Business Lunch

When it comes to growing and scaling your business, the 7 Levels of Scale give you everything you need to know and do—and in the exact order you need to do it.

In previous episodes, co-hosts Roland Frasier and Ryan Deiss have walked through levels 1-5 of their proven and powerful framework, The 7 Levels of Scale. In today’s episode, they’re discussing Level 6, Complete an Acquisition for Expansion. This level is one of Roland’s favorites. He’s acquired over 1000 businesses over the course of his career and has been in the trenches of acquisition more than anyone else Ryan has ever met.

Before you listen, make sure you’re all caught up on Levels 1-5. Here are all 7 in their very important, non-negotiable order:

• Level #1: Sell and serve 10 customers.
• Level #2: Build a growth flywheel.
• Level #3: Build an upgraded scalable operating system.
• Level #4: Double your take-home pay.
• Level #5: Build your advisory board.

• Level #6: Complete an acquisition for expansion.

• Level #7: Hit your number.

Once you’re caught up, listen in for everything you need to know about Completing an Acquisition for Expansion.

If this idea of acquiring businesses and assets is something that interests you, Roland has done multiple podcast episodes on the topic. He’s up to 220 ways to acquire a business. There’s no limit, and he’s constantly adding to the list. Every other month, he runs a 5-day EPIC challenge helping people acquire businesses.

Clients often ask Roland and Ryan: I could see acquiring a business to get into business, but why is it a level in this 7 levels of scale? Why is acquisition of another business a critical step to scaling a business you already have? 

Roland is quick to tell them that it’s not just his belief. The data supports it. Mergers and acquisitions have been proven to be one of the fastest ways to grow a company consistently. They absolutely need to be a part of your growth strategy. It makes sense. If you want to double the size of your business literally overnight, the simplest thing to do is acquire another business of the same size. 

Why do people want to grow their business? Some might say: I want to grow to achieve my goals. Okay, what can help you make that happen? Most of us know about a horizontal acquisition, acquiring our competitors. If you acquire a competitor, you’ve decreased your competition and increased your market share. It could be a replacement product or substitute or the same product but to a different audience.

Maybe you want to acquire to solve a challenge you face, which is currently constraining your growth. A common one is: I need more customers, so I need more leads. You could buy the customers directly by buying the competitor, or you could acquire the media that already exists, where somebody has already aggregated the eyeballs of your ideal client.

Ryan asks a great question: Why would we, who own DigitalMarketer, need to acquire media? Because everyone needs more leads, and it’s only smart to get them for the best deal possible. DM looks everywhere for leads—across channels and platforms, organic vs. paid. One of the richest veins of customers is finding someone who’s already gathered...

When you’re looking to acquire businesses, you can go vertical or horizontal, or you can even acquire intellectual property. Everything’s for sale if you know where to look.

In this week’s snackable episode, host Roland Frasier talks about the differences between vertical and horizontal integrations and how both of those can be the ticket to higher profit margins. You can also acquire intellectual property in creative ways to help breathe new life into your company. Once you start making these unconventional acquisitions, the whole world is going to open up to you.

Listen in as he shares some acquisition ideas that have worked well for him.

How can I get a higher profit margin? How can I make more profit off the customer relationship that I’ve got right now? These are great questions. The easiest way to do that is what business schools call vertical integration.

A horizontal integration is for when you’re interested in acquiring more market share. You sell microphones, and you go out and acquire a company, a competitor, that also sells microphones. If they sell the same amount as you, you’ve just doubled your sales overnight.

A vertical integration is going up your supply chain to acquire whoever is supplying you with a product or service you’re offering. You manufacture microphones by acquiring several components from other manufacturers that you assemble into microphones. So you do an acquisition of those parts manufacturers.

During this pandemic, it’s been really difficult to get supplies. There are over 100 container ships backed up in the LA/Long Beach port area. Millions of dollars’ worth of supplies are stuck. Maybe you could diversify the risk of your supply chain by acquiring some domestic manufacturers or suppliers of the products you want.

That’s up the supply chain. You can also go down the distribution chain. If you’re not selling directly to the consumer, then any company between you and your consumer is one you could acquire. What if you acquired a website that’s selling your microphones? Or you acquired a music store that’s selling your microphones? Owning your distribution chain will increase your profits.

