions space and we started reaching
out to business owners that potentially wanted to sell their business through the
conventional means, which most of these guys are doing cold calls, cold emails,
LinkedIn DMs, direct mail letters and stuff like that.
We were doing that and we were contacting a lot of different people.
But the one thing that happens so often, I would say 90% of the time, business
owners are not ready to sell their business.
So my colleagues have this next mentality, some of them did anyway, not to talk bad
about any of them, but a lot of them did have this next mentality.
So if they're not ready to sell right now, then we don't want to talk to them.
We only want to talk to people that want to sell right now.
And I'm like, as a marketer and a consultant, that didn't make sense to me.
So I decided I was going to go and get myself certified in exit planning, because
when I'm coming across people and I potentially want to buy their business,
they're going to be more comfortable with me if they know that I have their best
interest in mind by trying to help them do it the right way, not this whole shark
thing where I'm just trying to like, quote unquote, steal your business from you.
So that's how I kind of got to where I am now.
I care.
Like I want to do this the right way.
And EPI has been around, I believe it's for 20 years.
Chris Snyder is the one who he acquired it, which is an interesting thing, because
he acquired it from someone else.
I don't remember the name of the guy before that, but Chris and Scott Snyder
are the father and son team that own this business.
So it was like a family business.
And Chris, not recently, I would say maybe a few years ago, but he had been working
in the exit planning Institute and he used all the exit planning Institute's
presentations and words and methodologies to take himself through an exit.
So now this father and son team, the son is actually running it now and he's
working on his exit to have someone else take it over.
So they're constantly doing the same stuff that they're teaching.
So that's why I thought it was a good idea for me to learn from them.
And I do the same stuff myself.
That's smart, man.
You kind of, you covered a lot of important factors that I hope people evaluate
as they consider who they might want to work with.
It actually reminds me of my first realtor when I was the first time home buyer.
Right.
There was, we got, we had so many realtors that I went through, because I'm, I'm, I
don't want to say difficult on my research though, you know, like especially
with something that of that magnitude, that's that important.
And most realtors didn't want to deal with me.
You know, they just, they wanted the easy lay down.
They wanted the person who was going to listen to everything that they said.
And like you said, ultimately, like shark me into a deal that wasn't necessarily
in my best interest.
And so here I come fighting back, you know, and they'd be like, well, Jackson,
like, it's just not realistic to find.
There aren't that many houses on the market with this criteria.
And I said, guess what?
I only need one.
So you can either go on your way and not waste either of our time, or you can help
me find my one deal because that's what I will get.
Right.
So the, the gentleman that ended up working with Monte Maldine, shout out to
him from Keller Williams, who's become one of my great friends in life.
He understood the value of being there for us along the process and helping us
understand what we didn't understand.
So, like you said, rather than going to a shark tank style situation where it's
rushed and hasty, and they're only picking out the ones who are already perfectly
qualified, so to speak, it sounds like you've set up a system where people can
come in and learn about the exit process prior to the rush.
And kind of get themselves ready so that they can sell their business for as much
as possible while, while having a little bit more control and calm in the process.
Did I get that right?
Absolutely.
Yep.
Okay, man.
Well, let's, let's dive into some of those aspects.
I read some of it on your LinkedIn.
If anybody wants to reach out to Alan via LinkedIn and connect with them there, of
course, and your about section, it talked about establishing a realistic valuation
for your business, evaluating deal structures that can get funded in today's
lending environment and pitching the deal to people that you're connected to and
some other aspects, but walk me through a little bit of the process.
If I were interested in selling my business in the future, when is the ideal
time to talk to you?
What should I have prepared on my end?
And yeah, where do we go?
So the ideal thing to do, and a lot of people don't do this, they wake up one
day and then they decide they're going to sell their business, and they're like,
decide they're going to sell their business, but they have been thinking
about it for three years.
Don't contact me the day you decide to sell.
Contact me the three years before when you're thinking about selling.
Huge difference.
Most people don't do that.
So that's, that's one of the first things.
And in terms of the things that you need to understand in terms of selling your
business, it is so important for you to have a realistic valuation.
And a lot of people say, well, my business does a million dollars a year.
It's worth in revenue.
I'll be mentioning that in revenue, they think it's worth a million dollars.
That is not true.
