Building a business can be a lifelong adventure. Selling it—or merging it with another company—should be the culmination of the saga. A perfect ending gives you the financial security and liquidity that will carry you for the rest of your life. This practical A-to-Z guide reveals how and when to sell or merge your company—for the most money. Inside you’ll discover cutting-edge strategies and tactics that reveal what to consider when making the decision to sell, how to get the right help, how to put a price tag on your company, how to prepare a plan for selling your business, how to find the right buyer, how to make the right deal, how to successfully close the sale—and the door—and much, much more.
Greetings, and welcome.
I'm a writer, consultant, serial entrepreneur, private investor, and author of the 2010 publication, HOW TO INCREASE THE VALUE OF YOUR COMPANY: BENCHMARKING AND RULES OF THUMB TO PREPARE YOUR COMPANY FOR A PROFITABLE SALE. It's intended for small and middle-market business owners who are planning to sell their companies.
I'm also author of the book, HOW TO SELL YOUR PRIVATELY OWNED COMPANY, A BASIC GUIDE FOR INDEPENDENT BUSINESS OWNERS, BABY BOOMERS EDITION, released in 2010. It's target audience is Baby Boomer business owners who are thinking of selling their companies.
I'm not a business broker. Rather, I'm a business transaction consultant who helps company owners gear up to sell their businesses. Then I assist them with the selection of an appropriate, qualified, professional -- a business broker, a merger and acquisition (M&A) intermediary, or an investment banker -- who'll serve as their advocate during the selling process. These other professionals handle the actual sale. The scope of my consulting practice is nationwide. It encompasses all business sectors and all SIC codes.
I became involved in the business transaction field after merging my own company in 1994.
I'm former Board Chairman of Akron, Ohio, based Physicians & Surgeons (P&S) Ambulance Service. Ron Myers, my business partner, and I bought the company in 1972, with no money down. In 1994, during an industry-wide consolidation -- in a pooling of interest transaction -- we merged our company with American Medical Response Inc. (EMT), the first ambulance service to be publicly-traded on the New York Stock Exchange.
In 1993, shorty before the merger, Ron Myers and I wrote a book entitled THE NEW OWNER, MAKING THE TRANSITION FROM EMPLOYEE TO EMPLOYER. Audience for this book was employees of smaller companies who had aspirations of some day becoming business owners.
From 1981 through 1992, while chairman of my own firm, I was also a professional speaker. I specialized in presenting topics on small business management -- mostly to company owners -- at conventions, conferences and meetings throughout the United States, sponsored by trade and professional associations.
I credit much of my success to the application of ideas I learned from others. Synthesizing information from numerous sources, I then adapted and applied it in my own life. I helped build my companies using principles from books such as THINK AND GROW RICH by Napoleon Hill, THE MAGIC OF BELIEVING, by Claude Bristol, WHAT TO SAY WHEN YOU TALK TO YOUR SELF, by Dr. Shad Helmstetter, and the ADVENTURES IN ATTITUDES course by Bob Conklin.
In 1995 I relocated from the Akron, Ohio, area to Houston, Texas. I regularly spend time in both locales.