What if you don’t have a physical product? What if you sell an intellectual product like a course? It gets more complicated when you think of a service. Maybe you have affiliates or you’re paying affiliate or referral fees. You can acquire your affiliates.

Let’s say you have a digital marketing agency. There’s a decent chance that you are outsourcing some of the services you provide. Most of the time, there’s either outsourced SEO or content or media buying. Maybe you buy the ads agency that’s doing your Facebook or YouTube ads. 

Maybe you sell ice cream, and winter is slow. Or you sell pool toys or sleds or skis or some other product people use seasonally. If you want to smooth out the peaks and valleys in your revenue, how could you acquire something people are paying for on a recurring basis? This can be either MRR (monthly recurring revenue) or ARR (annual recurring revenue). What can you sell that people need to replace on a recurring basis?

What about a flower subscription? Or a beauty product someone uses regularly and will run out of? How can you recurrify the things you offer right now? Or what other consumable products or services could you acquire that people want on a monthly basis?

Intellectual...

When it comes to growing and scaling your business, the 7 Levels of Scale give you everything you need to know and do—and in the exact order you need to do it.

In previous episodes, co-hosts Roland Frasier and Ryan Deiss have walked through levels 1-4 of their proven and powerful framework, The 7 Levels of Scale. In today’s episode, they’re unpacking Level 5, Build Your Board. This board of advisors is a carefully curated group of people who will help guide you in the direction you want to go with your business.

The sequence of these levels is crucial here. The framework only works in this order: 

• Level #1: Sell and serve 10 customers.
• Level #2: Build a growth flywheel.
• Level #3: Build an upgraded scalable operating system.
• Level #4: Double your take-home pay.

• Level #5: Build your advisory board.

• Level #6: Complete an acquisition for expansion.
• Level #7: Hit your number.

So catch up on episodes if you need to, then listen in for everything you need to know about Building Your Board.

When you have a corporation, legally, there are different levels of people who have a role in the company. The first level is the owners, the shareholders. They elect the Board of Directors. The Board of Directors is responsible for creating the strategic vision of the company. Then, to execute the vision, they elect officers like CEO and President. 

Roland and Ryan are talking about a different kind of board: a Board of Advisors. This board of people will give you guidance toward moving in a direction you want to go. The biggest distinction between the Board of Directors and the Board of Advisors is this: The Board of Directors is really there to advocate for the shareholder, to make sure everything at the company is happening like it should. That may or may not include you. The Board of Advisors, on the other hand, is primarily there to support you. 

The nice thing about a Board of Advisors is that you can have as many as you want, helping in all the areas you need help in, and they don’t get to control anything. They’re truly just giving you advice. 

Broadly speaking, your Board of Advisors should be made up of two types of people: mentors and peers. Mentors are the people who have been where you want to go. Obviously, they’re a critical aspect. They’ll help you with your endgame and close skills gaps, broaden your network, and hold you accountable.

You also need peers. A mistake a lot of people make is filling their Board with only mentors. You need peers who are also in the trenches, but maybe in slightly different areas. These peers will help you through some bottlenecks, call you on your shiny object syndrome, commiserate on losses, and also help you celebrate some wins. 

After mentors and peers, there are two more categories you might consider. The first is strategics, people you aspire to do business with, people who are a connection to a business you want to get, people with a big network you want to tap into. Can you get someone on the board that’s part of a business you want as a strategic business partner? It doesn’t hurt to get to know those people upfront, sooner rather than later. These could be people with a financial or legal background, or a traditional retail background. Basically, anyone who knows things that will be valuable to you.

Roland likes to add an optional category: celebrity. Celebrities can bring huge

When you’re looking to acquire, you don’t always have to buy a whole business. Sometimes you can just buy the part of the business you actually need.

In today’s episode, host Roland Frasier walks us through some unconventional mergers and acquisitions, different ways to buy parts of companies instead of the whole thing. Maybe you just want to buy someone’s media, their list of consumers. Maybe you buy a podcast or Facebook group. Maybe you buy a company’s sales team or a certain product they sell that you’d like to add to your offerings. The possibilities are virtually endless.

Listen in as Roland shares a whole list of great acquisition ideas based on his own extensive experience. 

If you’re looking for more leads, there’s no better way to get them than to acquire media from a business that has already aggregated the attention and eyeballs of your ideal customer. To identify this business, ask: Who’s already got the customers I want? Who’s already gone through the trouble and effort to get a bunch of them together? 