Your, your valuation is going to be based on your profits.
So if you do a hundred thousand dollars a year in profits on that million dollar
business, theoretically, you're going to get a three X multiple, which means we
just multiply a hundred thousand dollars, your profits by three, and that's what
your business is actually worth.
Now, of course, this is some people want to say, well, that's doesn't work for me.
Look, that's just the numbers we're coming up with now, theoretically, as an example.
That's kind of what that looks like.
That's one of the first things we do.
And because people, and this, this is a lot of the reasons why businesses don't
sell because people don't understand this and they're not, they're not educated,
which is why I'm working on a lot of different things to make that happen as well.
Of course.
You know, and I see a lot of business owners out there who, they don't look,
they're not comfortable with profit and loss statements.
They're not comfortable with income statements.
Yep.
You know, this probably seems like not only foreign territory, but the
territory beyond the foreign territory.
So I would think maybe you already have one.
I would think that a new analogy is in store to help business owners get
comfortable with the idea of, of exploring the unknown behind the unknown.
But how do you, how do you help people get comfortable with the idea of
establishing these numbers, Alan?
So what I have people do, usually some people have an account and some don't.
I prefer that you do so that I could just talk to them and you don't
have to be as involved with it.
That's the easiest way to do it.
But ideally, if you, if you're running all your numbers on the back of a napkin
or in like a notebook or a legal pad, I can't really help you because I'm not
going to go through all that to try to fix it up and then like, that's a job
for me just to even try to like understand what your business is worth.
So it's very important that you at least have quick books on it.
I'm not going to tell you that you have to have quick books or Microsoft money
or whatever you use something, and you don't necessarily have to know, you
know, how to run everything with your income statements and your profit and
loss statements and all that stuff, but you need to have them available when
someone like me, whether it be an on the exit planning side where I'm talking
about you helping you exit your business.
Or if I'm the buyer where I'm thinking about buying your business, the things
that you need to have in place, I want to tell this to everybody very bluntly
that you absolutely have to have your profit and loss, well, I'm sorry, income
statements and balance sheets.
You absolutely have to have.
Right.
So income statement and P and L it's, it's the same thing.
Your balance sheet, you absolutely have to have that.
Those are the first two things you need to talk to me or an M and A person
or whatever, you absolutely have to have that.
The next thing you would like to have is your cashflow statement.
Then you want to have three years of tax returns and you want to have
your business bank account stuff.
If you've got all that stuff neatly put together, 90% of business owners don't,
but I want to talk to you about what you need to do in terms of you selling
your business or passing it on, or even getting it evaluated for a different
reason.
You may be going through a divorce.
You may be thinking about selling off a portion of your business.
You need to have all these things put together.
Most people unfortunately don't.
Okay.
All right.
So there's, there's lots of different ways to, to create the
valuation for your business.
There's different theories.
One of them, the other one I look at though on the, on the flip side
as a startup guy is Facebook acquired a small company called Instagram, right?
Their acquisition was a $1 billion acquisition.
They were not, they were not doing 350 million in profit, you know, at the, at
the time of that acquisition.
So how do you make space for acquisitions of that magnitude with the theories that
you're also bringing to small businesses and how do these processes harmonize?
So the larger the business, the larger the multiple, we're usually looking at my,
my team and I, we're usually looking at businesses from $2 million in revenue to
about $10 million in revenue.
And although Facebook didn't buy Instagram for three X, I'm sure they bought
it for a lot more than that.
There was, there's a specific type of buyer.
They were a strategic buyer.
So they bought it knowing what they'd be able to do with it.
And that's the reason they gave it the valuation they did because they knew they
could take, okay, it's a billion.
We can push this to a hundred.
That's perfect.
That's, that's why they bought it like that.
And that kind of brings me to this other part of this.
There are different types of buyers.
So you have a strategic buyer, kind of like Facebook and Instagram, then you've
got PE firms, private equity.
Everybody's heard of those.
Then you've got competitors, right?
So let's just say you have a landscaping company or an HVAC company and you're in
Baltimore, Maryland, but somebody in DC wants to buy your business because they
want to have a footprint in your area.
That's a comp, that's a competitor.
They would buy your business as well.
Exactly.
Then you have other people like myself that are entrepreneurs.
We come in and we're very flexible with how we deal with the business.
