May 22, 2025 • 25 mins
In this special edition of Business Buying Strategies, Jonathan Jay speaks live from the Deal Makers Retreat in Marbella, Spain, talking about the importance of personal branding when negotiating business deals.
He explains how to present yourself to business owners, emphasising the significance of the first impression and maintaining credibility throughout the negotiation process.
Jonathan shares practical tips and anecdotes, underlining that knowing the buying process thoroughly and having clarity of intent are crucial for success. Listeners are encouraged to adopt a calm, professional demeanour, control the conversation, and remain curious.
The session provides actionable advice on how to address common challenges faced by new business buyers and highlights the importance of being likeable and confident.
Key moments
00:00 Welcome to the Deal Makers Retreat
00:49 The Importance of Personal Branding
01:17 First Impressions Matter
05:09 Building Confidence in Deal-Making
09:29 Establishing Credibility
12:33 Effective Communication Strategies
17:21 Handling Objections and Questions
23:16 Turning the Conversation to the Business
23:41 Overcoming Self-Doubt
** Looking for a great acquisition lawyer in the UK? Use mine! **
If you are looking for a lawyer in the UK to help you get the deal over the line, then use my own lawyer, John Andrews. You can phone his office at (0345) 2412494 or email him at johnandrews.deallawyer@jmw.co.uk.
Ready to get started?
Here’s how you can start your business buying journey…
Download our free Business Buying Toolkit
https://dealmakers.co.uk/business-buying-toolkit
Join our Business Acquisition FastTrack programme
https://www.dealmakers.co.uk/fast
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if you've already bought a business, you should be part of my Inner Circle group where we discuss raising capital, integration management, and exiting. Email Maria on hello@thedealmakersacademy.com for more information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:29):
Hi, this is Jonathan Jay, and welcome tothis special edition of Business Buying
Strategies, and today we are live from ourDeal Makers Retreat in Marbella, Spain.
And today you're going to hearsome extracts from my talk all
about your personal brand and howyou present yourself when speaking
to the owner of a business.
I hope you enjoy it.
(00:49):
And this afternoon I'm gonnabe talking to you about the
personal side of deal making.
I'm gonna be talking to about how youare the brand and how you are unique
and how, regardless of how many peoplethere are out there wanting to buy
a business, there's only one of you.
So I'm gonna be showing you howto be the best you possible when
talking to the owner of a businessand when negotiating a deal.
(01:14):
So we are gonna be talking about.
That first impression with the owner ofthe business and that first interaction
with them, and I have to say, talkingto quite literally thousands of people
in your position over the years, Ican tell you that this is the biggest
(01:35):
challenge that new business buyers face.
The challenge is how do I communicatein a way to the owner that sets me up
as a professional that allows me not toself-sabotage the rest of the conversation
(01:56):
if I've never done it before, doesn't putme into a disadvantaged situation and sets
the tone for the conversation to come.
That allows me to negotiatein the strongest possible way.
And I'm gonna be giving you someexamples along the way of how
(02:16):
to do it and how not to do it.
And I'm gonna exaggerate some of theseexamples really just to make the point.
Maybe they're a little bit, a little bithumorous at times because I want you to
see how to do it and how not to do it.
And if you get this bit right,everything else flows from there.
Does that make sense?
So if we get the, it's, it's it's theold saying, isn't it about you know,
putting your best foot forward and,you know, getting off to a good start.
(02:38):
If we can get off to a good startwhen we are having a conversation
with the owner, then everything elsejust becomes a little bit easier.
There after.
See, you are the face of the deal.
You are the person that theyare doing the deal with.
So can we now agree to forget aboutclever names for holding companies and
(03:00):
about your SPV that you just set up?
You know, no one cares.
They care about the relationship with you,and here is a very frank piece of truth.
If they don't like you,the deal won't happen.
Even if what you put together is betterthan someone else, if they can't imagine
(03:24):
you owning their business, if theydon't like you, the deal won't happen.
Just give me a nod and a smileif you're in agreement with with
it, is all about personalities.
It's all about you.
You don't have to be anoutrageous extrovert.
It doesn't matter, but youhave to be likable to the
person that you are talking to.
(03:44):
Now, here's another thing.
You're not gonna win them all.
, You know, , you might be surprised toknow that some people don't like me.
It's crazy, right?
But some people, I'm not, I'mnot their cup of tea, but other
people, I am their cup of tea.
So it's about talking to the right peopleat the right time in the right way.
So, however good you are at thespreadsheets, if you haven't
(04:07):
got that personality bit inthere, it's not going to work.
And those first impressionsshape everything.
Now, who can tell me when the first,first impression will start to be formed?
When is that first, first impression?
What, from what moment?
As you open your mouth?
As soon as you open your mouth.
(04:28):
Yes.
Which is typically when they callyou because they've received some
sort of communication from you.
And they call you, and that firstcontact is where they start assessing.
So we've got to be reassuring.
Now, I'm going to be prettyprescriptive actually, with the way I
(04:50):
think that you should be doing this.
I've had hundreds and hundredsand hundreds of conversations
with owners of businesses.
The majority go nowhere,the minority go somewhere.
