27 Apr How to Communicate More Effectively
In our latest webinar “Accepting Offers Instead of Selling Businesses – Part 3: Using Communications Effectively”, we were joined once more by business intermediary and business broker legend, Doug Robbins. Over his 40+ year career, Robbins has completed over 1,000 assignments and 400 business sales. In this article, we will look at a few of Robbins’s key ideas for what business brokers and M&A advisors need to do to communicate effectively and make more deals happen.
Overcome Resistance
Robbins feels that you must realize there is a definite mindset where business owners, business buyers and business sellers are concerned. In short, they don’t want to be sold. Or as Mr. Robbins notes, “They have a built-in passive resistance to being sold.”
Psychology comes into play in other ways too. For example, as Mr. Robbins states, “Usually the buyer from a large company thinks differently than the seller of a small business.” All of this points to the fact that communication is of paramount importance. You must understand who you are communicating with and what this individual’s goals are.
Build Trust
As Robbins has pointed out in previous webinars, trust is a vital aspect in successfully working with buyers and sellers. Part of building that trust is emphasizing the importance of confidentiality agreements. A confidentiality agreement does more than simply stress confidentiality, as it also emphasizes non-interference. In short, a buyer agrees to not interfere, in any way, with the company, its employers, customers, suppliers and so on.
Establishing trust is a necessary building block towards having buyers and sellers know that you are an expert and a true professional. That means that your advice should carry weight. Another important variable is that buyers realize that the process of buying a business is complex and usually quite lengthy. There are many roadblocks that can interfere with completing a transaction. Buyers and sellers need to understand that you are the person who they can trust has the knowledge to overcome the various roadblocks that may arise.
Show Expertise
Robbins feels that sellers absolutely must understand that as the business broker or M&A advisor, you are not just an expert, but that you have also developed a fine-tuned process. In the case of Robbinex, there is a three-stage process. The first step is analysis, evaluation and understanding the strengths and weaknesses of the business. The second step is writing the business plan and determining who the right buyer for business may be and where they can be found. The third step is to actually execute the plan.
In our next article, we will continue to learn more about what Mr. Robbins believes you will need to do to more effectively communicate with buyers and sellers. The bottom line is that there is no replacement for results-driven communication.
