The Exit Engine Podcast Episode 26: Know Your Brand Story

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See terms. Welcome to the Exit Engine Podcast, episode 26. Good morning, John.

Good morning, Joe.

How you doing, man?

I'm doing great. And yourself?

Very, very, very, very good. Uh, you know, you were, uh, We were talking the other day about stories and how much the story of your company matters in, in any of your M&A work and anything you do from an exit standpoint, from a capitalization standpoint, from any time that you're dealing with going to another company or another entity to get anything. The brand story really, really matters. And it's no less important. In fact, it's even more important than people realize. When you're talking about selling your company.

Yeah. And the most important, I mean, you know, people always talk about financials, financials, financials, financials. We always talk about it. It's part of our TEV system, obviously. But when you have a, when you're able to tell a story of the company that matches the financials, right? The, you know, we're in a growth mode right now. We're in a harvest mode. We're We're testing some things. We need some money to validate the concept. Like, those qualitative things that match with the quantitative things that investors are going to see is so important, A, for communication purposes, but people think in stories and people hear stories and they can fill in the gaps. They understand things. And when something doesn't match, right, when the numbers don't match the words, That's when people sort of get edgy and get, uh, get confused, and they often, uh, can walk away when they're confused.

That's exactly right. And so what you're trying to do is that most— it's very common that business brokers who are not major advisors, okay, they're not there to do the work of your company to get this thing, your company, ready for you. They might give you some tips and some ideas and look at some things and, and maybe bring some different people to bear if you need them and whatever. But one of the big differences between a broker and an advisor, right, is that an advisor like Exio, like us, are going to bring a bunch of different things to the table. All right. And one of the things that we bring to the table at Exio, for certainly we've made this a major part of what we do, is the development and creation of what we call the brand story, but is often called the story of the business. Right.

Yep.

And that company story, as John said, pointed out, is, is so important because it is the, it is the narrative behind the numbers, right? And if you're making, taking this time, which you should be, to before you put the business on the market, to examine the business, to be looking at the numbers and getting all the stuff right and making sure the financials are all in order Looking at all your operational efficiencies and deciding, you know, things that you— improvements that you can make there. As you go through all these things, right, you are setting the stage for what you need to do in order to move the ball forward, right? But communicating what you've done, why you've done what you've done, and why you haven't done some things that haven't been done, okay, becomes really the starting place Uh, really the end-all be-all for the, the, the, for the ability to be able now to market this company, your company, as a business for sale.

Yeah, and, and just like in any other communication, right, you want to be the one to define your company. You know, you don't want someone else, an investor, to, to, to fill in gaps or to make assumptions about your business. Sure, they can fill in some things like some minor details, but the arc of your company, the story of your company, what you are trying to do and what you are doing and have done is so critical because, again, they're gonna look at the numbers, they're gonna look at your processes, but hearing from the business owner what you've done and how you've set up your company for success is so important because, again, You are defining that story and you're writing that story, not being defined by somebody else.

No question about it. And I, and I think that, that there, there will be things, there will be idiosyncrasies, there will be things in the financials, there will be inflection points. Um, if you're just looking at the numbers, right? And again, most accountants can tell the story of the business by looking at the numbers, right? And so, but the problem is, is that there are going to be things in there potentially that either don't make sense. Are, are, it may be, again, from a numbers standpoint, something that a buyer doesn't want to see, but there's a really good explanation for it.

Yeah. Like, like, when a couple of our clients, we were preparing some, some financial statements for them and preparing projections for them. Excuse me. Um, yeah, I would like to achieve, I would like to have them, have them achieve profitability sooner, full stop. But, but in the re— But in reality, like, there's an investment standpoint to one of the companies I'm talking about specifically is that it takes time, right? Rome was not built in a day. The company needs to test, needs to optimize, needs to grow, and needs to harvest. Those are the 4 stages that we think of when we deal with companies in most cases. Sometimes you're getting an investment in the testing phase. Some seed investment, sometimes you're getting investment in the optimize phase, sometimes it's growth, sometimes it's harvest, but rarely it's harvest. But, but when you're telling the story to an investor of, oh, we're going to use this, we're going to use your money for, for this, for growth. Well, if you're going to use your money for growth and you don't have your product set yet, well, that's gonna— that's, that's something that's sort of incongruent with what, what people, what the investor is looking for. And if you're saying that by the same token, If you haven't tested your product or you haven't done all those things, that's gonna be a red flag to investors. So you're— so you're just— again, just to emphasize, the story must match the numbers and must match the projections that you're giving to these people.

That's exactly right. And again, what we want it to be also is the opportunity to be able to say, here's who I am, here's who my company is, what they— what we stand for, the work that we've done in the past and where we've come from and how we've gotten here. Right. And then also to be able to say, and then, and then be able to say, and this is what we've encountered in the present moment and what we expect to be able to gain moving forward. Right. And so, and when you say this stuff, right, it's not a matter of you want the numbers, you want, really want the other way around. You want the numbers to back up the story. Right. Yeah.

Yes.

Because again, and it might be that, and every investor is different and the way that they look at things and what they, the weight they put into it and the importance of things, it's all different. It's a very individualistic thing. But at the end of the day, what they, what we, what we have to be able to present to them, to a buyer, right? What we have to be able to use as the representation of the business as a product is what we have is we have the numbers, the financials, and we have this, what we call the story of the business or the brand story, right? And again, you know, again, storytelling is a huge component of the human experience. Right. And so the idea of being able to communicate to somebody, um, and, and by the way, we, when we do a brand story thing, it's a foundational document. Okay. Yes. A very large foundational document that tells the entire story. That doesn't mean—

But in reality, right, Joe, it's the most important thing we work on.

It really is because it's the whole way in which the, at the end of the day that we communicate with the, with, with potential buyers.

Right.

And the rest of the communication happens there. Is, again, there might be questions and we're answering questions and we're, and we're meeting and we're— and there's obviously a, you know, in the case of individual buyers and things like that, there's going to be some situations where you want the personality with the owner, with the, with the seller and the buyer to match and, and things like that, right? So it's not that it's every single thing, but what it is is that it is, it is the way in which we get people into the fold from an investment standpoint to have the discussion, right? And so one way we can do that, and where most people kind of lay off, and this is why our— what we have found is that this, this doing this foundational story document and being able to have this story as we go, and remember, the story changes over time. So the reality is that as we potentially work with clients or as clients progress to the next level, wherever they are in the journey of the exit, right, is that that story sometimes changes and is augmented. And when we say to a client, hey, you know, in order to maximize your value and your salability, you're going to want to do these 2 projects that are going to increase those things or whatever, and we're going to change the story, obviously, as those 2 things come online and the story, the nature of things change, right? And so Being able to keep up with the story, you know, as you go through time is important. So it's the— as a— in terms of where it like lies in the process, it's like one of the first things we start doing.