So you've got to do this a lotto get really good at this.
So the first thing isyou need to be confident.
(05:13):
Now, you might be thinking right now,Jonathan, I don't have the self-belief.
I'm just starting out.
I'm a beginner.
I don't have the confidence.
Well, let me tell you wherethe confidence comes from.
The confidence comesfrom knowing the process.
You have to know more aboutbuying a business than the seller
(05:33):
knows about selling the business.
If you know more about buyingit than they, they know about
selling it, you're gonna be okay.
If you're in a situation where theyknow more about selling a business
than you know about buying it,then you're gonna be struggling.
Okay, so you get your confidencefrom knowing the process.
(06:10):
Now, how do you learn the process?
Well, I, as you know, I, I dothese onboarding zooms with
we call them kickoff zooms.
You've all been on a kickoffzoom at at some point.
So this is partly when you doface-to-face meetings, and actually
mostly when you do face-to-face meetings.
But I think the way you present yourselfjust from the way you answer the phone
(06:32):
sometimes I've noticed that peoplehave a, almost like a throat clearing.
They, they, they get a little bithesitant in those first few words.
What you need to do is to listento yourself and say, am I one
of those people that does itlike a throat clearing hesitancy
before I get into a conversation?
Or do I cut straight to the chase?
You want to be one of the people who hasthe clean communication where you start
(06:54):
saying what you want to say straightaway and you don't start apologizing
for the traffic noise and, and startingoff what is effectively a negotiation
to buy someone's business with anapology is really poor positioning.
Can you see why that would be?
You?
You don't want to be apologizingthat the moment you, you open your
mouth, . I have noticed that themost successful business buyers
(07:17):
have what we call clarity of intent.
Clarity of intent.
It is where you know exactlywhere you want to go.
So, you will appreciate that.
We talk a lot of mastermind abouthaving the end goal in mind and working
backwards to where you want to be.
In fact, actually in the members' areaand the training videos, you can work
(07:38):
out the number that you want to achieveand work backwards to how many deals
you need to do because it's really easyto , listen to people in the inner circle.
Do five deals and 10 deals and15, and where are you up to John?
You're up to 17, 17 deals and think,think you've gotta go and do 17 deals.
I'm here to tell you that onedeal can change your life.
One deal can change your life.
(07:59):
So maybe you don't need to do 17.
Maybe you do, maybe youdon't, but you probably don't.
You could just do one, and that willhave a life changing effect for you.
Okay?
So the clarity of intention means that.
When you are speaking to the owner onthe phone, I have absolutely a laser-like
intention of I am speaking to them becauseI want to assess as quickly as possible,
(08:24):
is this a business that I'm interested in?
And here is a very important numbertwo that most people miss, which is
this someone that I can do a deal with.
Now, why are the two things different?
Anyone know why the twothings are different?
Wait, it could be a business thatyou're interested in, but what
happens if the owner has incrediblydisconnected from reality expectations?
(08:49):
What if the owner is someone who isjust very aggressive and very bullish
and it's like, make me an offer andI'm not leaving my house unless you
put 5 million pounds and deposit,you know, all these ridiculous.
So you are looking for not justthe right business to buy, but
the right owner to do a deal with.
And I would say that the mannerthat you need to adopt is this
(09:12):
calm, professional energy.
It's where you are going to controlthe pace of the conversation.
So the deal maker personais all about credibility,
, communication, and character.
And we're gonna go into these in alittle bit more depth as we go through.
The first is credibility.
(09:32):
There is no doubt for most people,the hardest deal is which one?
First one.
The first one.
Why is it the hardest deal?
No.
No track record experience.
No experience, no credibility,perhaps no self-belief.
(09:54):
You haven't proven toyourself that you can do it.
And you ask anyone who's boughtmultiple businesses, they say,
when you've done that first one,suddenly the floodgates open.
You realize that anything is.
Possible.
Okay.
So what we want to do here is we wantto establish credibility if you've got
the track record, but also credibilityif you don't have the track record.
(10:18):
And I'm gonna be showing youhow to do that this afternoon.
In fact, you're gonna be doing anexercise around that this afternoon.
So by the end of this afternoon,you will have on your notepads a,
a, a scripted couple of sentencesthat will help you do that.
'cause I know that that worries peopleand concerns people, strategic language.
This is around saying we have aninterest in a number of businesses and
(10:45):
we thought yours might be interesting.
So what are you doing?
When I say those two things,what's happening here?
We have an interest ina number of businesses.
What is that telling them?
You've got, I've got options.
Options, options, absolutely.
But what's the next part telling you?
There's a possibility that we mightbe interested, but it's not a dead
(11:06):
cert and we've got other options.
So what are we doing here?
We're setting up a dynamic wherethe owner is going to sell to us
rather than us sell to the owner.
I can tell you right here, right now,if you feel you have to go into one of
these, these conversations and proveyourself, we need to shift your mindset.
(11:28):
Because what we need to do isto show you an actual fact.
They need to prove themselves to you.
And when you get that shift inmental dynamic, what happens is
that the confidence level increases.
All of these things are intertwinedand you need to speak with certainty.
