Scale Up With Nick Bradley

Nick delves into the darker side of private equity. While acknowledging the positive aspects of private equity, such as wealth creation and entrepreneurial freedom, Nick explores the psychological game of private equity M&A. He poses the question, "Are you the prize or the prey?" and explains how private equity views business owners as assets. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Private equity firms play a game of buying low to sell high, and it's important for business owners to understand this dynamic when selling their company. Being aware of the tactics and strategies used by private equity firms can help business owners negotiate better deals and avoid being taken advantage of.
• Business owners need to determine whether they are the prize or the prey in the eyes of potential buyers, particularly private equity firms. If a business has high cash flow, sustainable growth, a competitive advantage, and a strong culture, it is more likely to be seen as the prize. On the other hand, if a business has weak financials and lacks these key attributes, it may be seen as the prey and buyers may use the weaknesses to negotiate a lower price.
• Falling into the prey category can result in a significantly lower sale price and less advantageous terms for the business owner. Private equity firms may use various tactics, such as renegotiating the price during due diligence or structuring the deal with unfavorable terms, to reduce the value of the business and maximize their own returns.
• Business owners who position themselves as the prize and demonstrate their value and worthiness as a seller are more likely to negotiate better deals and secure higher sale prices. Confidence, preparation, and understanding the playbook of private equity firms can give business owners an advantage in the negotiation process.
• It is crucial for business owners to be aware of the potential risks and pitfalls of selling to private equity firms. These risks include the possibility of a retrade, where the buyer reduces the agreed-upon price after conducting due diligence, as well as the potential for reputational damage if a failed sale process becomes known in the market. 

BEST MOMENTS

"The difference between being the prize and the prey can be a life-changing sum of money."

"You want to walk into any sales process as the prize."

"If you're seen as a peer, the games that the private equity firms play won't work on you."

"You may not be ready right now, but there will be a time in the future when you need to be the prize."

"Don't let the process of selling your business become a car crash. Prepare and understand the playbook."

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.

https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.

His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.

His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

Charles Byrd is one of the most connected people in the online space and knows how to help set up lucrative promotional deals that have his clients and students booking multi 7-figures in new business. Charles's work on relationships, joint ventures, and frictionless systems, has been featured in the likes of Forbes, ABC News, SiriusXM and the Science Of Success.

Charles joins Nick to talk about one of the most important drives of growth in business - joint ventures and strategic partnerships.

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• If your primary lead source is a social media network that could be co-opted, hacked or even shut down, then you're building your success upon a house of cards.
• Partnerships are independent of each other and consist of "warm traffic", which can lead to much higher returns on connection.
• You have to know what a winning outcome looks like for you when it comes to partnerships. Think about what you hope to achieve, and celebrate the moment when you reach it.
• The Invisible Pitch demonstrates authority, momentum, and guides towards the outcome that you are seeking.

BEST MOMENTS

'This is one of the most important things to add to your repertoire if you want to build a high value company'

'With joint ventures, you're only paying commissions based on actual sales made, meaning that you are paying commission with money you wouldn't have had otherwise'

'Look for winning outcomes'

'It's a way to be useful without getting wrapped around the spokes'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

Charles Byrd - https://www.charlesbyrd.com

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

You don't always have to say yes to everything in order to get ahead in the world. Sometimes, this "entrepreneurial curse" can lead to great things, but as Nick explains in this episode, there's also a great power to be found in saying no from time to time.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• As entrepreneurs, we often feel as though if we say no to something, that we will somehow be missing out. This fear of missing out can often land us with headaches we can do without.
• Write down 25 goals on a piece of paper (business-related), then circle the top five. Look at what is remaining and decide for yourself whether these secondary goals are worth pursuing.
• The real threats to our time management are not the distractions we think are taking our attention. The real threats are the hidden activities, that make us think we're working hard, but which do not ultimately move the needle.

BEST MOMENTS

'There is power in saying no in your business'

'If you can get disciplined and focussed on your top 20% of priorities, then they will typically account for 80% of your business'

'You have to eliminate those distractions'

'it's easy to say yes, it's hard to say no'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

To become a part of the first Scale-To-Sale Mastermind visit highvalueexit.com and register now

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

Meet Cameron Herold, the visionary who, at the age of 42, engineered 1-800-GOT-JUNK?'s spectcular growth from a $2 Million company to a jaw-dropping $106 Million in revenue in just six years. Not only that, his companies scored over 5,200 media placements, including Oprah!