Absolutely.

Right. Aligning with your mission. What is it? What is the company then? What do they stand for? What do we know buyers are looking for? All that stuff that we're talking about examining in yourself and then making those changes now gets documented. Right? And so we're gonna, we're gonna write down, this is how this— this is the owner, this is— these are the senior management people, these are their stories, these are what— that's where they come from, this is why they put the company together, this is the way that the company has moved through time and what it's accomplished, what it hasn't accomplished, what it would like to accomplish more, right? All those things. And what you're really trying to do is build a case for why this is a good investment. Right. And it's not just a good investment because the numbers are good, right? It's a good investment because why? Because we know some of the other things that are important that we get across in the story. We know that there's an explanation for why, why things happened and why things didn't happen. We know there's background on all the people that are important and the people who are making decisions and things like that, who you want to make sure are going to use, you know, the investment money wisely and things like that. You want to know who you're dealing with. And you want to get us— and overall, you really want a sense of the cultural fit, right? Whether it's something that's basically going to be something that is right for you as the— right for them as the buyer in terms of their culture, and whether that's a strategic buyer or a financial buyer or anything else, right? And then you also want to be able to say, share the vision for the future.

Yeah.

What is the company? What was this? What's the owner? What are you hoping If you got this capitalization, what would you want to see happen? And again, this capital could be happening, as John pointed out, not necessarily in the exit stage, right, but still in the growth stage or in, in areas like that where it's not about exiting yet. It might be a step along the path to exit, but the idea here is that you still are often going to need money for, from other, for other reasons, and the process is exactly the same.

Yeah, and, and like, and like Joe said, is, you know, oftentimes it's If I had this money, I would be able to do X or Y or Z or expand and grow. And again, that can help you exit. So the capital that you can raise will help you achieve your goals in the future state. So the story can be— the story needs to match where you are. It can't be, again, not realistic to where you are in your— in the growth stage of your company or the seed stage of your company.

That's exactly right. And look, we know from experience that companies that spend the time on this brand story, creating a compelling argument, making the case for why this company in writing, not just with numbers, but in numbers and in writing together, command higher valuations. They command higher multiples. The reality is, this is just the truth.

Yeah. And when you have a company that you're not, you know, where there's other people involved, obviously 99% of the companies we deal with are that. And sometimes when you have a brand story that's, as Jo mentioned, written down and shared, it helps other people understand where you're coming from. Like, you have a vision of the company as a CEO, which is very important, but you also have other people involved in the management team, your other people that are involved in helping you run the company that might see it a little bit differently. But when it's written down and people use specific words and phrases, like, that can help people, everyone get internally on the same page with, oh, that's what we want to do. And oftentimes we've seen with clients is the CEO writes down a story or comes up with a brand story, or we start working with him or her on it. And, and she circulates it for review. And there's really good feedback about, wow, that I didn't— that's not how I would define it, not the language I would use. So it gets everyone on the same page internally, that you're all going towards the same goal.

That's exactly right. It gets everybody rolling in the same direction, you know, in the same, the same way as going after a specific goal You know, from a financial standpoint or something else. So again, all these things are all working kind of hand in glove to create the story that becomes the foundation really for the elements now that we use to market the company. Okay, so the idea is that, you know, you're taking all this information, you're putting it down, you're getting into a place where it can be accessed and changed and modularized so that pieces can be taken out. as we create the necessary tactical elements then down the line, right? So, and so where do you start? The question is that when you're starting about this kind of thing, and again, look, many of you are companies that are already doing marketing stuff, okay? And, you know, and you're already doing, maybe be doing thought leadership work. You might be doing some social media, you know, promotion and things like that. Chances are you've got a public relations company and things like that, right? The question that I have for all of you is that, and I'd love to see it in the comments on this stuff, is Have you actually been able to sit down and write the story of the company? Or most likely, has it been one-off situations where individual vendors of yours are creating small pieces of this that you're using tactically but have not joined it all together in one big story that talks specifically also about the company in its position in terms of what it's doing to be able to deserve, for lack of a better word, the, the equity investment or the capital investment that it's looking for, right? So chances are you have done, you know, you've had a— if you have a PR company, right, they've gone and they've maybe they've done a boilerplate and you've kind of got a good sense on your website about who you are, what you do from a marketing standpoint. But guys, remember that you're not talking to investors in that market. In that marketing stuff, right?

On the website, you're talking to people who are going to buy your product and service, which is what your website should be. And again, we've talked about this before, but selling your company's product or service is very different from selling your company.

Very different in the way in which you're— in which the messaging and the things you're talking about and the things you're pointing out is different, right? The, the, the, the— so that— so the big point is that we've got a couple of tips that we can give you in terms of how do we actually do this and what are the things we do. There's like 4 steps. Okay.

Yep.

The first thing is, let's start with your, your why. Okay. Why, why this business? Why did you start it? What were the problems that you were trying to solve? Okay. What was your personal journey as the founder that makes this story a relatable story to somebody else? Right. I noticed, I, back in, you know, 30 years ago, you know, I noticed a, you know, a problem with the efficiency of, you know, whatever, of propagating information throughout the internet, right? And so I came up with a SaaS model thing that creates this software that does this X, Y, and Z, and blah, blah, blah. And then on that, on the heels of that, we created this next thing because we realized that this happened, and then therefore this opened up and this opportunity. And now I've got this big kind of company that sell 17 different, you know, kind of elements that help you do— generally speaking, that help solve this one kind of problem. Okay. Yeah.

And ExitEngine, a good example. Why did we start ExitEngine? Well, there's a number of reasons, but one of the core reasons is that when Joe and I were working at another company, we got down the path of dealing with buyers who were looking to purchase these companies and In the vast majority of cases, in every case that I dealt with, the companies weren't ready to be sold. And there is a— there was a gap in what the buyers wanted versus what the companies and the sellers were selling. And we believe, and we know, that there is ample opportunity to help companies sell their company, to help owners sell their companies and prepare them for sale and get them marketed. And one of the key things that we help them with is crafting this story with, with them to make sure that it's written down, it's, it's circulated, it's, it's understood by everyone in the company. And the problem we were solving is helping companies communicate their story better to buyers.