(11:48):
Now, look, we all havedifferent speech patterns.
We all speak in different ways.
And how you communicate in yourday-to-day life is entirely up to you.
But I would say though, if you aregoing to be speaking to the owners of
businesses who are potentially goingto hand over their, the, you know,
(12:08):
their, their, their business babythat's been there for the last 30
years, they need to be certain in you.
And the fastest way for someoneto be certain in you is for
you to be certain in yourself.
Does that make sense in yourself?
(12:29):
So speaking with certaintyis very important.
So we've gotta measure tone andpace, clear, concise responses.
One of the mistakes that I see peoplemake all the time is they talk too much.
They overshare, they say too manythings, they add in too much detail.
All we're doing in thisfirst 30 minute conversation.
(12:51):
Remember, the first telephoneconversation is 30 minutes.
Okay?
Phone call, face-to-facemeeting about seven days apart.
Okay?
No more than seven days.
Yeah, if you can do it threedays away, that's even better.
But 30 minutes on the phone.
On the phone, you haven't gottime to go into a load of detail.
What you need to understand is somebasic numbers, some basic ideas about
(13:14):
their motivation, because we areestablishing number one, is this the
business I'm interested in buying?
And number two, which is,
is this someone that Ican buy a business from?
Is, is this someone I can do a deal with?
And every question you ask themhas to be a question with purpose.
(13:36):
Don't.
Distract yourself with irrelevantquestions that don't move you forward
in the decision making process, I wantyou to imagine that at 30 minutes,
that phone call is gonna be cut off.
So you've got 30 minutes to findout the information that you
need to assess the situation.
(13:58):
And if you wait, waste seven minutesof it talking about your golfing
holiday, you, you, you are wasting time.
You think you are building rapport?
I don't think you are.
This is a business call.
Your rapport is built by havingthe confidence, having the clarity,
having the certainty speakingwith a smile, good tonality.
(14:23):
That is where the rapport, becausethey are imagining is, is this
someone who can follow through ona deal, someone who can deliver?
And could this be someone who couldown my business in the future?
I would say that the number onepersonality skill that new business
buyers should adopt is curiosity.
(14:44):
Be curious.
So tell me why did that happen?
So tell me, you've justhad an amazing year.
You're talking to me aboutselling your business.
Why is that?
Those of you who've done this for awhile know that every business owner
has an amazing year, that the yearthat they're selling the business and
(15:05):
next year is just gonna be better.
Right?
Have you heard that?
Yeah.
And next year's gonna be better.
It's just gonna get better and better.
It's just gonna go through the roof.
It's incredible.
But you're selling now, of course you are.
Don't oversell if you don't need to.
They need to sell to you.
Be likable, but never needy.
Now it's a fine line to be fair, becauseyou don't want to appear to be desperate.
(15:26):
In the members area, there are 10 hoursof me talking to owners on the phone.
We videoed a whole lot.
It was probably a couple of years ago.
We videoed 10 hours ofof me talking to owners.
Of me negotiating.
And the person who was videoingsaid to me after filming a few
hours of this, she said, they allsay the same thing, don't they?
(15:49):
I said, yep.
They all say the same thing.
And and I said, you'll noticethat when someone tells you
that they're not desperate.
What does that actually mean?
They're incredibly desperate.
And I said, just listenout for the next one.
And we set up the camera.
I phone the next person, da, da, da, da.
They answer, we'rehaving the conversation.
(16:11):
And I said, oh, I'm notdesperate, by the way.
And she laughed, and youcan actually hear it.
She could hear it on the camera.
She laughed and says, here they are again.
They're saying the same thing.
So if you do enough of this,you'll start to realize that
there is a pattern to all of this.
It isn't just every event,every conversation is different.
You start to see a pattern.
(16:32):
So we've got a frameworkfor a conversation,
so the first is taking control.
The second is three key points, andthe third is turn the conversation.
Let me explain what this is.
The take control part is thiswarm professional tone that you
need to have the, the, the paceof speech you need to control it.
(16:54):
So some people naturallyspeak very, very fast.
Who are our fast speakers?
A few of you, right?
Okay.
You know that you arefast speakers, right?
You've gotta slow it down.
You've gotta slow it downbecause you, when you slow it
down, you'll gain more control.
It'll give you more time to think as well.
And comments like the one that we usedearlier, like, I've been looking at
a number of businesses, you start totake control of that conversation.
(17:19):
Just as an aside, this isin, in brackets if you like.
Sometimes new business buyers tell methat they are quizzed by the owner.
It, and they said it felt like theowner was interrogating me on the phone.
I didn't know what to say.
I broke into a sweat, I panickedand I had to end the conversation.
(17:40):
Don't worry if that's happenedto you, it's perfectly normal.
And the reason why it happened to youis because you didn't take control of
the conversation right at the start.
When you take control of the conversation,you need to be asking the questions.
If you are asking questions and they'reanswering them, then you have the control.
(18:03):
And if someone is asking you lotsof questions, I'm absolutely fine
with you saying, oh, that's a,that's a really good question.
Well, the short answer is, da da da.
