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Find great businesses and getting a great deal
Hint: you throw the 'normal' deals in trash
Buying companies sounds great in theory.
And to some extent, it is…
You have capital → You buy a great product → Scale it using your knowledge
Then, either flip it or enjoy the cash flow forever.
But here’s the catch:
❌ Good products are HARD to find
❌ You’re in competition with 10s of buyers
❌ You lose a ton of money if the product goes south
The solution?
✅ Knowing what product to buy
✅ How to avoid competition and be the first person coming to their mind
✅ Structuring a deal so that you and the seller make more $$$
Here’s how you do that 👇
Knowing ‘your‘ products
If you follow me on Twitter, it feels like I do many things without real coherence.
But I have a clear thesis: I build/buy B2B products for creators which will help them earn more.
You should have a thesis too.
Every product is great (for someone at least).
But not every product is great for you.
So list out your minimum requirements and set them as basic filters:
> Tech stack
> B2B vs B2C
> Minimum MRR
> A lot more points…
This will eliminate 80-85% of companies from the get-go.
So much time and effort saved.
Strategic networking
If you are on social media — Be social.
Sounds basic, but almost no one does this.
Whenever I see a product and founder I’d like to potentially work with/buy a product from — I DM them.
Nothing serious. Just general chit chat. And that way I build a genuine relationship with most of them.
This does 2 things:
1/ I make new friends across the globe!
2/ If they ever want to sell, I’m the first person that comes to their mind
win-win.
Structuring the deal
I’ve saved the best for last.
Most people just pay a multiple of ARR and be done with it.
But they forget that structuring a deal is not a templatized process that only goes 1 way.
Here’s what I do:
I buy assets, not the company.
This is important, you don’t wanna go down the buying the company rabbit hole.
Then: I offer the seller ‘Income levels to be unlocked' at various product milestones.
Let’s take an example of a $5k MRR product:
Normal deal:
$200k — paid and over.
My deal:
$50k upfront for all the assets + $75k at $10k MRR + $100k at $25k MRR + $200k at $50k MRR.
This way:
1/ I get to buy the company for less money
2/ The seller earns way more than the traditional means
3/ I lose less money if the product doesn’t work
This is the exact deal structure I followed for typeframes.com (not the same numbers of course)
That’s it for today!
Find great products, build meaningful relationships, and do smart business!
If you have more ideas/advice for finding businesses and structuring deals, reply to this email 👇 I read every reply!
Tweet of the week
Are you wealthy? or are you rich on paper?
Today's podcast guest firmly believes that cash flow is king.
So much so that he even calls the following his 10 second MBA:
— PrivateEquityGuy (@PrivatEquityGuy)
12:21 PM • May 28, 2024
That’s it for this week!
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See you next Thursday!
Keep building
Tibo 💻