That's it. I mean, that's, that's a large part of what we're out here doing is to understand, is helping and teaching the sellers, potential sellers, right, that, that they've got options. And that it's not just about, you know, and that one of those options could be selling your company to somebody else where you make a lot of money, right? And the ability to be able to say— we always say that our mission, right, John and I have always said our mission was to help, you know, 1,000 business owners successfully transition out of their businesses in the way that they want over the, you know, by 2030. That's always been our mission. It's on our website. The idea here is that, you know, again, that's the why. Okay, and so starting off with the why and that getting that story down, why did you do this? And maybe it's being— it's what we do is we interview. We have people on staff whose job it is, they go and they sit down, they interview you and your employees and all the people that you've got working for you and everything you've done and your mother and your cousins. I mean, honestly, it's almost everything, right? To get to really pull out the essence of what makes you tick. and what's driven. And as the, the business ends up being kind of the cultural— the culture of the business ends up relying very heavily on the, on the personality of the owner, that, that transition, that, that story now becomes a very relatable situation for other people, right? On top of that, then we start talking about what, what makes you unique.

Yep.

Okay, so number 1 is what's your why? Number 2 is let's highlight your unique differentiators. Not because— not again, not between you. Some of it might be between you and other people in your industry, for sure, in terms of pointing out that you are a better— that you might be a better investment than other people, right? The market you play in, why you play in that market, what is the growth of that market, where, right, where you play and showing where fits in the bigger picture becomes really important. But the idea, most importantly, is what is it about you? What are your proprietary systems? Where's your— what's your positioning that's unique? Do you have cultural things about your business that are— do you have special situations where you give away, uh, certain things to charity as part of your business model, right? Things that make you stand out in the marketplace above and beyond everyone else. If you do not have— as you go through this process, guys, you will discover whether or not you actually have these things. And if you don't have these things, it's going to be a big red flag for you to get some of these things, right? What does make you stand out? Do you even know, right? And so being able to highlight the things that are unique and different about your company and the way that you've done this and the way that you've approached the world is another thing that you want to then kind of layer onto the why.

Yeah. And there's companies, there's all sorts of examples of this. There's companies that give a product away every time you buy one, right? There's companies that donate to charity. There's companies with arms that say, when you, you know, we reach this level of money or of revenue, we're going to give X away. There's companies that do specific things for specific groups of people, right? For They focus on young children or older people or some demographic that's maybe underserved in their opinion. That's what you need. That's a sort of a unique feature of your business that you can highlight to differentiate yourself. That's the key point, is differentiating yourself from your competitors and other companies that may be— that are in your market.

I also think that when you go through this again, as we talked about earlier, you know, it's really important obviously to make this the financial picture, the financial story, and the overall brand story kind of jibe. They need to match, right?

Yes.

Or, you know, again, go hand in hand. So that the idea is that when you're talking about your differentiators, there may be a differentiator in your model that's not immediately apparent. There may be, you know, and again, this belief, if you have a company where you are built into your business model with some kind of, you social responsibility. Okay. That is not— it is, it is as much as it happens nowadays, it is still not typical.

No.

So it is not going to be immediately, right, unless you're in some kind of specific, very specific market, it's not going to be immediately recognizable that you do that. And A, how important is that to you as a cultural thing? Right? Because if it's not important to you and you just did it and it doesn't really Right, then, then, then that's gonna— it's gonna— you're gonna treat that differently in the story. If it's the kind of thing where you say, no, no, and I refuse to sell, and by the way, it's so important that it's our entire reason to be, and I won't even entertain talking with anybody who would threaten that.

Yeah, right.

So I mean, the idea of being able to say, if you're, if you're coming at me and you think that this model we do, you, you're going to be more profitable because you take away the donation we make of this pair of shoes every time we sell one, right? Well, then I don't want to sell to you.

Right.

Right. So the idea of writing these things down and getting this stuff out there and putting it out there is as much about, again, differentiating yourself to the individual buyers that are out there as much as it is anything else, right? So highlighting your— that's some of the things, one of the things that makes them— might make you unique. Okay, so the, the knowing your why— why did you do this, who are the people involved, and all that stuff— and why did— how did you get here? The highlight— highlight what makes you different. And again, the things that you've done internally are not things that are going to necessarily even be like from a competitive standpoint. They may not have anything to do with your industry.

Right.

They may just be good business practices or things like that that you've, that you've, that you've taken on that would, that would show that you were a healthy company that cares about managing to the bottom line, for example.

Yeah. And then, and sort of then, and moving on to the next one is, you know, how you showcase impact is what we call it. And it's, it's how has your company helped your clients succeed? Right? How have you made a difference? How have what you do, whether you sell a service or a product, how has your service or product made a difference for Your community, your employers, your customers, and give specific examples, right? You've done— you've helped this particular client, help them with their mission, right? That they might have a different mission and you help them raise money so they could expand a geographic area. Include those things because that's the proof's in the pudding at that point.

Also, how do you treat your employees? Right? I mean, what do you do? We've talked about the social responsibility angle of things. What are you doing from a cultural standpoint that helps you, or from a business standpoint that is important to you in terms of its involvement in the community? What are you doing for your— that you do for your employees? Look, some of these things are going to be on your financial documents, right? Like, some of these things are going to be like— it's literally going to say employee contribution to whatever, right? It's going to be a line item on there. And so, what is this? Yeah, right. And it's going to be apparent. You say, look, every time, you know, this is how we treat our employees, and this is how we— this is, you know, our system for, you know, for, uh, you know, for, uh, assessing, you know, their, you know, how their impact on our company, and this is how we remunerate or how we reward them. This is our— this is all that stuff goes in here.

Yeah, there's a, there's a good story about a company called Zappos. And Zappos was a company that was bought by Amazon. And the owner had some challenges, and he passed away. However, one of the most interesting things is they used to pay employees to leave the company. And because his thinking was he wanted people there who wanted to be there. So they would actually pay an employee to leave.

And the point of that is, If they weren't a good fit, you mean?

Yeah, if they felt they weren't a good fit, they would— he would pay them to leave because he wanted employees who cared for their customers and truly cared for their customers. So that was his differentiator. He actually elevated employees above clients and shareholders, which, wow, that was like a really interesting, like, interesting thing is when— and his thinking was if they take— if he takes care of his employees, Then their employees are going to take care of their clients in such a way that they'll treat them, and they literally treat you like a king.

No question. I, I think again, and that would be— that's not something that's going to come across except for maybe as a, as a weird question by looking at a, at a spreadsheet, right? Again, someone's going to come and go, what's this thing you spend on this and how does this work? Again, whatever the, you know, the, the financial repercussions of that of that policy are, right, are going to be, they're going to show up, be reflected in the financials, but they may not be explained. OK. And so again, that's— Yeah.

