Clearly Acquired Blog

Expert insights, funding strategies, and practical guidance for securing capital, financing growth, and navigating business acquisitions. Whether you're raising capital for expansion, restructuring debt, or exploring your first acquisition, our blog provides the knowledge and resources to help you succeed.

Growth
September 9, 2025

Guide to the M&A Sale Process and Deal Structures

The M&A sale process is a multi-stage journey designed to maximize value and align buyer-seller objectives. It includes preparation, marketing, buyer engagement, due diligence, negotiations, and post-closing integration, requiring strategic planning and expert guidance at every step. Understanding deal structures—like earnouts, platforms, add-ons, and tuck-ins—helps entrepreneurs and investors position their businesses effectively and achieve successful outcomes.

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Growth
September 8, 2025

Personal Expense Add-Backs in SBA Loan Deals

Personal expense add-backs play a critical role in SBA loan deals by adjusting financial statements to reflect a business’s true earnings. Properly documented add-backs—such as personal vehicle costs, owner perks, and one-time expenses—can increase Seller’s Discretionary Earnings (SDE), improve valuations, and strengthen the Debt Service Coverage Ratio (DSCR) needed for loan approval. However, poorly supported add-backs can trigger lender scrutiny, lower valuations, and even cause loan denials, making accurate documentation essential for buyers and sellers alike.

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Growth
September 7, 2025

Ultimate Guide to Predictive Analytics in M&A

Predictive analytics brings data-driven clarity to M&A—speeding up deal sourcing, sharpening due diligence, and guiding post-merger integration with AI/ML forecasts and NLP-powered document review. By combining internal financials with market and alternative data, it flags risks, models outcomes, and prioritizes the highest-probability wins. Success hinges on clean, standardized data and change-ready teams to translate insights into action.

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Growth
September 7, 2025

Small Business Investment ROI Calculator

The Small Business Investment ROI Calculator helps entrepreneurs evaluate the potential returns on business investments by factoring in initial costs, expected gains, and inflation. It provides a clearer picture of your investment’s future value and purchasing power, making it easier to weigh risks and rewards. Use it as a planning tool to make informed financial decisions before launching new initiatives or expanding operations.

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Growth
September 6, 2025

Debt Refinancing Calculator

A Debt Refinancing Calculator helps you compare your current loan terms against potential new ones to see if refinancing makes financial sense. By factoring in interest rates, repayment periods, and fees, it provides a clear picture of potential savings or extra costs. This tool simplifies complex calculations so you can make informed decisions before committing to a new loan.

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Growth
September 5, 2025

Business Acquisition Cost Estimator

The Business Acquisition Cost Estimator helps entrepreneurs understand the full financial picture when buying a business by calculating not just the purchase price but also closing costs, legal fees, due diligence expenses, and financing charges. By using default industry averages and customizable inputs, it provides a clearer view of total costs, helping buyers budget accurately and avoid unexpected surprises during the acquisition process.

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Growth
September 4, 2025

How to Build Trust With Investors Post-Fundraising

After a raise, trust is built by showing up with disciplined, predictable communication and clean numbers. Send structured monthly/quarterly updates, surface wins and misses candidly, and give investors self-serve access to metrics and documents via secure data rooms/dashboards. Personalize touchpoints and invite targeted input so they become engaged advisors—not just capital.

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Growth
September 4, 2025

Ultimate Guide to Risk Mitigation in Search Funds

The Ultimate Guide to Risk Mitigation in Search Funds explores how search fund operators can identify, manage, and reduce risks throughout the acquisition and ownership process. It covers key areas like operational, financial, regulatory, and human capital risks, offering frameworks for assessment and strategies like diversification, creative deal structuring, and governance systems. By leveraging technology, data-driven analysis, and platforms like Clearly Acquired, operators can make smarter decisions, streamline due diligence, and improve long-term success rates.

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Growth
September 3, 2025

SBA 7(a) Loan Calculator

The SBA 7(a) Loan Calculator helps business buyers and entrepreneurs estimate monthly payments, total interest costs, and repayment schedules before committing to financing. By adjusting loan amounts, terms, interest rates, and prepayment options, users can explore different funding scenarios and budget effectively. While the tool provides reliable estimates, actual terms may vary, so pairing it with lender consultations ensures accurate planning.