I'll fill you in, fillyou in on the rest later.
But let's talk about the most interestingthing here, which is your business.
So I take it and I flip itand I turn it back to them.
We'll come to that in a moment.
(18:24):
Now this is the part that people reallyfind the most difficult, and I'm gonna
break it down to make it easy for you.
Okay?
So, three key points that youwant to include in your opening
conversation with the owner.
Sometimes people want toknow what your background is.
You need to decide in advance whatyour background is because sometimes
people have such eclectic cvsyou don't know where to start and
(18:47):
you just dump everything on them.
Oh, well, in 1976 I was doingthis In 1984 I was doing this.
No, we don't need the cv.
It's not a job interview.
Okay, so my background is the answerto that question has to be something
that you've already considered to bereasonably relevant to what the, the owner
(19:09):
of the business that you are talking to.
It's super easy if you running a runa plumbing and electrical business and
you are talking to the owner of theplumbing and electrical business and you
say, I've run a plumbing, plumbing andnatural business for the last 15 years.
That's all we have to say.
All we have to say.
Now what happens if you have neverowned a business in that sector?
(19:30):
Let me tell you exactly what you do.
Okay?
You do something like this.
You say before you ask, I have neverowned a business in plumbing and
electrical, but I have a colleaguewho has 15 years experience, or I have
an associate, or I have a team, or Ihave a a person advising me who's got
(19:53):
15 years experience in that sector.
So even though I personally don't havethat, I wouldn't be running the business
because I would hear all about youramazing team that run the business anyway.
And our philosophy is always to make surethose people are engaged and incentivized
and motivated to do the best job possible.
(20:13):
So what I've done, I've picked it up,I've deflected it, and I've made it very,
very clear that in actual fact, it doesn'tmatter that I don't have a plumbing and
electrical business because I'm not goingto be the person running the business now.
Does that make sense?
? Okay.
So the question is, what happens ifyou've never bought a business before?
Well, I said to you earlier, everyonestarts off as a first time buyer.
(20:36):
Okay?
If you've got a motivated seller wholikes you, who believes in you, that
believes that you can follow through,you're not just messing them around,
you can actually deliver on a deal.
Makes no difference whetheryou bought one or five or 10.
It might to the odd person, but quitefrankly, yeah, if you are a motivated
seller and you can do a deal and I canget the money that I want and get outta
(20:59):
that business, that's causing me somuch stress because I'm 65 and I want to
retire, then quite frankly, whether you'vedone this before or not is irrelevant,
but I would always be very, very upfrontif you are asked that direct question.
I'd say, no, I haven't.
But you know what?
(21:20):
I work with a team ofpeople who've done hundreds.
I. Collectively and I havegot the most amazing advisors.
And what I can absolutely assureyou is that I'm not one of those
people who wastes anyone's time.
If I'm not interested in your business,then I will tell you, and we're part
as friends, if I am interested init then we have a very, very clear
(21:42):
and a focused systemized approach toacquisition that will get you the deal
that we agree in about 12 to 16 weeks.
How does that sound?
And flip it back straight on that.
Okay?
You should never be thrown by thefact you haven't done it before.
It makes no difference.
You know, let talk to anyof my inner circle guys who
(22:04):
you'd never done it before.
You'd never done it before,you'd never done it before.
You'd never done it before.
You'd never done it before, but nowit's sort of let's just do another deal.
Okay.
So getting to that pointis easier than you think.
Does that help you?
I mean, to be fair, let, let's sayyou're going to buy a house, alright?
And let's say you, you know,you're taking there typically
by the estate agent, aren't you?
(22:25):
And the owner of the house is there.
Who, who's bought a house before?
A property?
Who's bought a property?
Like most of you, right?
Have you ever been confronted bythe owner in the hallway and said,
have you ever bought a house before?
Well, you never have.
Well, no, they don't care, do they?
If you can get the mortgage andyou've got the deposit and you
can do a deal quickly so they canmove on, doesn't matter to them.
(22:46):
Does it makes no difference at all.
Everyone's a first timebuyer at some point.
In fact, the gratitude they feelfor you, contacting them to buy the
business that's become the millstonearound their neck is so immense.
It is.
They're open the door and say, comein, you're interested in buying.
Sit down.
Let me get you a coffee.
(23:06):
Because they want to talk to you.
They want you to be interested.
They want you to help them solvethe problem that they have got.
Now, the turning the conversation isthat flipping that we're gonna do,
which brings me to your business.
Tell me how it all started.
Let's talk about your business now.
If anyone's ever asked an owner to talkabout their business, they talk about it.
(23:28):
How long do they talk about it?
For ages.
For ages, yes.
And you'll have to say, well look, let'snot start back at the beginning, alright?
Just tell me about the last few years.
Where are you now?
Where are you now?
Yes.
Let's get the focus on where they are now.
. But the only thing that canstop you with this is yourself.
Have you noticed that with all of this,the only thing that can get in your
way, if you haven't gone out there andstarted doing some outreach to speak to
(23:50):
owners, the only thing stopping you is.
You and maybe having some level ofanxiety about speaking to the owners.
. What do I say and how do I say it?