Because if you think about it, a competitor is probably not going to keep
your employees in place, neither is a PE firm and probably neither is a strategic
buyer, but as an entrepreneur, that's going to be flexible and is really trying
to help you preserve your legacy and create a legacy.
We're going to look at things like, do you want to keep the name of the business?
Do you want to keep your employees in place?
How flexible do you want to be with the payments for us to buy this business?
Do you want them to be monthly?
Do you want them to be quarterly?
Do you want them to be all in one shot?
Very, very rare, by the way, doesn't happen very often, but those are the
things that we can be flexible with as acquisition entrepreneurs.
Definitely.
So part of your process is the education component of understanding what your
business is worth and valued at.
I would again, add for anybody who's listening to this, I think Alan would
support this, make sure that you're getting opinions from multiple perspectives
in the process.
And it's also helpful to be aware of as well, what types of businesses
Alan prefers to work with.
You mentioned a threshold from 2 million to 6 million.
Was that accurate?
Did I get that right?
Two to 10.
Two to 10 million.
Okay.
So if you've got a business that's producing revenues or profits from 2
million to 10 million revenue, revenue to two from 2 million to 10 million.
And you've learned about these different types of people who buy
businesses, then you definitely want to consider talking to him about his
strategies and again, make sure to evaluate multiple firms who can help
you with this process.
Let's look at some of the other things that you're helping with.
This is pitch your deal to your consortium of qualified acquisition
entrepreneurs that will be a safe pair of hands to guide your enterprise.
So what does that mean to come when I come to you, Alan, I have the
opportunity to pitch the deal to a consortium of acquisition entrepreneurs
who are going to guide me.
Tell me about that.
What is that?
So the way that that works is we're going to go back to the valuation.
So the first thing I'm going to need from you is your income statement
and your balance sheet.
I'm going to run them through a calculator and give you evaluation of,
and this is where I think I'm a little bit different than like a business
broker or some of these other guys.
We give you evaluation based on what we would buy the business at today.
So, right.
It's this realistic thing, not like, and I don't want to say made up, but kind
of different, right?
We give you evaluation based on what we would buy the business at today.
And we're going to give you at least two offers.
One of them is going to be fun versus what, what do you normally see happen
instead of it being, instead of it being based on buying it today, what do you
normally see happen in the market?
Well, a lot of people, brokers, they give you like an opinion, right?
So they just say like, okay, well, we think it's worth this much when we're
running them through our calculator.
I'm specifically coming back to you with the intention of buying your
business at this price today.
Most brokers, most other people are not, they're not giving it that level.
They're just saying, okay, well, based on this and based on this, this is
what we think it's worth.
You're doing a more thorough audit is what it sounds like.
Okay.
Yeah.
There's this more thorough, but ours is very specific in the fact that we know
what we would buy the business at today based on some of the things we talked
about, so we don't just need your P and L and your balance sheet.
We also want to know a SWOT analysis, a basic SWOT analysis.
Strength, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
How you bring in customers, what kind of revenue you have, is any of it recurring?
What kind of team do you have in place and all those things, those things.
And although it doesn't take us long to run these numbers, we can run these
numbers in two days, maybe three days and get it back to you as soon as possible.
But going back to the pitch part, we're talking about the pitch.
So the first part is that I want to review your numbers and put them
through this calculator to let you know what we buy it at.
Then I'm going to take it to, I've got a couple of things that I want to
take it to, I've got 600 people that are in this group that know me very well.
I'm one of the leaders of this group.
And I say, guys, I've got this deal.
Here's what it looks like.
Who's interested in potentially working with me on this deal?
A couple of people will raise their hand.
We'll get on another call with the seller, which I've actually just did one
of these not too long ago, three weeks ago, and then we'll talk about, okay,
here's what we think it's worth.
And if this doesn't happen as fast as I'm talking about it, usually we
have to build some rapport.
I'm just giving you the Cliff Notes version of it, but we'll talk through it.
And we say, okay, well, based on this, we think it's worth this.
Here's one way we could structure the deal this way.
And here's another way we could structure the deal this way.
Which one of these do you like better?
We give them the either or, and most people are going to pick one, but some
people are going to kind of push back a little and say, Hey, I think it's
worth a little more this.