This could be a whole business, but it’s more likely to be something like a podcast. Maybe it’s an ecommerce podcast, and your ideal customer is an ecommerce customer. If you acquire it, you’ve got media access to a pool of customers you’d like to send to your other business.

Roland buys a lot of Facebook groups. For his dog business, he buys specific types of breed owner groups, like a dachshund owner group or a German Shepherd owner group. For his real estate business, he’ll buy a Facebook group that already has a whole bunch of real estate agents in it. He’s looking for the exact aggregated lists of our ideal customers. 

In addition to podcasts and Facebook groups, you could acquire a YouTube channel, an existing business, a trade show, or websites that already rank in the Google search you’re interested in. It’s really easy to find media, and it’s really cool once you get it. 

Because now, especially with the death of the 3rd party cookie, the iOS 14 updates, and privacy rules and changes, it’s harder to get your word out to the exact targeted audience you want. If you already own the media (aka, the first party data or your list), you’re expanding your list by acquiring groups of your ideal customer that you can now market your message to. That’s a big benefit.

Did you know you can buy a company’s marketing team or sales team or whatever kind of team you need for your own business? It’s hard to start something from scratch. Let’s say you want to start an inside sales team, but you don’t have a salesforce. You’ve never been a salesperson, and you know nothing about how to find them, recruit them, vet them, qualify them, compensate them, but someone else has already done it. You can just acquire their team.

When Roland was looking to launch software development, none of his people had ever done software development management. They hadn’t found employees or qualified them. They didn’t know how to monitor their work, speed, or effectiveness. Rather than start a software dev team from scratch, Roland found a company he was already paying for their software product and acquired their software dev team. 

This is often called an acqui-hire. Whatever you need, that team has already been formed somewhere and you might be able to go out, identify, and hire them. Does someone already in your network—that you’re already working with—have a team you could acquire? This is really a great strategy.

You might also want to be thinking about resources. Roland’s business runs big events, and they’ve got thousands...

One of the absolute best ways to create massive amounts of wealth in a short period of time is utilizing your knowledge and expertise to gain equity in companies.

In today’s episode, we switch things up a little bit. Host Roland Frasier becomes the interviewee, while Ed O’Keefe sits in the interviewer’s chair. Ed is an absolute legend in the internet marketing space and has helped transform countless businesses and industries. One of Roland’s favorite topics, consulting for equity, has quickly become one of Ed’s as well. The two sit down to explore Roland’s journey through creating this path to wealth and lay out a vision for others who want to go down that path too.

Listen in to see if consulting for equity is something you might be qualified to do.

As Roland sees it, there are a lot of ways you can be compensated for something. He explains them in levels that build on each other.

Level #1: Give free advice. People ask us questions, want our expertise, and because we’re good humans and want to help people, we share. Yes, you should share, but where do you draw the line so you’re not spending all of your time giving things away for free? There has to be a point at which you say, I’m willing to share, but in the context of a short exchange. 

Level #2: Turn that knowledge into an actual, compensable skill. Roland did that for years as an attorney. But even if you can bill, say, $1000/hour and bill 2000 hours a year, you’re only making $2 million. That’s where you're capped out. Roland calls this the Dancing Bear. As long as you dance, people throw money, but the minute you stop, no money. That’s the dollars-for hours-trap. 

Level #3: Charge a flat fee. Maybe you could charge $1000 for something that doesn’t take you long to do. You’re making more than you would with an hourly rate, but you’re still really limited.

Level #4: Revenue share. Someone has a project you’re going to consult on. You’ll talk about it together, and you’ll make it happen for them. They know you’ll create a continuing value for them through that thing. Anything that comes through that effort you’ve made to create that intellectual property asset you own, you’re effectively licensing it to them and receiving some of the revenue from it.

Level #5: Consulting for equity. Over the years, Roland has helped people build a brand, then watched them sell their businesses over and over for multiples of what he received. Any time you’re a consultant, the rev share goes away at some point or doesn’t pan out like you thought. Or maybe it’s a campaign that only lasts for a year. How can you get compensated on a continuing basis for things you did? You become a part of the whole company. You get a piece of equity/ownership in the company in exchange for your knowledge and expertise. He started saying: “I’ll help you with this problem or challenge, but if I do, I want some ownership in the company.” And now he does that to scale.