And will I come across in the right way?
But if you get comfortable with that,you'll feel , the breaks are off.
You need to be in the position where Icould, and I'm not gonna do this, don't
worry, but I could select someone atrandom, just pick someone at random.
(24:10):
And I say, look, I've got thismobile number here, and it's someone
who wants to sell a business.
I dunno their name.
I dunno.
The type of business, I dunno thesector, dunno anything about it
doesn't wanna sell the business.
Talk to them.
And you could phone them up in frontof everyone, put them on speaker
phone, and you'd do a sterling job.
That is the level that you need to getto that self-belief and that confidence.
You can do this anytime, anywhere,and I can tell you that every single
(24:32):
one of my in the circle group iscan do that anytime the drop of out.
Don't need to prepare, don't need to lookat the person's website before calling.
Just have a conversation.
So tell me all about your business.
Yes.
Just get into the conversation.
Hi, this is Jonathan Jay, and welcome tothis special edition of Business Buying
Strategies, and today we are live from ourDeal Makers Retreat in Marbella, Spain.
And today you're going to hearsome extracts from my talk all
about your personal brand and howyou present yourself when speaking
to the owner of a business.
I hope you enjoy it.
(00:49):
And this afternoon I'm gonnabe talking to you about the
personal side of deal making.
I'm gonna be talking to about how youare the brand and how you are unique
and how, regardless of how many peoplethere are out there wanting to buy
a business, there's only one of you.
So I'm gonna be showing you howto be the best you possible when
talking to the owner of a businessand when negotiating a deal.
(01:14):
So we are gonna be talking about.
That first impression with the owner ofthe business and that first interaction
with them, and I have to say, talkingto quite literally thousands of people
in your position over the years, Ican tell you that this is the biggest
(01:35):
challenge that new business buyers face.
The challenge is how do I communicatein a way to the owner that sets me up
as a professional that allows me not toself-sabotage the rest of the conversation
(01:56):
if I've never done it before, doesn't putme into a disadvantaged situation and sets
the tone for the conversation to come.
That allows me to negotiatein the strongest possible way.
And I'm gonna be giving you someexamples along the way of how
(02:16):
to do it and how not to do it.
And I'm gonna exaggerate some of theseexamples really just to make the point.
Maybe they're a little bit, a little bithumorous at times because I want you to
see how to do it and how not to do it.
And if you get this bit right,everything else flows from there.
Does that make sense?
So if we get the, it's, it's it's theold saying, isn't it about you know,
putting your best foot forward and,you know, getting off to a good start.
(02:38):
If we can get off to a good startwhen we are having a conversation
with the owner, then everything elsejust becomes a little bit easier.
There after.
See, you are the face of the deal.
You are the person that theyare doing the deal with.
So can we now agree to forget aboutclever names for holding companies and
(03:00):
about your SPV that you just set up?
You know, no one cares.
They care about the relationship with you,and here is a very frank piece of truth.
If they don't like you,the deal won't happen.
Even if what you put together is betterthan someone else, if they can't imagine
(03:24):
you owning their business, if theydon't like you, the deal won't happen.
Just give me a nod and a smileif you're in agreement with with
it, is all about personalities.
It's all about you.
You don't have to be anoutrageous extrovert.
It doesn't matter, but youhave to be likable to the
person that you are talking to.
(03:44):
Now, here's another thing.
You're not gonna win them all.
, You know, , you might be surprised toknow that some people don't like me.
It's crazy, right?
But some people, I'm not, I'mnot their cup of tea, but other
people, I am their cup of tea.
So it's about talking to the right peopleat the right time in the right way.
So, however good you are at thespreadsheets, if you haven't
(04:07):
got that personality bit inthere, it's not going to work.
And those first impressionsshape everything.
Now, who can tell me when the first,first impression will start to be formed?
When is that first, first impression?
What, from what moment?
As you open your mouth?
As soon as you open your mouth.
(04:28):
Yes.
Which is typically when they callyou because they've received some
sort of communication from you.
And they call you, and that firstcontact is where they start assessing.
So we've got to be reassuring.
Now, I'm going to be prettyprescriptive actually, with the way I
(04:50):
think that you should be doing this.
I've had hundreds and hundredsand hundreds of conversations
with owners of businesses.
The majority go nowhere,the minority go somewhere.
So you've got to do this a lotto get really good at this.
So the first thing isyou need to be confident.
(05:13):
Now, you might be thinking right now,Jonathan, I don't have the self-belief.
I'm just starting out.
I'm a beginner.
I don't have the confidence.
Well, let me tell you wherethe confidence comes from.
The confidence comesfrom knowing the process.
You have to know more aboutbuying a business than the seller
(05:33):
knows about selling the business.
If you know more about buyingit than they, they know about
selling it, you're gonna be okay.
If you're in a situation where theyknow more about selling a business
than you know about buying it,then you're gonna be struggling.
Okay, so you get your confidencefrom knowing the process.
(06:10):
Now, how do you learn the process?
Well, I, as you know, I, I dothese onboarding zooms with
we call them kickoff zooms.
You've all been on a kickoffzoom at at some point.