And then that's when we kind of go through the whole negotiation process.
But that's what it looks like in a nutshell.
Okay.
Gotcha.
So they, they go through that process with the acquisition entrepreneurs.
Um, are these the people that are going to potentially buy the business from
them or are these just further guidance counselors?
Right.
So I, I serve as kind of like the front man and the pitch man.
And I bring the deals to the people that have more experience in
buying businesses than I do.
So all these guys that I'd be and girls that I'd be potentially bringing to you
that want to buy your business have bought multiple businesses in the past.
Okay.
Awesome.
So it's kind of like a mini shark tank.
Um, we're just not on TV.
Yep.
Okay.
Interesting.
And so you're, you're like preparing people for their shark takings,
shark tank experience.
Yep.
Okay.
I got you.
Um, so what types of businesses do you prefer to work with Alan?
Well, because I have a digital marketing background, I actually prefer digital
marketing agencies and e-comm stores.
And I'll tell you two quick stories about deals that I'm actually currently
working on a young lady.
I sent a LinkedIn direct message to in April.
Contacted me back in July and said, Hey, can we have a talk?
So I sat with her.
I talked to her.
She was on for about 45 minutes and she is very interested in selling her business.
So she's motivated.
We're always looking for someone who's motivated to sell like in real estate,
the same kind of thing.
And she's motivated to sell.
She's got her reason.
She's got her team.
She's got everything in place.
And I'm like, okay, well, this isn't really an exit planning engagement
because you want to sell your business when in the next 18 months.
She's like, yeah, but I want to exit in this way.
That's not like you're going to buy my business today and I'm going tomorrow.
I want to be involved for the next 18 months during this transition.
So we're talking about that.
I talked to her about that.
I brought in one partner and we had great before we talked again about certain
things that we need to talk about that.
I brought in another partner.
So now there's three partners, two partners and myself in this deal.
And we're going back and forth with her.
Now we got our P and L, we got our balance sheet.
We're going through itemized things now.
So we want to know about her owner's compensation.
We want to know about her revenue by month.
We want to know what she pays her teams and all this stuff.
So this stuff is all coming together like in real time.
So probably I'll have another meeting with her in the next week or two.
So that's one deal, digital marketing agencies.
The other one is e-comm stores.
Now what's interesting about this is that I'm, I post on Facebook and LinkedIn.
So people reach out to me.
I don't have to do a lot of outbound.
More people started to come to me now.
Especially with me doing podcasts and stuff like that.
So a gentleman came to me and said, Hey, Alan, do you want to buy an e-comm store?
I said, well, that's not really our business.
We really want to get into the business.
And if I was going to buy an e-comm store, I don't want one.
I want 10, 20, 40.
That immediately piqued his interest.
He's like, wait, you want to buy that many?
I'm like, yeah, let's talk about it.
So he got on the phone with me.
He vetted me.
I vetted him.
And we said, okay, this is what you want to do with your business.
You want to take your business to a higher level, not with you just being able to sell
one e-comm store to one customer.
You want to make this thing into something that's large and has a really good ecosystem.
And he's like, yeah.
I said, well, the first thing you're going to need to do is to acquire your supply chain up and down.
You need your distributors, you need your warehouse, you need transportation and all that stuff.
And he's like, yeah, we thought of that.
That's not really our expertise.
We need some help with that.
I said, okay, no problem.
So I brought in a partner.
We start talking to them about that.
We've been talking to probably about six weeks now.
We have a weekly meeting that's ongoing.
And now we're at the point where these guys are going to go to their suppliers and start
finding out who they are and how much of their business is represented within those suppliers.
So we have a leg to stand on when we go to acquire these suppliers.
And now this is all overseas, by the way, this guy happens to be in Spain.
And I'm talking to someone in my network who has phenomenal supply chain experience.
And she's potentially going to be helping us with that because she's got boots on the
ground over there.
I'm over here.
So I can't, I'm going to go over there, but I don't live over there.
So that's another deal that's coming together.
So to answer your question, the long and short of it is digital marketing and econ.
Okay, interesting.
So we've dove into a lot of areas of business and selling businesses.
You know, the niche you you're going after.
So let's bridge some of the gaps in this, these series of questions.
So who should be listening today, Alan, why should they listen to you specifically?