Not simply a theory guy, Cameron teaches what he knows from experience and is passionate about sharing his expertise with today’s most dynamic business leaders.

Cameron joins Nick this week to discuss his most recent book, 'Second In Command', and what the most important role in any business is when you're trying to scale a company.

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Managers and leaders are very different people. Managers tend to fix problems by hiring more people, whereas leaders empower the already existing teams.
• When looking for your ideal COO, you have to understand yourself as a CEO first. Look at your strengths and weaknesses as well as the core areas of the business that feed your energy.
• You have to define the roles you give to people and what they're there to do. You can't empower people and then revoke at will.
• Never be afraid to turn people down. True leaders have to say no more than they say yes. We are there to grow and empower others, but we shouldn't ever have to give it all away.

BEST MOMENTS

'You have to understand yourself as a CEO first'

'I try to find the parts of the company that drain me of energy, and then I find someone who's really good at those things'

'It's an art or skill that executives need to hone - to say no to people'

'The great senior people are never out looking for a job'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

Cameron Herold - www.cameronherold.com

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

What makes your company unique and remarkable when you're pitching? Which lessons could you take from the world-renowned business model pioneered by Apple?

Nick answers these questions and explains all in this episode.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• When it comes to pitching, many business owners struggle to crystallise everything they've created into a core concept and saleable snapshot.
• A win-theme are the five bullet points that, when explained to anyone, describe why your company is valuable and crucial to other people.
• If you hope to bake the best cake in the world, there will always be ingredients that every other cake has to have, but the unique ingredients are what makes you stand out. It is the same in business.
• Branding and its quality are significant factors that drive value. When you can ensure that individuals perceive you as a premium experience, they will consistently strive to be a part of that level of quality.

BEST MOMENTS

'People love the entire Apple experience'

'If you can't name the five things that make your business remarkable, then that's your homework this week'

'Trust me that this will be very important to your entrepreneurial journey'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

To become a part of the first Scale-To-Sale Mastermind visit highvalueexit.com and register now

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

Justin Cooke is the founder of Empire Flippers, a company that he has taken from zero revenue, to selling over $450 million worth of businesses in just ten years.

Justin joins Nick to discuss his incredible talent for acquisitions, as well as his new business, Webstreet, which aims to invest in online businesses as an asset class.

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Online businesses are being aggregated together in order to provide a more saleable concern, and so that private equity can be attracted.
• Many entrepreneurs don't even realise that their businesses are in a sellable state. Justin and Empire Flippers are helping business owners to hugely profitable exits.
• Often businesses are bought as platforms, where a company is purchased as a starting point, and several adjacent businesses are acquired and added to it.
• There needs to be a certain basic skill set for those who buy an online business, which limits the audience when it comes to potential buyers.

BEST MOMENTS

'You need to think about having breadth and depth across your portfolio'

'We call it exits for the rest of us'

'The education's out there. You can partner with people'

'This is a high class problem to solve'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

Justin Cooke at Empire Flippers - https://empireflippers.com/about-us/justin-cooke/

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

In the fourth part of his series on Breaking Through Business Growth, Nick discusses the platforming stage of scaling up, and how it ties into value expansion and strategic thinking.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• You can only scale up through people, processes and systems. As a leader, your identity has to shift in order for you to be successful.
• When a business becomes a platform, it's an acquisition that acts as a starting point for other acquisitions in that sector.
• A platformed business creates value by facilitating exchanges between consumers and producers of goods and services. For this to happen there has to be a large network of users and resources.
• The fundamental requirement if you want to take your company from a business to a platform, is having a strong management team in place.

BEST MOMENTS

'It's not an easy road'

'Showing that you can do these things before your life changing exit is a positive thing'

'We're talking about taking what you have created and being able to transition that to another buyer'

'When you break through this final stage, you are becoming the platform'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

To become a part of the first Scale-To-Sale Mastermind visit highvalueexit.com and register now

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

Brandon Steiner is a globally-renowned sports marketer, who published his first book, The Business Playbook: Leadership Lessons from the World of Sports in 2003.