So this is partly when you doface-to-face meetings, and actually
mostly when you do face-to-face meetings.
But I think the way you present yourselfjust from the way you answer the phone
(06:32):
sometimes I've noticed that peoplehave a, almost like a throat clearing.
They, they, they get a little bithesitant in those first few words.
What you need to do is to listento yourself and say, am I one
of those people that does itlike a throat clearing hesitancy
before I get into a conversation?
Or do I cut straight to the chase?
You want to be one of the people who hasthe clean communication where you start
(06:54):
saying what you want to say straightaway and you don't start apologizing
for the traffic noise and, and startingoff what is effectively a negotiation
to buy someone's business with anapology is really poor positioning.
Can you see why that would be?
You?
You don't want to be apologizingthat the moment you, you open your
mouth, . I have noticed that themost successful business buyers
(07:17):
have what we call clarity of intent.
Clarity of intent.
It is where you know exactlywhere you want to go.
So, you will appreciate that.
We talk a lot of mastermind abouthaving the end goal in mind and working
backwards to where you want to be.
In fact, actually in the members' areaand the training videos, you can work
(07:38):
out the number that you want to achieveand work backwards to how many deals
you need to do because it's really easyto , listen to people in the inner circle.
Do five deals and 10 deals and15, and where are you up to John?
You're up to 17, 17 deals and think,think you've gotta go and do 17 deals.
I'm here to tell you that onedeal can change your life.
One deal can change your life.
(07:59):
So maybe you don't need to do 17.
Maybe you do, maybe youdon't, but you probably don't.
You could just do one, and that willhave a life changing effect for you.
Okay?
So the clarity of intention means that.
When you are speaking to the owner onthe phone, I have absolutely a laser-like
intention of I am speaking to them becauseI want to assess as quickly as possible,
(08:24):
is this a business that I'm interested in?
And here is a very important numbertwo that most people miss, which is
this someone that I can do a deal with.
Now, why are the two things different?
Anyone know why the twothings are different?
Wait, it could be a business thatyou're interested in, but what
happens if the owner has incrediblydisconnected from reality expectations?
(08:49):
What if the owner is someone who isjust very aggressive and very bullish
and it's like, make me an offer andI'm not leaving my house unless you
put 5 million pounds and deposit,you know, all these ridiculous.
So you are looking for not justthe right business to buy, but
the right owner to do a deal with.
And I would say that the mannerthat you need to adopt is this
(09:12):
calm, professional energy.
It's where you are going to controlthe pace of the conversation.
So the deal maker personais all about credibility,
, communication, and character.
And we're gonna go into these in alittle bit more depth as we go through.
The first is credibility.
(09:32):
There is no doubt for most people,the hardest deal is which one?
First one.
The first one.
Why is it the hardest deal?
No.
No track record experience.
No experience, no credibility,perhaps no self-belief.
(09:54):
You haven't proven toyourself that you can do it.
And you ask anyone who's boughtmultiple businesses, they say,
when you've done that first one,suddenly the floodgates open.
You realize that anything is.
Possible.
Okay.
So what we want to do here is we wantto establish credibility if you've got
the track record, but also credibilityif you don't have the track record.
(10:18):
And I'm gonna be showing youhow to do that this afternoon.
In fact, you're gonna be doing anexercise around that this afternoon.
So by the end of this afternoon,you will have on your notepads a,
a, a scripted couple of sentencesthat will help you do that.
'cause I know that that worries peopleand concerns people, strategic language.
This is around saying we have aninterest in a number of businesses and
(10:45):
we thought yours might be interesting.
So what are you doing?
When I say those two things,what's happening here?
We have an interest ina number of businesses.
What is that telling them?
You've got, I've got options.
Options, options, absolutely.
But what's the next part telling you?
There's a possibility that we mightbe interested, but it's not a dead
(11:06):
cert and we've got other options.
So what are we doing here?
We're setting up a dynamic wherethe owner is going to sell to us
rather than us sell to the owner.
I can tell you right here, right now,if you feel you have to go into one of
these, these conversations and proveyourself, we need to shift your mindset.
(11:28):
Because what we need to do isto show you an actual fact.
They need to prove themselves to you.
And when you get that shift inmental dynamic, what happens is
that the confidence level increases.
All of these things are intertwinedand you need to speak with certainty.
(11:48):
Now, look, we all havedifferent speech patterns.
We all speak in different ways.
And how you communicate in yourday-to-day life is entirely up to you.
But I would say though, if you aregoing to be speaking to the owners of
businesses who are potentially goingto hand over their, the, you know,
(12:08):
their, their, their business babythat's been there for the last 30
years, they need to be certain in you.
And the fastest way for someoneto be certain in you is for
you to be certain in yourself.
Does that make sense in yourself?
(12:29):
So speaking with certaintyis very important.
So we've gotta measure tone andpace, clear, concise responses.
One of the mistakes that I see peoplemake all the time is they talk too much.
They overshare, they say too manythings, they add in too much detail.
All we're doing in thisfirst 30 minute conversation.
(12:51):
Remember, the first telephoneconversation is 30 minutes.
Okay?
Phone call, face-to-facemeeting about seven days apart.
