Are You Built to Sell?

My fellow BNET blogger, John Warrillow, has a pretty good deal going.

If you buy one copy of his book, Built to Sell, today, then he’ll give you a goodie basket worth around $65 (the book costs $16) that includes:

• a 1-year subscription to Inc. Magazine
• a 2-hour teleconference with him
• the E-Myth ebook, The Four Pillars of a Sellable Business
• the BizBuySell valuation report
• a $25 Kiva loan in your name

I haven’t met John, but I do feel a kinship with him because of our shared BNET experience.

Also, I haven’t yet read Built to Sell, but Rieva Lesonsky has (by way of disclosure, please note that that review of the book is on Grow Smart Business, a blog hosted by Network Solutions, which is a client of mine).

Not only do I respect Rieva’s opinion enormously, my friend Gini Dietrich does as well … so if Rieva says it’s good, I’m going to take her word for it.

(Now that’s influence.)

When John asked if I’d mind sharing this information, I said I didn’t at all. He seems like a nice guy, and it doesn’t hurt me to put it out.

But then I went across to the Built to Sell website, and really liked what I saw, especially when I read a chapter from the book.

I was also curious about the BizBuySell valuation report, so I asked John to tell me more about that. He said,

“I used to ask myself two recurring questions when growing my last business: ‘What is it worth today?’ and ‘If I do x, y and z in the coming years, how much more would it be worth?’

“As the Internet’s largest marketplace of businesses for sale, BizBuySell.com has a deep data set of past deals to draw benchmarks from.

“The BizBuySell.com valuation report takes your key financial data and compares them against recently completed transactions in your industry to develop a benchmark for the multiple being paid for a business like yours.

“If you order a copy of my book this week, you will receive a code to develop a customized BizBuySell.com valuation report (which typically retails for $19.95 – $59.95) for your business. Just plug in your basic financial stats and see what your business might be worth.”

While looking up the book, I thought, why would PR pros be interested in a book/offer like this?

But what jumped out at me, when I read that sample chapter, and looked through the site, was that it’s all about “creating a business that can thrive without you.”

Duh me, because that’s the tagline of the book as well.

And that’s one of the things that many of us PR pros, especially those of us who are independent (like me) or who run small shops, struggle with.

Our commitment to clients is that we will be with them every step of the way. That they (the clients) won’t be sold on us, and then get farmed out to someone else.

And that is how I try to run my business.

But it is also very hard, if not practically impossible, to do everything by yourself.

I’m very particular about the people I work with, not just clients, but sub-contractors as well, which I think is a good thing.

But if I ever want to grow my business beyond one person, then I’m going to have to figure out how my business can be equally reputable without me doing absolutely everything.

And then one day I’ll be bought out and can go live on an island … but there’s no way any of that will happen if I don’t build a business that can thrive without me.

I also asked John why he thinks PR pros, or firms, should read this book. He said,

“PR firms are usually very dependent on their owners, which makes them tough to sell.

When they do sell, the owner usually only gets a little bit of money up front and the rest on an earn-out, which means you trade ownership in your firm for a job and a chance at a payday.

Earn-outs are risky and to be avoided. This  book will show PR firms – and all service firms – how to avoid one.”

So I started writing this post with the thought of helping John out.

But by the time I got to this sentence, I’d bought the book.

If you’re in a similar situation, no matter what industry you work in, I think you should do the same.

What’s the worst that can happen? The book turns out to be crap, you don’t use any of the other stuff, but you’ll do some good with the Kiva loan, and you’ll still be ahead by $9.

Right?

So that’s what I wanted to share with you today. But if you’re going to take John up on his offer, you have to go buy the book today. The offer won’t be there tomorrow.

Go! Do it now!

If you’ve already read the book, will you let me know what you think? What other resources have you found helpful as you’ve been growing your business?