By Stefania Aulicino
Growing a business deserves to be fun and profitable.
Sara knows the importance of fast customer service when someone wants to buy.
Her expertise is credit card processing and customer support
Her focus is the higher education market, with its unique needs.
She used her innovative approach and became a leader in the field.
Her reward was revenue growth to $ 6 million at a rate which won her a spot on the Inc 500 list of fastest growing companies.
So what is the problem?
She is tired. Work is consuming her time so she can’t do the other things she loves.
Solution?
Sell ….. Sara was entertaining the idea of selling her company.
Because Sara’s company had low profits today, the valuation she could get was capped.
She had ideas of a new suite of products and some automation which could propel her company to $100 million revenue. Any buyer would tie their purchase price “valuation” to future profits obligating Sara to deliver milestone success for a new owner during a transition period. Problem is she would have no ownership or authority to direct the actions she knew were necessary.
Sara was about to pursue a permanent answer to a temporary problem, until we spoke and I suggested it was a business model issue. continue reading…