Okay?
No more than seven days.
Yeah, if you can do it threedays away, that's even better.
But 30 minutes on the phone.
On the phone, you haven't gottime to go into a load of detail.
What you need to understand is somebasic numbers, some basic ideas about
(13:14):
their motivation, because we areestablishing number one, is this the
business I'm interested in buying?
And number two, which is,
is this someone that Ican buy a business from?
Is, is this someone I can do a deal with?
And every question you ask themhas to be a question with purpose.
(13:36):
Don't.
Distract yourself with irrelevantquestions that don't move you forward
in the decision making process, I wantyou to imagine that at 30 minutes,
that phone call is gonna be cut off.
So you've got 30 minutes to findout the information that you
need to assess the situation.
(13:58):
And if you wait, waste seven minutesof it talking about your golfing
holiday, you, you, you are wasting time.
You think you are building rapport?
I don't think you are.
This is a business call.
Your rapport is built by havingthe confidence, having the clarity,
having the certainty speakingwith a smile, good tonality.
(14:23):
That is where the rapport, becausethey are imagining is, is this
someone who can follow through ona deal, someone who can deliver?
And could this be someone who couldown my business in the future?
I would say that the number onepersonality skill that new business
buyers should adopt is curiosity.
(14:44):
Be curious.
So tell me why did that happen?
So tell me, you've justhad an amazing year.
You're talking to me aboutselling your business.
Why is that?
Those of you who've done this for awhile know that every business owner
has an amazing year, that the yearthat they're selling the business and
(15:05):
next year is just gonna be better.
Right?
Have you heard that?
Yeah.
And next year's gonna be better.
It's just gonna get better and better.
It's just gonna go through the roof.
It's incredible.
But you're selling now, of course you are.
Don't oversell if you don't need to.
They need to sell to you.
Be likable, but never needy.
Now it's a fine line to be fair, becauseyou don't want to appear to be desperate.
(15:26):
In the members area, there are 10 hoursof me talking to owners on the phone.
We videoed a whole lot.
It was probably a couple of years ago.
We videoed 10 hours ofof me talking to owners.
Of me negotiating.
And the person who was videoingsaid to me after filming a few
hours of this, she said, they allsay the same thing, don't they?
(15:49):
I said, yep.
They all say the same thing.
And and I said, you'll noticethat when someone tells you
that they're not desperate.
What does that actually mean?
They're incredibly desperate.
And I said, just listenout for the next one.
And we set up the camera.
I phone the next person, da, da, da, da.
They answer, we'rehaving the conversation.
(16:11):
And I said, oh, I'm notdesperate, by the way.
And she laughed, and youcan actually hear it.
She could hear it on the camera.
She laughed and says, here they are again.
They're saying the same thing.
So if you do enough of this,you'll start to realize that
there is a pattern to all of this.
It isn't just every event,every conversation is different.
You start to see a pattern.
(16:32):
So we've got a frameworkfor a conversation,
so the first is taking control.
The second is three key points, andthe third is turn the conversation.
Let me explain what this is.
The take control part is thiswarm professional tone that you
need to have the, the, the paceof speech you need to control it.
(16:54):
So some people naturallyspeak very, very fast.
Who are our fast speakers?
A few of you, right?
Okay.
You know that you arefast speakers, right?
You've gotta slow it down.
You've gotta slow it downbecause you, when you slow it
down, you'll gain more control.
It'll give you more time to think as well.
And comments like the one that we usedearlier, like, I've been looking at
a number of businesses, you start totake control of that conversation.
(17:19):
Just as an aside, this isin, in brackets if you like.
Sometimes new business buyers tell methat they are quizzed by the owner.
It, and they said it felt like theowner was interrogating me on the phone.
I didn't know what to say.
I broke into a sweat, I panickedand I had to end the conversation.
(17:40):
Don't worry if that's happenedto you, it's perfectly normal.
And the reason why it happened to youis because you didn't take control of
the conversation right at the start.
When you take control of the conversation,you need to be asking the questions.
If you are asking questions and they'reanswering them, then you have the control.
(18:03):
And if someone is asking you lotsof questions, I'm absolutely fine
with you saying, oh, that's a,that's a really good question.
Well, the short answer is, da da da.
I'll fill you in, fillyou in on the rest later.
But let's talk about the most interestingthing here, which is your business.
So I take it and I flip itand I turn it back to them.
We'll come to that in a moment.
(18:24):
Now this is the part that people reallyfind the most difficult, and I'm gonna
break it down to make it easy for you.
Okay?
So, three key points that youwant to include in your opening
conversation with the owner.
Sometimes people want toknow what your background is.
You need to decide in advance whatyour background is because sometimes
people have such eclectic cvsyou don't know where to start and
(18:47):
you just dump everything on them.
Oh, well, in 1976 I was doingthis In 1984 I was doing this.
No, we don't need the cv.
It's not a job interview.
Okay, so my background is the answerto that question has to be something
that you've already considered to bereasonably relevant to what the, the owner
(19:09):
of the business that you are talking to.