And what do you think they're going to get out of the rest of today show?
So the people that should be listening are people that have a mindset toward the future
are people that get into a business and realize they're not one of the people that say,
I'm going to die at my desk.
There are very few of those people.
People tend to say that, but that's not really the truth.
If you're an entrepreneur and you know that you're going to have, like, like most people
have multiple jobs in this day and age, right?
So if you're going to have a job that you stay at for five years or seven years or 10
years, it's probably not longer than that, especially in 2023, you're probably going
to do the same thing in your business.
If you own a business today and you say, I'm not going to sell it.
This is my baby.
I want you to think twice about that, because that's not absolutely true.
Unfortunately, you're going to have to exit that business for one of a couple of reasons,
death, disease, divorce, disability, or you get bored and disillusioned or you have a
partner dispute.
Any of these reasons are could be reasons that you potentially exit your business.
And it is so important for you to have things in place now so that if any of those tragedies
may befall you, you're in place to do that.
Those are the people that are think are forward thinking and understand that kind of thing.
Those are the people who should listen.
The reason why you should listen to me is because I consider myself a little bit of
a unicorn.
I am emergence and acquisitions guy.
I'm an exit planner, and I'm also a marketer.
Very few people have all three going on.
I know a lot of people that are in M&A and marketing.
I know a lot of people that are in M&A and exit planning, but I don't know anybody
that's in all three.
So the reason you should be listening to me is because one, I'm in all three.
Two, I actually care because there's a process to this, guys.
Like if you're going to think about selling your business, you want to work with somebody
who is going to help you plan the exit, take you through the liquidity event, meaning that
you asked somebody actually bought your business from you.
And then the next part, which we haven't even talked about yet, Jackson, is wealth management.
Think about this.
If I help you plan your exit and that takes 24, 36 months, and then I actually take you
to somebody who's going to buy your business for more than $20,000.
That's for more than what we talked about originally three years ago, assuming that
we talked three years ago.
Your business is sold, let's just say it's sold for $10 million.
If you get $10 million in your hand, chances are you may not do what you need to do with
it.
And if you don't have the proper tax planning in place, it's going to go, you're going to
have half of that anyway.
But the idea is that you get the planning first, the liquidity event, and the wealth
management to take you toward the future, because as an M&A person, if you sell your
business to me, I don't want you to just kind of like take your money and run.
I would want you to potentially take some of that money and let me work it in another
deal that I'm trying to work on.
So this whole life cycle, this holistic, comprehensive thing is what I do.
And it's like I said before, I actually care about this.
I'm not a shark.
I play with the sharks, but I'm not a shark.
I want to help you actually create a legacy and preserve it so that you can do something
significant for your family and your grandchildren's grandchildren know who you are.
Let's talk about that for 15 seconds.
What's your vision, Alan?
My vision is every person that I help sell their business decides that they want to create
a trust fund for their children and grandchildren.
Interesting.
So follow up question.
Why is that important to you?
Okay.
So my mom passed last year in February and I love her dearly, but she worked 30 years
at a job and was only able to leave $20,000 between myself, my sister and my brother.
That's not something I want to happen to anybody.
I'm not saying anything bad about people that work at a job, but if you have a business
you have, there's something more to you if you have a business because you're serving.
It's not like you just go to a job and collect the check and walk away.
If you have a business you want to serve people and chances are you want to leave something
more for your children.
Right.
Absolutely.
So that makes sense from your own personal background, but why do you care about others?
Well, this is interesting because every time I've tried to do something,
selfishly, it never really worked out.
And I've got to admit it.
I'll give you that.
At least you admit that you've done things selfishly, right?
Yes.
I've done a lot of things selfishly and they rarely work out.
And I've got personal examples that I don't want to go through, but just in general,
when I think about other people and I bring people in my vision and the universe, God
or whatever you want to call it, gives me more energy to do it.
Because if I'm just doing it for me, it doesn't matter that much.
How much money does one person actually need?
But if you're supporting a family or a community or a world, I wouldn't go that far, but just
going out there, you have more energy to do more because then that's why you're going
to be able to do more because you have that energy to do and it's given to you from the
universe.
Nice.
I love that.
That's fair.
So let's talk about powerful lessons.
What powerful lesson can other visionaries learn from your experience, your personal
experience?
