Take Five #127: 6 bank relationship tips to help secure business lines of credit, and more
Top five must-reads this week in the world of SMB acquisitions and operations
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Take Five #127: 6 bank relationship tips to help secure business lines of credit, and more
1. The entrepreneur's innate ability to operate under (and seek) uncertainty is a feature, not a bug
A career path is a continuation of the direction you’ve gotten at home and school – do these things and you’ll get these rewards. (Even with a career path you’ll discover that you need to champion your own trajectory down that path. No one will tell you that you are in a dead end job. No one will say that it’s time to move on. No one will tell you that you are better qualified for something elsewhere. No one will say work less and go home and spend time with your partner and/or family. And many end up near the end of their careers trapped, saying, “I wish I could have…, I think I should have…”)
Non-Linear Career Path
But entrepreneurs instinctually realize that the best advocate for their careers is themselves and that there is no such thing as a linear career path. They recognize they are going to have to follow their own internal compass and embrace the uncertainty as part of the journey.
Read the rest of Steve Blank’s post here.
2. “Why Mastering the Art of Demand Creation is Key to Building a Successful Business”
To understand why lead generation is so important, you need to look at basic economics. The principle of demand and supply governs everything. EVERYTHING. Take Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. Smith famously asked: why is water, essential to life, free, while diamonds, non-essential and scarce, are so expensive? The answer lies in the supply-demand imbalance. Water is abundant, so its value is low. Diamonds are scarce, driving their value higher.
Business is no different. It’s not about fairness; it’s about tension. Yes, you can think of some industries that should, theoretically, be more profitable—like airlines or grocery stores. Despite being vital and complex to run, they operate on razor-thin margins (3-7% for airlines and 3-5% for grocery stores).
Read the rest of Silverwave’s post here.
3. Acquiring Minds Interview: 3 partners outline a unique snowball-style HoldCo-building strategy
Marc Nzojibwami and his partners decided that they would pool their capital, about $50k each, to come up with the deposit for a first business acquisition, and one of them would quit his job to run it.
Once that business was stable, and the 3 partners had saved enough capital again for the deposit on a second acquisition, they would buy that one, and one of the 2 remaining partners would quit his job & run it.
Same thing for the third business, at which point the 3 partners each operate one of the 3 different businesses in the portfolio.
Then in similar fashion, they will extricate themselves one by one from each business's operations as they install operators, freeing each partner to go buy another business.
Find the Acquiring Minds podcast episode here.
4. 6 bank relationship tips to help secure and build business lines of credit
5. EtA Event: SMBash 2025 in Dallas, TX
Hosts: Sam Rosati, Kevin Henderson, Chandler Reed, and David Brackett
Date: April 2-4, 2025
Where: The Rayleigh Underground, Dallas, TX
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