Yeah. And I was gonna say, and that's a key part of your brand story. If you're, the activities that your company does that are different than the ones that, again, I go back to differentiators, are different or unique, those are the things you want to highlight in this, in showcase impact is, How are you making an impact for your clients and what are you doing differently?

That's exactly right. And again, some of these things, there is overlap with what you do normally, right? Obviously, you're going to use some of these same stories to, you know, in your new business development, right? You're talking about the success stories you've had with clients. Maybe there's case studies and things like that might be obviously on your, even on your website and things like that you do to, you know, your new business materials that help you get you know, show people that, you know, generate sales or whatever, right? But in the context of selling the company, the reason this stuff is important is because, again, it goes to, this is the way that we've looked at the world over this amount of time, right? This is what we've done. This is how we've changed, right? Why is it important to show how you've changed as an owner to a prospective buyer? Right. What, what would be one of the things that— why would, why would I care about that? Right. Well, the reason is, is because it shows you, you're a— that you're, depending on where you are and what you're doing with this money, okay, is it shows that you're potentially a good business partner.

Yeah. And think of all the companies, and again, we go back to the pandemic a lot, but it was such a crazy time, is think of companies that pivoted to and all the new business models that came out of the pandemic for Dine-in sheds in New York City, takeout food across the country, all of those things. Like, look, when, when a, if a restaurant opened in, in March of 2020, early March of 2020, and they just got a huge investment from, from a buyer, the buyer is not going to want to care. The buyer is going to say, look, like, it's an unprecedented thing, but I invested in you, Joe and John, Sarah or Paula. You need to figure this out. And, and by, and by changing and by adapting to what you're, you know, the, the, the, the reality of what it is, of what, what it— what the present situation is, that's what you need to do. You need to adapt, you need to change to what the circumstances are. And that's no, that's no different in whether it's a pandemic or a new competitor or whatever it happens to be.

Right. Whatever. There's— they're going to be— they're going to be When we look at spreadsheets, and John can speak, you know, to this a little bit more than me, but basically I've looked at a lot of spreadsheets in my life too, is that there are things that will jump out. Okay, and there are things that you look at and you go, huh, that's interesting, or that's a, you know, just by looking at the numbers, right? But again, the explanation is not always, and almost is almost never actually included in that. You see what happened, you see the result. You don't necessarily know why. Now, we certainly in spreadsheets can make notes, and you can say this is what happened, and you can point to a thing and say this is why this was. But to John's last point, the idea of being able to, to show how you pivoted during the pandemic as an example, right, and how you became this or whatever, shows resiliency. It shows that you have potentially have good— a good team that's able to basically, you know, to work together. And again, the team is something that's going to go with the company, right? So knowing that you're working together and being able to do that is a huge piece to be able to show that you've made it through the pandemic because of this team, potentially.

And you're able to learn and adapt, right? You're able to learn from what the market's telling you. Whenever— when anyone sells a product or service to anybody, to a business, to a consumer, the feedback that you're getting is, is A, in the sales that you're making and from those customers that actually buy the product, But it's also getting— you're getting feedback from the people that don't buy it from you. Like, well, why didn't you buy it from me? Like, and sometimes that feedback can help you learn and be like, oh, I didn't think of that. Or sometimes those are conversations and those are stories that can help you learn from why a non-taker, right? Those are the— when we did back in real estate, when we did franchise sales, we'd always interview the people that didn't buy the franchise. Like, well, why didn't you? And it was oftentimes it was financial, but oftentimes it was, well, I didn't understand how I could make money in this model. Like, oh, well, we clearly didn't do a good job of letting them know of all the potential in owning one of those real estate franchises, whether it was, you know, one of any of the ones that we, that I used to help out on selling. And I'd come in at very specific points. But the point is, those stories that we could tell helped people put it Put the story in their context and be like, oh, well, I could do X or I could do Y. And you're opening up all these potential things when you're telling these people these stories, because they become the main character in that story.

I would say, and you check me if you think I'm wrong on this, I would say that about 99% of the deals that we've done all come down to, would come down to basically that the brand story making a difference. As opposed to, right? I mean, I can't think of a single situation where it was just like, I don't need to see the brand story, just give me the numbers and I'm going to make a decision based on that, right? Like, it's— that never happens. I might make a decision on what I think is the information and all the information that is available, right? If I'm a buyer, I'm going to look at the thing and go, what's available? Oh, I have a PowerPoint deck that I did that basically walks you through the financials. And here's my website and, you know, and my bio.

Right. And the opposite side of that is, I agree with you 100%. The opposite side of that is when we do provide the brand story to buyers and they only look at the financials, they always come back with questions that are inevitably answered in the brand story, right? They're like, oh, well, I noticed that their expenses went down in 2020, whatever it is. in the projection or whatever it happens to be, like, yeah, we talked about that in our brand story and we truly encourage— because a lot of times buyers think it comes down to, or some buyers I should say, thinks it comes down to what's in the numbers. And yeah, it's important, but the reality is that, as Jo mentioned, the story is front and center. The financials are the ones that support the story, not the other way around.

That's exactly right. And I think that the, the, that the, the, the fact that our process, the, our process anyway, I can't speak for other people, you know, other advisors and what they do or whatever, you know, becomes documenting this story from the very beginning, right? Because what you don't want to do is be in a situation where you're constantly trying to get this done in like a timeframe. Okay. Because it is a rather large project. Yeah. Right? You know, again, it could take a couple of weeks if you had somebody really focused on it and really get it done and things like that. But again, the— then the marketing of the company becomes a whole other level. That becomes tactical. It becomes advertising. It becomes public relations. It becomes investor relations. It becomes, it becomes, uh, you know, listings. It becomes a whole other, like, kind of marketing challenge. Right, or, or, or a piece of the, piece of the activity that has to happen. But in order to be able to even start or thinking about where you're going to put this stuff, creating this, this story first, showing the impact, telling who's the owner, what, where did you come from, what is your viewpoint, how do you see the world, right? How do you approach business in general?

Yep.

Not just your business, but how do you— what, what's the kind of person Who am I dealing with, right? That's what we're trying to communicate to the potential— to the buyers or to the investors. And remember, guys, this isn't just about end-of-the-road buyers, okay? Any investment money, okay?

Yep.

Whether you're doing crowdfunding work, you're gonna do, you know, big seed investment, right? Whatever— growth capital, whatever you're doing in those situations. By the way, even the banks, right? As we found out. Yeah, even the banks want to see this stuff, right? It's not just about the numbers, right? It's about who is this guy I'm loaning money to, especially the local banks. When you go into credit unions and you look for, look for, uh, you know, for when you're going into debt, you're looking for debt in those certain situations, that stuff matters too. And having that story done and ready to present to somebody, and again, being able to change the format of it, like, it's okay, I don't need You know, I don't need a 14-page document to send to somebody every time. Maybe just a one-pager that goes together with a specific sheet or something like that, a specific spreadsheet. But the idea is that, to John's point earlier on, it's like all the answers to everything should be here. Okay?

