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Episode

The Secret to Selling Your Business for Maximum Value with Kevin Berson

Podcast
The B2B Growth Blueprint
Published
Mar 16, 2026
Duration seconds
1739
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Summary

Maximizing business valuation requires moving beyond a single unsolicited offer to a structured, competitive auction process. Kevin Berson explains how to prepare financials, leadership, and market positioning to attract private equity and strategic buyers.

Topics

  • Mergers and Acquisitions
  • Private Equity
  • Business Valuation
  • Exit Strategy
  • EBITDA
  • Due Diligence
  • Lower Middle Market
  • Strategic Buyers

Highlights

  • Main idea: A competitive auction process is the only way to drive higher offers and control the deal timeline
  • Failure mode: Relying on a single unsolicited offer often leads to buyers using exclusivity to find reasons to lower the price
  • Practical takeaway: Prepare your business 1–3 years in advance by cleaning up financials, KPIs, and leadership structures
  • Strategic insight: Understand the difference between being a 'platform' company versus an 'add-on' to better target the right buyers
  • Critical risk: High customer concentration (e.g., 70% of revenue from two clients) is a major red flag during buyer due diligence

Chapters

  1. 1:00 Navigating the $10M–$100M Exit Market: An overview of how Connected Advisors manages the M&A process, from outreach to post-closing transitions.
  2. 3:10 The Consultant's Perspective: Kevin discusses his background in consulting and how seeing business transitions shaped his approach to advisory.
  3. 7:25 Current M&A Market Trends: An analysis of the current 'murky' market where more capital is chasing fewer high-quality deals.
  4. 9:35 Platform vs. Add-on Acquisitions: The mechanics of synergy arbitrage and how companies are bought to be integrated into larger private equity platforms.
  5. 11:40 What Buyers Look For in a Platform: The importance of scalable processes, technology, and a clear vision when attracting premium buyers.
  6. 13:50 The Danger of Unsolicited Offers: How buyers use initial offers to trap sellers in exclusivity and subsequently renegotiate terms downward.
  7. 15:55 Controlling the Deal Cadence: Strategies for using competitive bidding to dictate the timeline and prevent buyers from running the seller around.
  8. 18:05 The Importance of EBITDA Accuracy: Why precise financial reporting is critical, as buyers will aggressively audit EBITDA during due diligence.