When you help people for free, free has no value. People don’t have skin in the game, so they’re less likely to take action on the things you help them with. Roland had a friend who he had given free advice to over the years and nothing had changed. The friend called again recently and asked what he should do, and Roland said, “You need to hire me. If you don’t, you won’t take action.” With love, the best thing he can do is have them invest in themselves. This friend paid $25k for four hours on Roland’s couch. 

Sometimes you offer free advice in the hopes that it will lead to a...

There are a number of trend-based marketing opportunities you can leverage to achieve profit breakthroughs in 2022.

In today’s episode, host Roland Frasier shares 5 more business trends you’ll want to know about, and stay on top of, in the coming year. In Part 1, he talked about:

1. ESG
2. DEI
3. The Great Resignation
4. Supply reallocation
5. AI

Listen in for trends #6 through #10 as well as practical, actionable steps to help you take advantage of them starting today.

Trend #6: Web 3.0

This one is huge. Roland believes it’s the most important, most long-lasting, and will have the biggest impact because it will replace a lot of giant incumbent tech companies. You need to have an awareness of Web 3.0, what it is, how you’ll be affected by it, and how to take advantage of it. In simplest terms, Web 3.0 is basically block chain technology. 

Here’s the cool thing. What it really is going to do (and is doing) is democratize the ability of any creator to own their audience. The challenge in the past has been that, if you’re on Facebook and create a giant group, and Facebook decides they don’t like you, you lose it all. There’s no due process. It’s not fair.

Imagine instead that all of your audiences are completely portable. You aren’t relying on a social media platform. You get exposed to an audience on a platform, get booted, and get to bring your audience with you. Web 3.0 says, that when you work hard to build an audience, you get to keep the loyalty of that audience and take it wherever you want. 

This will be game-changing. Opportunities will pop up that will become alternatives to social media platforms. Hopefully it will force incumbents to be better. Take any chance you get to participate and invest in Web 3.0 companies. Get your content out there in some of these places too. Help other people understand NFTs and Web 3.0.

Also, just generally across the block chain, look for opportunities to get involved with businesses and products coming out of it.

Trend #7: Authenticity

This is an opportunity to help companies understand that their audiences want to know the truth. They don’t want fake photoshopped things. They want real people telling them how things really are. The heavy-produced photo shoots don’t convert as well as simple iPhone videos. People are looking for ways to recapture “real.”

What are the opportunities there? First, become someone who’s authentic and real. Test authenticity against whatever you had out there before. How can we be more real, more connected and communicative with our audience? How can you help other companies do that? How can you facilitate migration to authenticity? How can you coach those companies and create services and opportunities? 

Social purpose goes hand in hand with this. Be authentic in supporting some social good out in the world. 

Trend #8: Coopetition, Integration, and Strategic Partnerships

This is where companies are competing with each other and also cooperating in their competition. Coopetition is a big buzzword right now, but it’s hard for direct competitors to cooperate with each other, so Roland isn’t sure how successful it’s going to be. Facilitating coopetition could be an opportunity for you, a way to make a name for yourself in a blue ocean field.

We’ll definitely see more integrations, brands partnering with each other to release new products. Brands are able to create brand awareness with other brands’ audiences, helping their audience connect with a whole new brand with your endorsement. 

Ask: Who are the brands I would like...

When it comes to acquiring businesses, the best (and most fun) way to do it is to think outside the box.

On today’s episode, host Roland Frasier sits down with Joey Gilkey, Founder and CEO of Sales Driven Agency, a company that builds sales operations specifically for digital marketing agencies. Historically, marketing agencies are creative strategists, Joey says, not sales people. They’ve never built a sales operation or hired salespeople successfully. The agency space is unique in that they don’t have the same kind of margins as other companies and need to operate differently. They need the kind of help Joey has to offer. 

There’s more to Joey than what he’s doing now. He says he picked this niche because he has a grander plan than just helping agencies with sales. His big plan involves acquiring businesses in some pretty creative ways.

Listen in and be inspired.

Joey has been in the agency space for a decade. He knows agencies super well. He even has a mastermind for 7- and 8-figure agencies. He knows how to grow revenue. He can add 7 figures to an agency by building out a sales operation, but there are areas where he can’t help—operations and fulfillment, for example. That’s his next problem to solve. He personally doesn’t have that background, but he can buy a company that does.

His bigger picture is to become a super company for agencies. He wants to do it all—sales operations, fulfillment, sourcing fractional accounting that serves agencies, etc. He’s acquiring for growth. 