Yes.

And then we can take the component parts that we need and distribute them to where they need to go or whatever, or put them to rearrange them in the order that makes sense for the, you know, for the You know, for the actual instance. And I think that the, the— what essentially you're doing here is turning this— one of the main documents that you will get out of this is a prospectus. It's what in the, in the buying world, uh, you know, the brokers call a CIM. All right, it's a CIM. It stands for Confidential Information Memorandum, if you could have a more generic term than that. Um, so what we, what we say is what we call is the brand story. And actually, and what we're going to put together is a prospectus, because a prospectus is a big boy word, okay?

Sure.

Prospectus is a word that sounds like a grown-up company doing grown-up things, okay? Doing a SIM and a confidential information memorandum, whatever, tells me nothing. It does nothing. I've always hated it personally. The fact is that this is how the broker world exists. Okay, in a lot of ways.

Yeah. And what's— what the sims that Joe's talking about that we have typically seen, and we have typically been a part of in other companies, is 2 slides of financials that's sort of jammed together on a PowerPoint, a couple of slides of information about generic information about the company, and then the 3rd one, if they don't lead with this, is You know why they want to sell or why they need the money, and and it becomes so rote and it becomes so just blasé and bland. Is when you have a brand story document that that is that is in place of a sim, it it differentiates you. Gonna use that word again. It differentiates you from all the other companies that are being sold. It isn't the formulaic. 6-slide presentation. It's a story. And, and there's all sorts of research about stories resonating with people. Think of all of the stories that we learned growing up— Hansel and Gretel and, and all, you know, The Wizard of Oz and all those stories that are made, that are, that are made from Disney's vault into these, into these stories that are made for children. Because you know what? People relate to classic stories and relate to things, um, that are sort of— that are told in a story format. So it gets down to human nature too.

No question about it. And again, it's like you said, doing this kind of full-blown prospectus as opposed to a, you know, 4-point PowerPoint slide separates you right there from being serious, which is not, right? You're basically— so a couple of things that a full-blown prospectus are going to give you kind of right off the First of all, greater transparency in what appears to be compliance. Okay, in other words, the, you know, right off the bat you've said, I am an open book, here's everything that you want to know about this company that I know that you're going to need to know in order to want to invest in it or to be able to buy it or whatever. And so I'm going to give it to you, all of it, because I have nothing to hide. And in fact, I want to take control of the narrative.

Well, right, like we said earlier, It's better that you define your company than someone defines it for you.

Exactly right. And so basically it's that, again, the SIM is the SIM versus the, the, you know, the, the, let's call it the prospectus versus the SIM. Okay, just that this, the prospectus is a much more robust, much more engaging document. It's got a lot of stuff. You can have an executive summary in that, in that prospectus. Okay, so we can cut to the chase and get the salient points and highlight the stuff up front. Okay, but having a prospectus versus having just a sim shows you're serious. It shows you're transparent. It shows you're compliant, and it shows you've got nothing to hide. And right there, that is a huge win. Huge win.

Yep.

You're the other thing is that it's going to help you potentially appeal to a much larger kind of broader audience. Okay, than the traditional sim would. All right, that, that, that, that buyer, uh, broker kind of SIM thing— people are used to getting this thing or whatever— the SIM will still be there, okay? Because the SIM is essentially the executive summary. All right, so the SIM will take as the executive summary in the prospectus, and it becomes a much more robust document that again is there and searchable. And we also, by the way, attach, uh, we We personally, I'm not sure if everybody does this or not. They should. Attach is all these documents are located in a place that's also driven by AI. And so in the deal room or wherever we write what we call the place where we put this listing and all this information and we store this information for buyers to access when they've signed an NDA and they're and they're serious. Okay. Is inside this stuff is the ability for them to ask questions in real language. And and go into this document to provide the answers.

Yep.

Okay. So it's gonna be yes. It's a larger document. Oh, people don't want to read all that information. You're right. They probably don't. And if they don't, that's fine. But the information still needs to exist, right? And it needs to be searchable. And it needs to be the kind of thing so that when the guy comes in and says, "I've got some questions about this looks really interesting. Tell me what blah blah blah blah and why this happened." That the— right, that the AI and, you know, coming from that document can return exactly the right answer and point you to the page and the financial place where this is represented.

Yep.

Such a big deal, guys, right? And it's— and I know that most of our broker friends are not even close to this.

No.

Okay, so we love our broker friends, but again, this is the difference. This is what it takes, okay? This is why, one of the reasons why we love our broker friends, but this is why they're only successful 50% of the time.

Yeah. And, and the bro— because if you think about it, and again, I don't want— I'm not trying to disparage brokers, but the broker has been hired to sell the company, right? Yes, we at ExitEngine, we are helping the company define itself in many, in many ways. We're creating a story. Yeah, the ultimate goal is to get sold, But that can— we work with clients that are nowhere near ready to sell their companies for many reasons. Because yes, we could probably try and go out to the market. We've done this and get them an offer or present their company to a buyer, but it won't go anywhere because you're not ready. They're not ready to be sold, right? There's all this work that needs to be done. The brand story is one component of it, but it's also the financials, right? It's It's preparing a business. It's diversifying revenue streams. It's working on those individual projects that help a client, that help a company get ready to be sold. The brand story is, is when you have all those things in motion, right? You have plans for all those things. Things are, things are happening at your company now that you're telling a story about, and then you're telling them about the future, right? You're telling them about what your vision is and what you want to do. And what you would do with this money. So, so those types of things are of paramount importance when you're crafting a story too.

That's exactly right. And again, and just crafting the story alone opens you up to more buyers, right? Because you look like, oh, this is interesting. A, I have never seen— you know, you're going to come across buyers, especially PE firms and stuff like that, who do this all the time, who are going to go, oh my God, really? Like, this is a full-blown prospectus? I can search it and go in and figure out and get my questions answered and whatever, and it's all right here, right? Do you know how much— how that shows not only are you easy to work with, but you're transparent? You're not trying to hide anything. You're not trying to get one over on it. It shows you know who you are and what you're doing. And yeah, that's a great spot to be when you're selling your company.

