Will this be the year you seriously drive up the value of your company?
If you have resolved to make your company more valuable in 2017, you may want to think hard about how your customers pay. If you have a transaction business model where customers pay once for what they buy, expect your company’s value to be a single-digit multiple of your Earnings Before Interest Taxes, Depreciation and…
Read MoreOne Way To Decide When To Sell
How do you know the right time to sell your company? One answer to this age-old question is that the time to sell is when someone else is willing to invest more in your business than you are. When you start a business, nobody is willing to invest in its success more than you. You’ve…
Read More5 Ways To Get Your Business To Run Without You
Some owners focus on growing their profits, while others are obsessed with sales goals. Have you ever considered making it your primary goal to set up your business so that it can thrive and grow without you? A business not dependent on its owner is the ultimate asset to own. It allows you complete control…
Read MoreThe Anatomy of a Successful Exit
Stephanie Breedlove started Breedlove & Associates in 1992 as a way to pay her nanny. The big payroll processors weren’t interested in dealing with one person’s wages and doing it themselves was complicated and time-consuming, too much for the then overwhelmed Breedloves. Breedlove saw a business opportunity and started a payroll company for parents who…
Read MoreHow To Avoid Disappointment When It’s Time To Cash Out
How do you avoid not being disappointed with the money you make from the sale of your company? Perhaps you’ve heard that companies like yours trade using an industry rule of thumb or that companies of your size sell within a specific range, and you want to get at least what your peers have received.…
Read MoreOne Tweak That Can (Instantly) Add Millions To The Value Of Your Business
If you’re trying to figure out what your business might be worth, it’s helpful to consider what acquirers are paying for companies like yours these days. A little internet research will probably reveal that a business like yours trades for a multiple of your pre-tax profit, which is Sellers Discretionary Earnings (SDE) for a small…
Read More4 Traps To Avoid When Selling Your Company
Business owners have been known to refer to due diligence as “the entrepreneur’s proctology exam.” It’s a crude analogy but a good representation of what it feels like when a stranger pokes, prods, and looks inside every inch of your business. Most professional acquirers will have a checklist of questions they need answered if they’re…
Read MoreThe Downside of Being Upfront with Employees
One of the core principles of creating a more valuable business is ensuring it can run without you by getting managers to think like owners. The theory goes that empowered employees are the best positioned to solve your company’s thorniest issues, as they are the ones closest to the problems. In theory, people feel more…
Read MoreYou-proofing Your Business
Making your business less dependent on you has a number of benefits: you can scale your company more quickly if you’re not acting as a bottleneck; you get more time to enjoy life outside of your business; and a business less dependent on its owner is much more valuable to an acquirer. Pulling yourself out…
Read MoreThinking Vs. Doing: The Owner’s Dilemma
There’s a steady breeze from the northwest, which cools the warm Caribbean afternoon. Framed between a palm tree and the turquoise water, you notice a man reading. He appears to be working, which seems strange given his appearance: shaggy blonde hair, linen shirt, surf shorts and flip-flops. You squint and realize the man is Richard…
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