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Happy Friday! In case we haven't met, I'm Kevin (aka KO), founder of Diffactory, where we help business owners figure out what their company is actually worth and what to do about it. I'm a Certified Exit Planning Advisor, a black belt, and a skateboarder who grew up in his mom's board shop, which taught me about what happens when a business consumes a family and leaves them with nothing to show for it. That's more or less why I do this work. I send one email a week with everything I'm learning about building businesses that don't fall apart when the founder steps away. Founder HQ is the community where we go deeper. It's on Skool, it's where the owners who are actually doing the work hang out. Let's roll.... The 20% of businesses that sell Most owners think selling their business starts with a valuation and then listing with a broker. The broker puts together a package, lists it on BizBuySell or another private marketplace, and then waits for offers. When the numbers are strong and the buyer pool is frothy, the model works for about 20% of businesses. Those with recurring revenue, low owner dependency, diversified customers, and a story that tells itself on paper. The problem is that most businesses aren't clean. They're built around relationships and expertise that don't transfer easily, and brokers know it. The good ones are selective about what they take on. They take listings they can close. The other 80% So let's say you're part of the 80% that won't sell. Maybe you have a loan liability, feel trapped, or just think you'd like out, but nobody's lining up to help you. You really have three paths:
1. You can love it again by rolling up your sleeves and fixing the issues that made it unsellable in the first place.
2. You can wind it down.
3. Or you can run an accelerated marketing event, which means building a targeted buyer list, following a structured process with a real timeline, and creating urgency and competition instead of hoping for it.
Think of it like selling a house. Passive is putting a sign in the yard. Active is calling every prospective buyer, staging an open house, doing a 3D tour, making your agent create an embarrassing TikTok, and setting a deadline for offers. We've made it our work to help the 80% find one of those paths forward. Next week, I'll break down what an active process looks like. Fixed timelines, sealed bids, pre-qualified buyers, and a structure built for the businesses that traditional channels can't move. Talk soon, -KO |