Oh, my personal experience.
So although I left my job in 2008 and became a digital marketing consultant, I wouldn't
advise that for everyone because it doesn't work for everybody that way, right?
I had an entrepreneurial spirit from when I was very young.
And that's not to say that I didn't have my struggles from 2008 to 2011 because between
2008 and 2011, I bought every course I could buy.
I had no money.
I ran out of all my credit cards.
I slept on other friends' couches.
It was really bad for a time.
And if you don't have the strength to allow yourself to go through something that's that
hurtful, because it can be, then you're probably going to have a tough time really being an
entrepreneur.
And you should listen to someone like myself who's been through some of the hard times
and, yes, as an entrepreneur, you fail.
You're going to fail.
And if you don't fail, you didn't really try.
So listening to someone who just only tells you about the good things and under the bad
things, those probably aren't the right people.
Interesting.
So who are some of these mentors then who shared some of the bad things with you?
I mean, are some of the ones that seem to be more transparent in the market?
Right.
So the people that I'm working with now, I can give you a couple of names right off the
back, Carl Allen and Roland Fraser are my two top mentors in the mergers and acquisitions
space.
I also listen a lot to Cody Sanchez because she puts out a ton of content.
And I listen to Alex Hormozzi as well.
So those four people.
Now, I'm not in Cody's or Alex's courses.
I'm actually in the mastermind with Roland Fraser and Carl Allen.
Like, I paid my money to get into these things.
And when I tell you that, I have acquisition entrepreneurs who can help me with my work,
who could potentially buy your business, I can send out a link or a chat or whatever
in both of those communities.
And I say, I've got a deal that has this, this, this, and this.
I got the P&L. I got the incomes.
I got the balance sheet.
I ran it through my calculator.
Who wants to work with me on this deal?
I said 500 or 600.
That's just in Carl Allen's group.
There's another thousand or so that are enrolled in Fraser's group.
And because I'm doing these things like this, people tend to see me.
So they're like, okay, Allen, you're the real deal.
So those are the people that have worked the best for me.
That's awesome, man.
And to validate a lot of what you're talking about, like Alex Hermosy, for instance,
you don't necessarily need to be in his group in order to extract the majority of the value
that he puts out into the world, because he's a giver.
He's constantly exposing more and more about what he does.
And he may expose it all, but the value of purchasing
and deciding to be in a group with an entrepreneur like that is you get the certainty,
the security that you're being given the path from A to Z in a linear format.
And you've done that now with, it sounds like with Carl Allen and Roland Fraser,
is you have that path clearly there.
You can call them or you can text them.
You can hit their support email and find out what's going on.
But also they have a vested interest in seeing you succeed because you're on the inner circle.
So, and at the same time, these circles expand.
We got micro circles and we've got macro circles.
We got circles that are larger, circles that are more intimate.
And each one of us is building that, well, it's really called a sphere of influence.
So you've got your sphere of influence building as well, which is pretty awesome.
And once somebody's in, I hadn't thought too much about that process of,
okay, the person who sells with you, I didn't know that you were also helping them on the
post acquisition phase of, hey, here's what you can do with that investment.
But that's also why it's so important to have long-term friendships
in these situations and to come in.
So if you're wanting to get to know Allen, understand that the goal is not a quick win.
It's to be able to take the law of abundance, the wealth, and allow it to compound upon itself
as you continue to build a relationship together.
So I'm glad you brought that forward as one of the main points.
So how do you envision that building in the rest of 2023 and going into 2024?
So the best thing about what I'm doing now is, like I told you before, most of these guys,
they're behind the scenes kind of people.
They're not really front-facing people that they don't like to be on podcasts.
They don't like to do events and masterminds and stuff.
And what's going to propel me to my vision, which is helping everybody else do what I talked about
today, is being on these kinds of things.
So I've got three events, three events next month that I'm going to.
I believe one is a mixer here in Maryland.
Another one is, oh, I'm going to Onyx thing, Onyx and Gall.
He's got a thing coming up.
So I'm going to his thing.
And then I've got a Dealmaker Live event with Carl Allen's group at the end of September.
So next month, I'm going to be at three different events, like physical in-person events,
because a lot of people want to hide behind their computer and just kind of type and send out cold
emails and all this stuff.
And I've done that and that stuff works.
