Hi All,

I come from an IB and PE background and am searching for an acquisition in the core industries I've focused on in the past. Whether or not it's a fair assessment, some sellers only want to sell to a strategic as they believe it would be too difficult for someone to learn their business. I've had this conversation on a few occasions with business owners I sourced through proprietary outreach, both with businesses that genuinely are complex as well as those that are actually pretty simple. How have you typically positioned the conversation and have you had any success getting business owners to continue discussions?

For what it's worth, my approach has generally been to highlight my prior industry investing experience and then also will provide some information about my advisors. Most of the time, once I provide some credibility they take the conversation seriously, but for a few owners they just don't view that as relevant. Look forward to hearing everyone else's thoughts.