There’s a business principle that can make your brand’s message travel ten times further on a fraction of the budget, and it’s all about embracing the absurd. I learned this firsthand when I launched my first marketing company at twenty years old. It was a classic a story that grew way too fast for me to handle. Just a year in, I took a $300,000 investment from our biggest client.
If you're an entrepreneur, you know that the first idea isn't always the one that hits it big. Success often comes from being a serial entrepreneur—always looking for the next opportunity. You might spot a business for sale that you know you could elevate, but there’s one problem: your cash is tied up in your current company. When this happens, don't let a lack of capital stop you. An SBA loan could be the key to financing that acquisition.
Buying a software-as-a-service (SaaS) business can feel like a huge opportunity, but every investment carries risk. Going in blind is like flipping a coin and hoping for the best. But if you do your homework, you can confidently pick a winner and plant the seeds for incredible growth instead of just pouring your money down the drain. This is how smart operators approach in a .
When it's time to sell your business, you just know. It’s a gut feeling—maybe you’re feeling burned out, or maybe you’re just ready for the next challenge. Whatever the reason, once you decide to sell, you need to act. The startup world moves incredibly fast, and to get the best deal for your company, you have to keep pace.
So, you're thinking about selling your SaaS startup. Before you even get to the formal part of the acquisition process, where buyers will definitely demand a professional valuation, you need a number. This isn't the final price tag, but rather a well-reasoned estimate to get the conversation started and pull serious buyers in.
When you see videos of accelerator classes chanting like rock stars, it’s easy to think that raising money is the only way to build a real company. There’s a growing sense that the funding-obsessed culture in tech can be unhealthy, and I have to agree. That’s why, aside from a little bit of early help, we decided to bootstrap our company instead of chasing investors. I’m convinced that for many (though not all) entrepreneurs, forgoing venture capital is the smarter play.
Moving to San Diego was supposed to be the answer to my burnout. After the multi-year slog of getting my business off the ground, I thought the change of scenery would be a magic fix. In many ways, it was one of the best decisions I ever made. It gave me the space to think, to reflect on how a dorm room project had become a multimillion-dollar startup company. But that breathing room also brought a difficult realization: I wasn’t just tired. I was ready to move on.
My story, and the story of my business, starts with my family. My dad passed away when I was six, leaving my mom to support us without a college degree. She took up cleaning houses because it offered the flexibility to raise my brother and me. We lived on food stamps in San Clemente, a beautiful Southern California beach town where it seemed like everyone else was jetting off to Hawaii for spring break. It was then I learned a hard lesson: money meant freedom. I was determined to build a life where my own family wouldn't have to worry about stretching a paycheck to cover new school shoes.
With our scalability problem finally behind us, I could turn my attention to the rest of the business. The truth is, I’d been running Bizness Apps pretty much by myself since we launched, and I was completely overwhelmed. My days were a blur of answering support tickets, making sales calls, and troubleshooting with developers. I was pulling 100-hour weeks, chained to my phone and answering emails at one or two in the morning. I can’t imagine doing that now, but sometimes that’s what it takes to get an edge.