Blog
Writing on buying, fixing and funding businesses.
Nine years of writing on buying, selling, funding and running businesses in the lower middle market. Practical rather than theoretical: what the numbers do, where deals break, and what the people on the other side of the table are looking at. 78 posts, newest first, with topics at the foot of the page if you would rather start from a subject than a date.
Latest
Fractional Services: Which Executive Role Do You Actually Need?28 February 2025
What a Fractional COO Does, and When You Need One21 February 2025
What a Consulting Firm Does, What It Costs, and When Not To14 February 2025
Business Advisory Services: Which One You Actually Need24 January 2025
Crisis Management for Small Businesses: What Decides the Outcome17 January 2025
Small Business Consulting Firms: How to Choose One15 November 2024
How the Balance Sheet Strategy Works for Acquisitions Under $100 Million8 November 2024
Boost Your Company's Valuation: High-Impact Moves That Matter1 November 2024
Understanding Strategic Counsel: Benefits for Your Business4 October 2024
What a Fractional Integrator Does, and How It Differs From a COO27 September 2024
What Does a Business Consultant Do?19 September 2024
What Does "Fractional" Actually Mean in Business?12 September 2024
Browse
By topic, not by date.
Nine years of writing, in the order the business cares about it. Everything above is the same archive, newest first.
Acquisitions and M&A
Buying a business: what to check before you are committed, how deals are structured, and what actually happens after the papers are signed.
2 postsExit and valuation
What a business is worth to a buyer, why that is rarely the number the owner had in mind, and what moves it in the years before a sale.
9 postsCapital and lending
How acquisitions get funded, what lenders look at, and the cost of money for a deal this size.
20 postsGrowth and strategy
Making a business bigger and more durable. Written for owners, and useful to a buyer reading the same company from the outside.
21 postsFractional advisory
Part-time senior help: what the roles actually do, what they cost, and when bringing one in is the wrong answer.
6 postsLeadership and team
The people problems that decide whether a business survives its founder, which is the first thing a buyer tests.
3 postsMarketing and sales
Where revenue comes from, and how much of it walks out of the door with the person who built it.
7 postsInterviews and podcast
Longer conversations with operators and specialists, from the earlier podcast.
5 postsMore writing
Everything that does not sit in one of the above.