It can be tempting to expand your niche to grow your business, but the broader the market you serve, the less valuable you may be to an acquirer.

Despite having distribution at Whole Foods, Kroger, and Safeway, salsa-maker Julie Nirvelli found herself on the brink of bankruptcy. She sent a last-ditch email to four potential acquirers – and you won’t believe what happened next. 

With celebrity endorsements like Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon, Viviscal hit €50 million in revenue…so, why would the CEO want to sell it?

Chemco Industries’ customers included Walmart, eBay, and Amazon, which is one reason they were so irresistible to an acquirer.

Ross Organic was a family business so when Stephanie Leshney took over from her father, she knew she had to make some changes if it was going to grow into a more valuable company.

Tom Hannon’s publishing company grew rapidly, and he received 4 offers.  So why does he wish he handled his exit differently?

Pete Borum practically invented the term “influencer marketing.” So how did Borum raise $15 million dollars and attract multiple acquisition offers in an industry that didn’t exist before he showed up?

Digital marketing agency Blast Radius went from 10 people to more than 400 in less that 10 years, ultimately attracting the attention of WPP who acquired them in 2007. Here’s how they did it. 

Gorny built his first business- and lost it. He was determined not to let that happen again.

What started as a part-time job to get through college turned into over 100 franchises.

Teetering on the brink of liquidation, a key hire at Dimple led to a dramatic turnaround that resulted in a $13.4M exit.

Embanet broke just about every rule there is for running a company and still sold for $200M.

Oribe sold in early 2018 for $441M, but in 2008 they were just a few sketches of shampoo bottles on a piece of paper. Tev Finger shares the surprising tactics they used to drive revenue.

Impact LABS had no hard assets and little intellectual property, so why would ContextLabs want to acquire them for millions?

Finding an acquirer for your business feels a lot like searching for an investor, but as Moritz Plassnig found out, there is one crucial difference.

Harpaul Sambhi’s company was 8 days away from bankruptcy. So why would LinkedIn want to buy it for millions?

While Michael Pedone survived off of food stamps as a kid, he dreamed of living a lifestyle where money wasn’t scarce. Fast-forward a few decades, and Pedone sold his first company for $1.2MM.

Scott Miller knew that telling his employees he wanted to sell his $3M company, Miller Restoration, could get messy. But he wasn’t prepared for what actually happened. 

Back when mobile phones had green screens with black dots on them, Andy Nulman founded Airborne Mobile. In one year, the company went from $2M in revenue to $20M, driven by the explosion in the adoption of mobile devices. Leveraging his client list, Nulman sold 85% of Airborne Mobile for over $100M and retained 15% of the company—a position he would later expand in a strange twist of fate.

Richard Manders co-founded iAutomation and built it up to $12M before deciding it was time to recapitalize. Manders sold 75% of his company for almost 8 times EBITDA to a Private Equity (PE) and held 25% interest in the company after the sale.

After a motorcycle accident shattered Jon Read’s collar bone into 6 pieces, he wasn’t able to follow-through on his post-surgical rehabilitation appointments because of his busy travel schedule. Knowing he needed to do something to augment the home program the therapist gave him, Jon used his technical skills to hack together what would become the first prototype for Keet Health.

Four years ago Nexalogy CEO Claude Théoret was counting the employees he had to lay off. His company had burned through their $600,000 seed round of investment and he was running out of cash. An ugly split with a former co-founder had divided his team, and Théoret had to turn to his wife for a $40,000 loan.

Courtney Reum left Goldman Sachs in 2007 to start a Vodka business. He built VEEV up to more than $10 million in annual sales before he sold the company for more than seven times revenue.

The market for digital assistants is booming. Apple has Siri, Amazon has Alexa and Google has Google Assistant. Now, thanks to Charles Jolley, Facebook has Ozlo, a digital assistant designed to outsmart Siri and Alexa at their own game.

David Fairley estimates he has sold more than 20 online properties but admits it was the sale of Hammocks.com—one of his first exits—that taught him the most.