Someone else has put in the hard work of building an audience and trust, and they don’t know how to use/monetize it. Joey has plenty of offers. He would love to cut a deal and work something out, where they either drive their people to his offer or he just takes it over completely.

He’s done a lot of creative deal structuring. For example, he once bought a Facebook group from someone. Talk about an innovative way to acquire someone’s work and audience. How did he structure the deal? He offered them 10% of everything he makes from people in the group.

He’s under contract right now with a company that does fulfillment and operations. They serve the same clients he does, but they have a bigger list. They’ve been working together so well that he thought to himself: instead of making a referral fee, why not own the company I refer people to?

He threw out a simple offer to get the ball rolling ($3.9 million), and they came back with $4.2 million. He said it wasn’t worth that and got creative. He offered a 10-year seller finance, 10% down payment, 5-year balloon, 4% interest, at a $4.5 million valuation with a 6-month deferred down payment. They said it was too complex, and they went back to his original offer but kept some commissions. They made a few other compromises and had a deal.

Moral of the story? Get creative and get it done.

RESOURCES:

• salesdrivenagency.com

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There are a number of trend-based marketing strategies you can implement to achieve profit breakthroughs in 2022.

In today’s episode, host Roland Frasier gives us the inside scoop on a lot of cool things going on right now in the business world. He walks us through the first five today and will share the rest in an upcoming episode. 

Listen in if you want to stay on top of both what’s happening now and what’s coming down the pike.

This is one you hear a lot about in the investment banking world. ESG stands for Environmental, Social, and Governance. There’s a tremendous focus right now on sustainability and corporate responsibility to keep the environment healthy (E), doing social good (S), and building in protections against the companies doing bad things (G).

There are a lot of funds right now set up to do ESG investing. The more focused we are on being sustainable, environmentally-conscious, and socially responsible, the more we’ll get business from these bigger companies focused on it. Consumers are demanding this too, so you’re winning on both sides.

Ask yourself: what could I do in my business, or what business could I acquire to become more sustainable? Things like rethinking your supply chain, reducing your carbon footprint, and giving back environmentally. From a social perspective, what can I do to contribute? Give back to your local community or the world at large, or specific organizations like Black Lives Matter.

Yes, there are a lot of acronyms to keep track of. DEI stands for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. From a diversity (D) standpoint, when it comes to the people working with us—at all levels of the business—we should be diverse both racially and socio-economically. 

How can we get people of different genders, however they might identify, to get involved in the company so we can get different perspectives? How can we be friendly to the LGBTQ+ community? Not just people we’re selling to, but people in management, in executive positions, on the board. Studies have shown that diverse companies are more profitable, come up with more ideas, and are more innovative.

The equity (E) part is how do we give people ownership and have stakeholders that are diverse? Stakeholders who will profit and be uplifted by their involvement and the things they contribute to the company.

Inclusion (I) is very broad. How are we going to be aware of all these different interests out there, and how can we serve them? What opportunities do we have in the company to bring these diverse viewpoints in and how can we facilitate this? There’s a lot of money flowing to companies that are DEI-aware. This is a huge trend and theme in 2022, and will probably go for the rest of this decade. 

There’s a whole flow of people, mostly young people, leaving their jobs saying, “I’m not happy with where I am. I’m not happy with the progress I’m making, with the prospects I have of getting to do something profitable and fulfilling and socially responsible.” People want to contribute to the world, feel good, and take care of themselves.

The Great Resignation is creating real problems for businesses. The opportunity here to think about is: how do we serve all the people who are leaving the workforce and starting businesses for the first time? People want to be entrepreneurs and go into business for themselves. 

Starting a business is really hard, so you’re going to see people wanting to reenter the workforce, but in better jobs. We’ll need career counselors, headhunters, people to help...

What if you could use the same five-step formula that helps candidates win elections to win big at digital marketing?

On today’s episode, host Roland Frasier sits down with Phillip Stutts, CEO of Win Big Media to talk about using data to grow your business. Phillip worked in political campaigns for years, using a systematic formula to elect candidates (1433 victories!). When he turned 40, his answer to the stereotypical midlife crisis was to start a business in a new-to-him industry. 