And it also— what it also does is when you're dealing with private equity firms, right, a lot of times when you're dealing with private equity firms, you're dealing with an analyst. and someone who all they do is look at these SINs and these confidential memorandums. When you do a prospectus and you do a document like we're discussing and you include a brand story, that opens up the people who are reading it to different— to a whole new group of people. It's the analyst, but it's also, hey, all the other stuff that they would want to know about the company is inherent in that document. Sure, the financials are there, but also the story about Where are the companies coming from? What they do, what their differentiators— all that stuff is in that document that can then be easily sent up the chain to the manager, the investment committee, the people who are really making decisions at those private equity firms and investment firms.

That's exactly right. And the ability to be able to even pull out salient pieces or whatever so that analysts can make it as easy as possible to get the highlights to them and all that stuff. It's There's no question, you know, it's like any other business thing, right? If you help your client be successful inside, internally with themselves, right, that's the— that, that's just as— that's just as good as, you know, as that's helping them solve their problem, right? And so the, the reality is, is that what we're trying to do here is make it— yes, we want it to be as easy for buyers as possible, right? We don't want them to feel like jump— they have to jump through hoops to do this, right? And we've already talked about in 25— by the way, this is episode 26, I think. So by the way, congratulations. The last— our last episode, I think we actually mentioned this, was our 25th episode.

Yeah.

So, but the point is to say that 25 episodes in a row, we have spoken about how important it is, right, to look at this through the perspective of the buyer, the eyes, and, and in the eyes of the buyer with your company, but also making it as easy as possible for them to do their job. Which is going to be, again, might require levels of people getting involved at certain points and things like that. So you're making it as easy as possible. You're disclosing things. You're making it transparent, right? And it's showing, uh, it's, it's, it increases the confidence with the buyer, right, that this is a good company. And, and if it— and it gives you a sense of professionalism and, and, and a high, you know, a very high, well-received kind of perception of the company right, right off the bat. Right. And I haven't even looked at the financials yet. But boy, this is the company that's together, man. That's— this is what people want. The other thing that this thing is going to do, John, as we know, is it creates the vision for the future, right? It shows this is where the company is headed.

Yep.

And so what we can talk about— well, we will talk about in the brand story is, so this is where we've been and how we've gotten here, and this is where we're headed now. Right? And what we're looking for is, as an owner, I'm looking to exit. Here's why I'm looking to exit. Here's what I'm gonna, I'm gonna do with this stuff so that you understand where my head's at. And we have this great management team, and here are the things, and here's the way, and here's how I hope these are the people will be the people who you will meet, who will be the people that will be key people in the company moving forward, etc., etc., right? Can you tie your vision into your buyer's goals.

There you go. Yes, exactly correct. Right?

What do they want to do? What are they going to— what do you want to point out? Yes, we say this all the time. Yes, there's this operational inefficiency I haven't solved for yet. Yet. But that's what I would do if you gave me that money, or this is what you should do if you buy my company. And here's the plan, and here's the thing. And by the way, You know, and the plan, specific plan on how to do this is available upon request.

Yeah, and these types of, you know, the types of stories you're talking about, this isn't a one, you know, to put it into one section, right? This is like a thematic story, right? The story is whatever your story happens to be needs to be in all different places and you really need to own it. Right? You can't just talk about it in one liner. It can't be just the headline of your presentation. It needs to be woven, if you will, into the financials. And this is why the financials are this way, or this is why we did this. This is why we expanded here, because we had more opportunity to do X, Y, and Z. And it sort of— you can use data, You need to use emotion. And those techniques, again, need to be part of the entire, your entire sort of ethos, the way you run your company.

That's it. Now you're gonna take all this information, okay? And it's gonna be a big, huge, long document. It might be, I don't know, might be a dozen pages or whatever, has, you know, all this stuff. And that's gonna be the foundational document, okay? That one document might, will turn into a prospectus. It will turn into a bunch of other things. All right, so what are the things it's gonna— you're gonna use this information for? Well, you're gonna use it obviously for pitch decks, right? Any kind of pitch deck, buyer presentation, prospectus, whatever, all those things. And again, we create multiple pitch decks.

Why?

Because we have multiple kinds of potential buyers, right? And we have mo— even within a category of, say, private equity, we've got it. We've got a bunch of subcategories of people that we need to talk to in different ways. Okay, so again, you build the foundational story, and now we're talking about building a specific tactic off that foundational story, or is that with that foundational story as the basis where we're changing attitudes or changing certain things to meet a specific audience?

Because just like we're crafting a story, the, the, the, those PE firms and investment firms have a story, and oftentimes their story is is more quantitative. But they— but if you look at their website, like, hey, we're looking for these types of companies with this range of EBITDA that are in these 3 industries, that's their story. They have created their business and crafted their business and honed it over time. Say, this is where we can be successful, this is where we can add value. It's— that is their brand story, and it's speaking to, um, potential sellers of companies. And so we need to oftentimes, nearly all the time, I should say, as Jo mentioned, tweak our presentations to match what the buyer is looking for. No, we're not being nefarious or there's no negative implications of it. It's just we want to highlight the things that these buyers care about.

That's right. And they're different. And so we're going to play some things up and play other things down based on who we're talking to. And think about the way that you would use a pitch deck. So it's one thing to think about, okay, in a selling situation, I'm gonna have a pitch deck, I'm gonna meet with investors and, or, or buyers, and, you know, in that pitch deck— no, no, that pitch deck is gonna be used well before you sit down with the buyer, right? The pitch deck is a pitch. This is, hey, this is why I think you should be buying this company right now. That pitch deck might be paper, it might be social media, it might be, you know, video. Okay, but the reality is, is that you're going to use all these. You're going to use all these tactics. Okay, we, we use all of them. We're going to use advertising. We're going to use, we're going to use social media. We're going to use video. We're going to use every single thing. We're going to use websites. We're going to use all kinds of marketing collateral. We're going to do everything we possibly can based on the situation to make sure that that story and the elements of that story get communicated Through these tactical channels and tactics, right, that basically— and now since we have this foundational document, it's very easy to do. I'm not rewriting, I'm not— I don't have to, you know, I don't have to, you know, reinvent the engine every single— reinvent the wheel, rather, every time to do a new piece of marketing collateral, right? It's all right here. It all comes right off the same foundational document with the same language. It's about how I'm putting it together for what purpose. Right. But if you're not using video content in your, uh, in your pitch decks or in your, in your overall prospectus, then let me tell you to, to make sure that you are. Okay?

Yep.

Because again, much even better than reading this, this information would be hearing and seeing a, a big video with interviews and that kind of stuff is, is, is something that you're absolutely gonna wanna do. It's something that again, is the video. Any kind of video basically in general performs 30% better than any kind of written word overall, and probably higher margins than that in certain, uh, situations. Okay, so the video you want to use, you want to use your website. We're going to use all kinds of marketing collateral. There have been times when, when billboards have been used. Okay, but I know no matter what the tactic is, it all comes out of this brand story that you've already created.