But when you combine that with this content marketing, public speaking, podcasting, being
on other people's events, your own events, now you're going to be able to do that.
You've got this thing because now, like you said, the law of abundance, this circle goes
from this to this really quickly.
So that's what's going on with me for this year and all the next year as well.
I love it.
There's a huge psychology to in-person events.
And it's not something that you need to dissect the psychology or the science of, but just
to know it.
If you're not going to in-person events and interacting with people, you're missing out
on a massive cash flow opportunity.
There's just something about people being primed and ready to transact when you're physically
in their presence.
And a lot of that has to do with knowing how to be prepared for those events, too, knowing
how to be set up for those events.
But they're fantastic opportunities to move your business forward in ways that are, I
don't want to say limited online, but just not as natural online as they are when you're
in person.
So that's awesome.
All right, cool.
What else would you like to add today?
Let me leave the floor open for you because there's a lot about mergers, acquisitions,
selling businesses that we haven't covered.
What do you want to cover?
So the main thing I want to tell people is there's four steps to this thing.
And I mean, yes, there are more, but I'm going to break this down for you as simple as possible.
Steps number one is standard operating procedures.
Everybody knows what they are.
Some people have them.
Some people don't.
And some people are in the middle.
If you're going to sell your business, think about this, guys.
If I'm going to buy your business today and you're going to walk out the door tomorrow,
very rare, but just work with me here.
If I don't have a training manual, your business is going to get run into the ground, which
nobody wants.
Like I can't, there's no value to me and there's no value to you of me doing that.
Right.
So you've got to have standard operating procedures in place.
The other thing about SOPs is that if your business is relying upon you, sad to say,
you don't have a business, you've got a job.
And a lot of people don't like to hear that, but that's the absolute truth.
So step number one is your SOPs.
Step number two is succession planning.
Succession planning just simply means, well, if I take a vacation for two weeks, is my
business going to burn to the ground?
Right.
So you don't want to have that happen.
So you also want to have a number two or number three or a number four.
You just want to have someone that can do what you do and they don't have to be you,
but you can, so that you can just take some time off.
Like so many people are stuck in their businesses and I ask people, I say, Hey, could you take
a week or like, what would happen to your business if you took a week or two week vacation
and didn't answer emails, phone calls, texts, or anything?
A lot of people, 80% of people tell me my business will burn to the ground.
And I'm like, that's not a good business.
You don't want to have that.
So standard operating procedures, succession planning.
The other part to succession planning is if you decide to sell the business or when you
decide to sell the business, most investors, myself, and all the other people that I've
talked about acquisition entrepreneurs, we don't want to run your business day to day.
So if you don't group a number two, number three, number four, or have a management team
in place, that business has very little value to us because we're owner investors, not owner
managers.
We want to come in and help the business move, but we don't want to actually be responsible
for running it.
So that's the succession planning part.
The third thing is what I kind of mentioned before business finances.
I know a lot of businesses, they're co-mingling funds and they're using this business thing
to pay this personal thing.
And then they've got a car in the business, but it's not really the business.
And it's like, dude, do this the right way.
Okay.
Get your, get your tax returns in order.
Keep your bank statements together, have your cashflow statement, have your income statement,
have your balance sheets, have all that stuff in a pretty little box so that whenever you
need it, it's available to you.
That's number three.
And step number four is finding the right buyer.
So the difference between myself and a business broker is that when I talked about this whole
holistic and comprehensive thing, where I take you through this process, a business broker
is very transactional.
So a business broker is just going to help you find a buyer and he's gone.
Right.
But finding the right buyer is hugely important.
Like I said, there's a couple of different buyers.
So strategic buyer, strategic buyers, competitors, you can even sell to your family or you can
sell to employees.
Like these, these are options that a business broker is just not going to take you through.
All they're looking for is to find a buyer for you, for you as a seller.
They're not looking at the other stuff.
So those are the four steps quickly.
I'm going to review step number one, standard operating procedures.
Step number two, succession planning.
Step number three, business finances.
And step number four, finding the right buyer.
Finding that buyer.
Excellent, man.
I took some notes myself on all of that.
That was, that was awesome, Alan.
I appreciate your expertise on the subject.
First class business, transparently, we are not at that stage.
We know it.