It's super easy if you running a runa plumbing and electrical business and
you are talking to the owner of theplumbing and electrical business and you
say, I've run a plumbing, plumbing andnatural business for the last 15 years.
That's all we have to say.
All we have to say.
Now what happens if you have neverowned a business in that sector?
(19:30):
Let me tell you exactly what you do.
Okay?
You do something like this.
You say before you ask, I have neverowned a business in plumbing and
electrical, but I have a colleaguewho has 15 years experience, or I have
an associate, or I have a team, or Ihave a a person advising me who's got
(19:53):
15 years experience in that sector.
So even though I personally don't havethat, I wouldn't be running the business
because I would hear all about youramazing team that run the business anyway.
And our philosophy is always to make surethose people are engaged and incentivized
and motivated to do the best job possible.
(20:13):
So what I've done, I've picked it up,I've deflected it, and I've made it very,
very clear that in actual fact, it doesn'tmatter that I don't have a plumbing and
electrical business because I'm not goingto be the person running the business now.
Does that make sense?
? Okay.
So the question is, what happens ifyou've never bought a business before?
Well, I said to you earlier, everyonestarts off as a first time buyer.
(20:36):
Okay?
If you've got a motivated seller wholikes you, who believes in you, that
believes that you can follow through,you're not just messing them around,
you can actually deliver on a deal.
Makes no difference whetheryou bought one or five or 10.
It might to the odd person, but quitefrankly, yeah, if you are a motivated
seller and you can do a deal and I canget the money that I want and get outta
(20:59):
that business, that's causing me somuch stress because I'm 65 and I want to
retire, then quite frankly, whether you'vedone this before or not is irrelevant,
but I would always be very, very upfrontif you are asked that direct question.
I'd say, no, I haven't.
But you know what?
(21:20):
I work with a team ofpeople who've done hundreds.
I. Collectively and I havegot the most amazing advisors.
And what I can absolutely assureyou is that I'm not one of those
people who wastes anyone's time.
If I'm not interested in your business,then I will tell you, and we're part
as friends, if I am interested init then we have a very, very clear
(21:42):
and a focused systemized approach toacquisition that will get you the deal
that we agree in about 12 to 16 weeks.
How does that sound?
And flip it back straight on that.
Okay?
You should never be thrown by thefact you haven't done it before.
It makes no difference.
You know, let talk to anyof my inner circle guys who
(22:04):
you'd never done it before.
You'd never done it before,you'd never done it before.
You'd never done it before.
You'd never done it before, but nowit's sort of let's just do another deal.
Okay.
So getting to that pointis easier than you think.
Does that help you?
I mean, to be fair, let, let's sayyou're going to buy a house, alright?
And let's say you, you know,you're taking there typically
by the estate agent, aren't you?
(22:25):
And the owner of the house is there.
Who, who's bought a house before?
A property?
Who's bought a property?
Like most of you, right?
Have you ever been confronted bythe owner in the hallway and said,
have you ever bought a house before?
Well, you never have.
Well, no, they don't care, do they?
If you can get the mortgage andyou've got the deposit and you
can do a deal quickly so they canmove on, doesn't matter to them.
(22:46):
Does it makes no difference at all.
Everyone's a first timebuyer at some point.
In fact, the gratitude they feelfor you, contacting them to buy the
business that's become the millstonearound their neck is so immense.
It is.
They're open the door and say, comein, you're interested in buying.
Sit down.
Let me get you a coffee.
(23:06):
Because they want to talk to you.
They want you to be interested.
They want you to help them solvethe problem that they have got.
Now, the turning the conversation isthat flipping that we're gonna do,
which brings me to your business.
Tell me how it all started.
Let's talk about your business now.
If anyone's ever asked an owner to talkabout their business, they talk about it.
(23:28):
How long do they talk about it?
For ages.
For ages, yes.
And you'll have to say, well look, let'snot start back at the beginning, alright?
Just tell me about the last few years.
Where are you now?
Where are you now?
Yes.
Let's get the focus on where they are now.
. But the only thing that canstop you with this is yourself.
Have you noticed that with all of this,the only thing that can get in your
way, if you haven't gone out there andstarted doing some outreach to speak to
(23:50):
owners, the only thing stopping you is.
You and maybe having some level ofanxiety about speaking to the owners.
. What do I say and how do I say it?
And will I come across in the right way?
But if you get comfortable with that,you'll feel , the breaks are off.
You need to be in the position where Icould, and I'm not gonna do this, don't
worry, but I could select someone atrandom, just pick someone at random.
(24:10):
And I say, look, I've got thismobile number here, and it's someone
who wants to sell a business.
I dunno their name.
I dunno.
The type of business, I dunno thesector, dunno anything about it
doesn't wanna sell the business.
Talk to them.
And you could phone them up in frontof everyone, put them on speaker
phone, and you'd do a sterling job.
That is the level that you need to getto that self-belief and that confidence.
You can do this anytime, anywhere,and I can tell you that every single
(24:32):
one of my in the circle group iscan do that anytime the drop of out.
Don't need to prepare, don't need to lookat the person's website before calling.
Just have a conversation.
So tell me all about your business.
Yes.
Just get into the conversation.
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