And there are obviously some things to avoid, right? What you need to avoid, Jo, what's one of the things that these people need to, that our listeners need to avoid when they're creating a brand story?

I think that one of the biggest things is that there's a focus that tends to be, we forget about focusing on the future and And we, and all we're doing is talking about the past.

Yep.

Right. So the idea is that we, we talk about this kind of thing being like an almost nostalgic, like it's not a trip down memory lane for you, right? It's a, it's a, this is why I made the decisions, or these are the things that befell us and here's how we got out of them or how we changed or how we improved or whatever. Right. And what everybody loves, right, most is a story of, you know, the, the, The person who didn't think they, you know, could do it. They're against all odds and they made it anyway, right?

Horatio Alger stories.

That's it. It makes— it shows resilience. It shows the— it shows grit, right? It shows that you stick to it. You don't give up, right? It sounds like, you know, whatever. And when you're a success, when you don't give up and you're successful, right? Which, by the way, just FYI, is kind of like the secret to life, right? It's actually just not giving up. Just keep showing up every day. If you're having a problem, if something's not going your way, just keep showing up. All right? Most 99% of the time, it will work out. But the idea here is that right now is that if you are only focusing on what happened and you're not telling the story of what will happen or what would happen or the or the or me at least understanding the ramifications of what I've done, right? And that's a weird thing to say, but. Think about it. I want to explain to the next person, I did this, I regret it.

What?

Yeah, it's okay because we all make mistakes. And so we went this way, it didn't work out, we, we, we pivoted, right? Or the pandemic came, or, and we had to do this, it completely changed everything for us, or whatever. We had no choice, we had to go this way to keep the lights on, whatever. And then it turned out that we Had a new product line, and then, right, or then this great stuff happened, or, right, right. You being able to describe what happened is half the battle. What you're gonna do now and moving forward, I think, is a key piece that most people forget, and it's almost never in a sim.

Yeah, and right, exactly. And it's refreshing when it is, because everyone can relate to, A, mistakes that they've made if they're being honest with themselves, And things they do differently in the past, and also things they've learned from, like, right? Like, imagine if you, you know, if you always made the right decision in the past. You know, a lot of times, first of all, no one ever does that. But you wouldn't have learned anything, right? I know I've learned from the scars. I've learned from the mistakes way more than the successes I've had. So I agree wholeheartedly is you need to focus, you need to focus on the future. Um, and you need to understand that, um, to be honest with people— people appreciate honesty. They really do. Because when they're betting with their money and they're putting their money where their mouth is, they want someone who's going to tell them the truth. It's not going to be all roses, right?

It's trust. It's— I can— can I trust what's going on here? And by the way, you know, we hope that buyers trust us and our brand, okay? Because it's important. Right? But the reason they do is because our clients do this stuff, right? Our clients are, are transparent. They are open, right? They are not hiding anything. Okay? And we— and they, they understand that, that, that in order to get their business sold, that they've had in some cases to take a very hard look at themselves. Okay? And some of our clients have had to do things that they really didn't want to do. Okay? In order to survive. Okay.

Yeah.

But the reality is, is that all of them, okay, are in a better place because, because of things, because we're able to basically help them understand how important this stuff is. Right. And again, this is the stuff. It seems so easy, right? It seems like in some cases, and I think this was the way we felt about it when we got into this side of the business, or at least I did, was like, I couldn't believe that there wasn't more of this. Like, why is this just about spreadsheets? Like, that's not— I would never buy a company based on a spreadsheet. Not ever.

No.

Right. And the reason is, is because I don't trust a spreadsheet. Now, some people would say, well, I don't trust what they're writing in the, in the narrative. And I would say, great, don't trust that either. Right. But if the 2 things say the same thing, well, it's a pretty good case that what they're saying is correct.

And, and that's the— that's one of the other pitfalls is, right, inconsistency. Right, is when you're saying one thing, you're doing another, and your financials or spreadsheets say something different. You know, oh, I'm investing in the business, and they see a lack of investment in the business. Or, um, no, we didn't lose a customer, and it's very clear they lost a customer. Or my costs, my expenses, uh, decreased in 2026 and they increased. Like, wait a second, you need to explain those things.

So that's exactly right. And what you don't want is a bunch of questions that then beget that, that reduce the confidence in what's happening here. Every time, every time a buyer comes across a situation that looks like— nefarious is not a good word— every time a buyer comes across and looks at something that he questions or makes his head tilt, okay, that's a— but that's potentially— that's, that's a, that's a percent or so off your saleability right there in that instance.

Yeah.

It doesn't mean another person won't do something differently or whatever, but To think about it that way, right? That if I make this person have to think, go, really?

Huh?

That doesn't jive with everything that I know about this industry. Okay, so those are the things— the consistency across what you're saying, not just focusing on the past but also in the future. And the last thing is, guys, you know, it doesn't— we're talking about larger documents, but then, then, then, then maybe like a 3-page SIM. But we shouldn't be overcomplicating it, right? We want to make sure it's— we're not trying to write a novel. The way we present this information can be chunked out in spaces and video and stuff. That's not a big giant, like, uh, you know, that's not War and Peace.

Okay, and you're not introducing, right, as Joe just mentioned, you're not introducing multiple concepts for people, like, right? What we're saying is when we do these different formats, right, In the different formats, the video, the PowerPoints, the— you're saying the same thing. You're just saying it in, in a slightly different medium because there are all sorts of ways that people absorb information. There are auditory learners, there are visual learners, there are kinetic learners. So when you are presenting the material, you will need to say it, say it again, repeat it and say it one more time. So, and, and if you say it the same way, if you actually have someone saying it as opposed to a video saying it, sometimes people drown out to that. But when you have your website saying something, a specific video saying something, and then a presenter saying very similar things in those 3 different mediums, it gets across that this is ingrained in the culture and this isn't a, a veneer story that you're trying to tell. It's a story that goes down, you know, below the ground of your company and is really, it's the DNA of your company, right? It's really a part, the story, the brand story is a reflection of your company, not just the thin veneer at the top.