We've got lots of standard operating procedures to streamline.
The book, the training manual has grown immensely.
And it's something that needs to continue to be refined for every position that we continue
to create.
Many of you business owners, you know what that's like.
You know what it's like to have a process, for instance, a standard operating procedure
created six months ago and been utilized somewhat, but you get away from it and now
you got to update it.
Six months down the road, that's part of the grind in the process.
That's why it's, it's not easy to be a business owner.
It can be simplified, but it's still a difficult process.
The succession planning.
No, we're also not at that stage.
I wish I could say we're not Jackson class business.
In many respects today, we still are.
You know, we want to be first class business.
We want to be where the entire operation, if I walked away for a week or two, would
be smooth like butter and fluid.
And we take, we, in some respects, we take opportunities to test that, you know, and
we realized like, okay, we survived the day.
You know, okay, cool.
We, we survived the two days, but there was things that happened that if we let that
faster, if I wasn't here to clean it up, you know, we would, we would be in trouble.
You know, we would lose a client or we'd make somebody mad, et cetera, or we aren't
comfortable with that loss, but maybe we need to learn to be comfortable.
Um, with that loss.
So there's lots of ways to look at it again.
Alan's bringing up the important aspects of, of, um, what again needs to be evaluated.
Um, you know, and, and then of course, having somebody like Alan to be able to, to
throw these things onto and say, Hey, Alan, what do you think, man?
What, what, what do I do to bridge these gaps?
Um, you know, that's part of the process.
Um, the business finances as well.
Um, one of the things that, um, Alan talks about is profits.
Um, and you know, if you're not in a position where your business is profitable, um,
you're not in a position to where you're handsomely profitable and where you're in
control over your environment of selling, you're going to have to give far more way
than you want to, um, you know, negotiating, uh, Chris Foss, I'm a big fan of his book
as it is narrated.
Um, I won't dive into the details of what I mean by that, but the, um, the, um,
he talks about how the person who has the least to lose wins the negotiation, which
is a basic, basically saying you can suck at negotiating, but if you don't care
about losing, you're going to win.
Um, and so with your business model, if you have the finances you need and you
don't need to sell your business, you're going to make more than if you have
yourself in a position where you feel like you need to sell.
Now you're willing to sacrifice in order to get some type of return.
Um, and the sooner you get ahead of that framework, the better, the sooner you're
planning with these aspects in mind, the better.
And then lastly, it's finding the right buyer, um, right.
Having somebody creative by your side to be able to showcase your business.
Um, you know, it's just like selling your house.
Um, that's what your realtor is supposed to do.
They're supposed to be out there looking for the buyers, attracting them,
getting your, uh, your home listed on different applications, but also digging
in their own personal network.
That's usually where the, the great realtors end up finding the deals is they
know who to turn to in the market, which the other, which are the other great
realtors out there who have constant buyers in their portfolio who are ready
to pick up that home like that.
And that's where people like Alan come into play is he's constantly building
his portfolio of people playing with the game.
Of buying and selling businesses.
So, man, I'm impressed.
I'm grateful for all that you threw down today.
Um, and I know that our vision pros who are building with that futuristic
mindset of someday, you know, I'm going to want to sell this.
Um, and so I better start preparing myself now for that day to transpire.
Man, you threw down.
I appreciate you, Alan.
Very good.
Thank you.
Absolutely.
Vision pros.
We will actually see you later today, um, on another episode.
Um, Alan, I'm so glad you're here.
We're going to have a special episode.
Um, Alan, thanks for coming in for this special show.
If you want to reach out to Alan, please do so on his LinkedIn.
I'm sure you can find him elsewhere.
Um, we've, we've got the, uh, the link to his website.
That'll be in the show notes as well.
It's, uh, work with Alan.com and, uh, you know, make sure you, you let him know
that you came from vision pros live if you work with him and, uh, Alan, we
look forward to hosting you again in the future, my friend.
Thank you.
Thanks for having me.
Absolutely.
Vision pros.
Thank you for being here today.
Cool.
Thank you for being here today.
I'm really happy that you tuned into vision pros live.
I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions as these episodes continue to
move forward.
This is going to get more and more fun.
We'll have more and more engagement as well.
We'll invite people to participate in the show and thank you for giving us
your time and attention.
Excellent time building out.