Brandon joins Nick this week to talk about his humble beginnings and how he learned the art of entrepreneurship through some very unique methods, the values he obtained from his family, and the most invaluable lessons he's learned from the world of sport.

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• The secret to being a great marketer is to not just like people, but understand them - relate to them, lead with empathy and compassion and stand in someone else's shoes.
• If the route to a solution isn't clear then hustle. Look for another way around the challenge. There's always a way to defy the odds and win.
• As a leader you have to have a vision, and the ability to take that vision and find a way to sell it. It's about finding paths to success, as though leading your tribe to safety and sustenance.
• Don't ever confuse managing with leading. Sometimes blending them can work, but in the long term it generally doesn't

BEST MOMENTS

'Get out of your freakin' head'

'Once you understand where people are coming from, you can see the white space'

'It's not who you know or what you know, but what you know about who'

'Leadership is very, very complicated'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

Brandon Steiner - https://brandonsteiner.com

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 
Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb
Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li
Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

Nick is joined by Ruari Fairbairns, the founder and CEO of One Year No Beer, to talk about alcohol - the impact it can have if you're a regular drinker, and what effects this can have on you as an entrepreneur.

Nick and Ruari also talk about the journey that led to such a groundbreaking, innovative concept as One Year No Beer, and what we can change if alcohol is showing up in our lives in ways that fail to serve us.

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• When you're a serious entrepreneur, you need to show up as your best self every single time - not just in business, but everywhere. The ones who do this, are the ones who last the longest.
• As business owners, the idea that alcohol is something we need to be participating in, in order to relax and unwind, really needs to change. The evidence against it is overwhelming.
• We must find other ways to "take the edge off" when it comes to relaxation. We need to subsidise and fund research into more healthy forms of "relaxation" with the help of the alcohol industry itself.
• The first step towards building a better relationship with alcohol is to remove the belief that you are an "all or nothing" person, and change that belief to one of feeling fully in control.

BEST MOMENTS

'I guarantee this will be one of the best things you can do for yourself'

'Entrepreneurship is a game of sustainability and attrition'

'I am entirely in control. I am entirely in control'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

One Year No Beer - https://www.oneyearnobeer.com

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/

In the third part of his mini-series on breaking through business growth, Nick focuses upon expanding value, and why it might be the most crucial part of your business exit strategy.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Most people think that they start a business and then exit a business, without really ever considering the crucial "expansion" phase that can dynamically increase the exit numbers beyond their initial expectations.
• Value expansion is sometimes referred to as the buy-and-build approach, because it encompasses the ways in which you bring companies together to create a group.
• Scaling is the art of making sure you are no longer the thing holding up your business's growth. It's the act of stepping out and putting into place processes that make your business thrive and breathe without you.
• When you bring in strategic partners, it's all about making sure that you've created a platform that can scale more assertively through strategic levers.

BEST MOMENTS

'This is kind of the centre point'

'The centre of value expansion is strategic growth'

'You have to ensure that you're not the bottleneck any more'

'You have to have the plan'

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Find out now if you’re building a high-value, exitable business (even if you have no immediate plans to sell it). You’ll get an instant PDF report with powerful insights specifically tailored to your business in just 4 minutes.
https://highvalueexit.scoreapp.com/

To become a part of the first Scale-To-Sale Mastermind visit highvalueexit.com and register now

ABOUT THE HOST 

Nick Bradley is a renowned entrepreneur, investor, speaker, and business growth expert.
His background is growing and scaling Venture Capital and Private Equity backed businesses globally. Over the last decade, he has completed 117 acquisitions and 25 business exits with a combined valuation of over $5bn dollars.
His mission is to help business founders build valuable businesses and create life-changing exits so they can realise freedom, wealth, and impact.

CONTACT METHOD

Work with Nick: https://highvalueexit.com 

Nick’s Facebook: https://highvalueexit.com/fb

Nick’s LinkedIn: https://highvalueexit.com/li

Nick’s Instagram: https://highvalueexit.com/ig

Support the show: https://highvalueexit.com/