Five years ago, a business owner, a large landowner, came to him. He had hired a marketing agency and spent $50k on a marketing campaign and got one lead, not even a sale. After working with Phillip’s team, and spending just $5k, they got him over 700 leads, and he converted a bunch of them.

Phillip realized that the same formula used in successful political campaigns could be used in companies’ marketing campaigns as well. They just needed to take 5 simple, important steps.

Phillip can’t count how many times a business owner has come to him and told me they spent so much money on marketing and produced no results and fired a marketer. It’s like a broken record. He always asks them: what did you know about your customer data before you built your brand? 

In politics, before he spends any of his candidate’s money, he has to make sure they know what the voter cares about. The voter doesn’t care about a 25-issue platform. You can do a survey, get some data in the field, and figure out the two main issues they care about, that would get them to vote for you. 

Phillip is obsessed with Step 1 and formed a partnership with a data and analytics company. Before you spend any money, he can tell you everything you need to know about your customer. The data is the most important thing. He won’t work with any client who isn’t willing to do a deep dive understanding of their customers. It’s just not worth it to him. 

His team started working with a title company that wanted to be #1. Their customer is the real estate agent, not the house buyer. Phillip’s team found that 61% of the realtors in their target market owned dogs. They started running campaign ads with dogs, and now they’re #1 in their region and #3 in the state. Realtors come into the title company to close on a house and say, “I saw your dog ads and loved them.” It’s all about making meaningful connections, because you know what they want.

Phillip says that Step 2 is where everybody screws up. Almost everyone is running a marketing campaign based on tactics. You have to put a strategic plan together that aligns the vision of the company with what the customer wants. You have to align your budget with where your customer actually is.

Building the brand is not Step 1 like a lot of people think. It’s a waste of time to build your brand haphazardly without first studying the data to figure out what your customer wants and putting together a strategic plan.

You’ve got to run test ads before you launch your campaign. You’ve got to compare at least two versions of something to see which one performs better. Successful political candidates run all kinds of test ads in all different versions. It’s the best way to get it right.

Now that you’ve eliminated your risk in

The final steps to acquiring a company are very important. Do them well, and you’ll be the proud new owner of a business.

This is the third and final episode of an invaluable series where Roland Frasier has been walking us through some important questions to ask when buying a business. All three episodes are important, but this one in particular will help you finish strong.

Listen in, take notes, then go connect with Roland on social media (Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn). He’d love to hear what you took away from these episodes and what you’d like to hear next on the podcast. 

In the previous episode, you were finding common touchpoints and building rapport with the owner of the business you want to acquire. You showed interest, asked questions, got them talking, so you could take notes to help you craft an offer.

Once you’ve had that conversation, the next set of questions is more specific. Roland has a target data information sheet he fills out. You don’t need a financial statement to get these questions answered. Here are some of them:

• What is the top level sales?
• What is the profitability of the company?
• What are the assets and liabilities of the company?
• What kind of cash is in the company?
• What are the accounts receivable/payable? 
• What is the long-term debt of the company?
• Does it own any real estate?
• What other assets does it have?
• Does it have inventory?
• How many employees do they have?
• What is the owner’s reason for selling?
• What will they do going forward?

The reason you ask that last question is because you want them to get excited about life after business. Then you’ve built a common goal. 

A lot of people believe businesses to acquire can be found through online and offline brokers of businesses. The truth is, those are really the worst deals. Here’s why. Think about when you list a house. You’re emotionally invested in it, so you typically think it’s worth more than it really is. When someone goes to a broker to sell their house or business, the broker will say, “What do you want for it?” They’ll either say, “I don’t know” or “I want x.” The broker has to think of how to keep the seller’s expectations reasonable and get the deal. There’s a compulsion to let someone list something for sale at a higher price than they can actually get for it. You’re fighting against a seller’s expectation. Plus they need to get enough to pay the broker. If you have someone who has received multiple offers they’ve turned down, that will be helpful for you, but you’re still going to pay the highest price the broker can get. 

Wouldn’t it be better if you could get off-market deals that aren’t listed? Or deals that were listed but the listing expired? They’ve gone through the “expectation curve” process and are much more reasonable in what they’ll accept. Keep in mind that 80% of businesses listed do not sell.

Roland recommends finding businesses organically. You’re probably not going to find businesses by running an ad. Most of this happens through word of mouth and networking. The more you meet people and tell them what you’re doing and what you’re looking for, the more likely it is that you’ll meet someone who knows someone who can refer you to...