That's exactly right. So what can you do right now? Okay, so here's, here's the thing, easy thing. You got it. You've got your, you've got your PR guy, you've got your marketing head, marketing person, you've got Right? You've got somebody around you right now, okay, who can help you do this if it's not you. And the first thing you're going to do is we're going to do a story audit, okay? What you're going to do is you're going to gather all the information— your website, all the things that you've written about your company in terms of what you do and how you do it, whatever— you're going to gather it all together. You're going to see what you got, okay? We have bios over here. We have, we have client testimonials over here. We've got You know, video stuff or interviews that you as the owner did with some newspaper like a year ago. All that stuff, you're going to start gathering all of those things and you're going to start putting them in one spot. And generally speaking, you're going to put them on a server, okay? Some kind of server, and you're going to put some kind of AI, uh, some kind of, kind of AI, uh, information system on top of it, okay? And these are clearly and readily available. I'm sure that we can link to some names of some things if you don't know, but the idea is just do a Google search. Okay? All you want to be able to do is you're going to keep a repository of this information, and the repository is going to be educated. The AI that oversees this repository is going to get educated on it. So you're not only going to know what's there, but you're going to be able to search and go into pieces and pull pieces out. Okay? So that's the very first thing you're gonna do. Take all the information that you have currently right now, put it all in one space, and ask AI to take that information, review it, and write the first pass of the story. You don't even need a human to do this right yet, right? But do an audit. What's the thing? What does the AI see? What do you get out of it? Now go back and look at what that AI has written. and go, okay, is this the story? Is this what I want to tell? Okay, we're at a point, guys, where we are getting very close to AI being able to take over a lot of this. Okay, and I'm not saying— again, not putting it off on AI and making anything— I am saying that if you are a busy business owner like we all are, and you— and the first thing that when you hear me talk about asking you to do a story audit, that you go, uh, More work I gotta do. But I'm saying, yes, I hear you. Then go get the tools that help you do this work. Right? And the AI avoided— it's work to be done despite how you feel about it.

Yeah. And what the AI will do is the AI will give you an objective. When you— whatever you put into AI will give you— will spit you back. So when you ask it to summarize information, it will just summarize the information you provided it. It won't give its opinion. It won't give what you may— the, the deep-seated things that you think about your business that are, that are left unsaid. It will give you the honest truth about the information you put in. And it's, it's illuminating when you do this, because I've done this, we've done this a couple of times. And when you do this, you get back— it's remarkable— you get back like, wow, there's nothing about X or Y or Z, which are oftentimes the most important part of the business, or What the owner thinks is an important part of the business or the team. This will spit you back an objective summary of what you've put into it. And if that's not what you like and you find yourself doing a ton of edits and it doesn't capture the essence of your business, well, the inputs weren't good either. The inputs need to be modified too. So—

Bingo. Exactly right. It's a great way to test the story on your own and whatever. And once you have been able to build this prospectus and that kind of thing, You're gonna start looking at your, your key stakeholders, your, your own team, advisors you might have, whatever consultants you have, get them involved, right? You wanna talk to your customers, right? You want your customers to be interviewed. You want all your employees basically to have a sit-down and talk about their relationship with the company, right? Their relationship with the owner, right? Get all those things, gather this stuff. You can choose what to use, okay? But get in, get all this stuff. Right? And get all— every element of the story and get it together. Right? The financials are also gonna go in this, in this repository. Right? When you get the financials done, which you will do, promise you will do the financials. You will get them right. You will get them set up so that they are accurate and that they actually tell the story and everything else. And you will put them together in this file server that will be also governed by AI. Okay, all these things, all the decks. Now everything kind of gets put in here. All right, and, and again, if you need the help, the help we can provide, the help— there's lots of companies out there that can do that. This is something that we actually specialize in. But understand that hiring somebody to take this, these elements and put this, all these things together for you is probably money and time well spent. Because you're going to need it, whether you know it or not. You're going to need it. You may not need it today. But you're gonna need it tomorrow. You're gonna need it next year when you do go to exit and things like that. And you'll already be there. The story might change over time, right?

It will change over time. Yeah. Yeah.

But at least you'll be, you'll be caught up with the elements of that story and then you'll be able to rewrite the story as you need to very easily moving forward. Yeah. Right. So these are things, guys, that you can do literally right away. Okay. So whether you are exiting right now, whether you're looking to get capital, whether you want to borrow money at some point, this is something that you should be doing, right? And if you can't do it, we understand that it's a time suck, we get it, but go get someone to help you do it, all right? And then you'll be able to keep up with it. Incorporate AI where it makes sense, okay? Give this, this place— give it— offer a place to potential buyers or investors, the easy access to transparent and information that is helpful to them in making a decision about you, right? Do the work for them.

Yeah. And, and again, what if, what if a buyer asked you tomorrow, what makes your business special? What would your story be? What would your answer be to that question?

That's it. And think about if what it all boils down to for us sometimes is a headline. Right? What's the— what do you want the headline to be, right? Remarkable SaaS company, uh, owned by, uh, you know, military veteran, right? Uh, you know, with grit, with, uh, with, uh, month over— with 3 years worth of month-over-month growth, right? You know, that, that's what you write. Those are the elements you want to pull out to make the headline because that's the first thing that on a listing site And different places that a lot of these potential buyers or investors are going to find you.

And yeah, and, and we want to hear your comments, right? Because this is, this is a topic that, you know, we deal with all the time. It's not a technical topic, uh, to a large degree. It's, uh, this is, this is about storytelling. Everyone understands stories. So we'd like your comments on this. So please comment, share, get in touch with us. We'd love to hear your opinion. info@myexitengine.com will get to us. Because again, we are constantly working with clients who are doing these brand stories and we are improving their brand stories. But, or, and I should say, we'd love to hear from you. What stories have you told about your company or what is the story of your company? Share it with us.

What's the thing that makes your company special? What's the one thing that you could boil down about your company that really makes you stand out? amongst other companies in your space? Again, not necessarily in the eyes of clients, but in the eyes of what we've been talking about for the last 26 episodes, which is that in the eyes of buyers, right? Can you figure out what your company needs to look like in the eyes of buyers and make it look that way? Right? And again, the combination here is we're talking today just about the story and creating the story after the work of getting the business right has been done.

Yep.

Okay, so understand that we're not trying to— we're not making a story to cover up. This is not lipstick on a pig, right? This is making a beautiful company and then telling the beautiful story about it. That is the way— that is the way that you will be the most successful. Cutting corners around these things will only leave you with less money and less salability. I guarantee it. Thank you so much, John, for today. Love you, man. Guys, this is the Exit Engine Podcast. I'm Joe, that's Jon. You can find us right here where you found us today, whether it's on Apple Podcasts or any other podcast services. Love your comments, so please comment. Please share this with a business owner that you love. And again, you can ask us anything you want ever at info@myexitengine.com. I'm Joe Stapleton, that's Jon Kniff. Thanks for listening to The Exit Engine Podcast, everybody. Have an awesome, awesome week. We'll talk to you next week.