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Growth
September 3, 2025

Working Capital Benchmarks for SMB Acquisitions

Working capital benchmarks are critical in SMB acquisitions because they help buyers understand the true liquidity needs of a business and ensure smooth post-closing operations. By using normalized 12-month averages, industry-specific ratios, and negotiated working capital pegs, buyers can avoid cash shortfalls, structure fair deals, and maintain operational stability. AI-driven tools like Clearly Acquired streamline this process by automating benchmarking, flagging discrepancies, and providing real-time insights for smarter decision-making.

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Growth
September 2, 2025

Business Valuation Calculator

A business valuation calculator helps entrepreneurs and small business owners estimate their company’s worth by analyzing revenue, profit, industry multipliers, and growth potential. It’s an essential starting point for planning a sale, attracting investors, or evaluating opportunities for expansion. While not a substitute for a formal appraisal, it provides valuable insights to guide smarter financial and strategic decisions.

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Growth
September 2, 2025

How to Review Contracts After an Acquisition

After acquiring a business, reviewing contracts is critical to avoid unexpected risks and liabilities. Focus on high-impact agreements—customer, vendor, employment, and lease contracts—since they may contain change-of-control clauses, renewal deadlines, or termination triggers that could affect operations and revenue. A structured review process, supported by secure document organization and proactive renegotiation, helps ensure compliance, reduces financial exposure, and streamlines integration.

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Acquire Quality. Fund Growth. Close with Confidence.

As an AI-driven Business Acquisition Marketplace and Financing Platform, we are on a mission to simplify and accelerate the MainStreet to MidStreet lending and acquisition ecosystem.

We specialize in technology that supports price discovery, identity verification and financial qualification, and buy-side tools to help searchers source and manage deal flow, make offers, secure lending/financing solutions, and close with confidence.

illustration of team with digital platform

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are some frequently asked questions by users that are looking to buy businesses on Clearly Acquired:

How can I show business owners I'm a legitimate buyer and that I'm interested?

With a Clearly Verified account, you can instill confidence in other users, brokers and sellers that you are, who you say you are, when you "verify" your identify.  This is the key to instilling confidence in the users on the platform,  gaining traction and getting instant access to financials, supporting data and insight to quickly move to making an offer or moving on.   This will save you months of wasted time and expedite the closing of a sale.

How are my finances verified?

Using financial technology the Clearly Acquired Platform safely and securely verifies your finances, to help sellers understand your closing capability and help lenders expedite your financing. Additionally, the buy-side deal room will help you get your documentation in order, to prepare you for the debt and equity financing you will need to close your acquisition.

Can I get in touch with advisors to help support me in this process?

The Clearly Acquired team is here to support you on your business acquisition or business sale journey. That said, the platform is designed to connect you with a community of users, who are identify verified, which include: investors, lenders, advisors, brokers, consultants, and other buyers who are looking for partners.  

What is a Deal Hub?

The Deal Hub is the central repository for all transaction-related activities on our business acquisition platform. It serves as a secure and organized space where buyers and sellers can access critical information and manage the entire acquisition process efficiently. The Deal Hub is divided into two main components: the Data Room and the Deal Rooms.

Data Room: The Data Room is a secure, virtual storage space where sellers can upload and share essential documents related to their business. This includes financial statements, legal contracts, operational reports, and other due diligence materials. Buyers can access these documents to conduct thorough evaluations and make informed decisions. The Data Room ensures that all sensitive information is protected and only accessible to authorized parties.

Deal Rooms: The Deal Rooms are dedicated spaces for each business listing where buyers and sellers can collaborate and negotiate terms. Each Deal Room is equipped with tools for real-time communication, document sharing, and tracking the progress of the deal. This streamlined environment facilitates transparent and efficient interactions, helping to expedite the acquisition process and ensuring that both parties are aligned at every stage.

The Deal Hub's comprehensive and secure infrastructure simplifies the complexities of business acquisitions, providing a seamless experience for all users involved.

What is Plaid?

Plaid is a financial technology company that provides a secure and seamless way to connect and interact with financial institutions. It enables applications to access users' financial data with their consent, facilitating a wide range of services such as identity verification, account authentication, and transaction history retrieval. Plaid's robust API infrastructure ensures high security, reliability, and compliance with regulatory standards.

By integrating Plaid, Clearly Acquired can offer a secure, efficient, and reliable method for identity verification, building trust among users and ensuring the integrity of the acquisition process.

I am new to the idea of business acquisition, where can I get more information on how to get started?

Make sure to check out our Educational Course on Business Acquisition that is offered in our paid plans for buyers: From Purchase to Profit: Mastering the Art of Business Acquisition.

This Membership Course for buyers is designed to empower individuals with the knowledge, skills, and confidence to navigate the business acquisition process successfully. Whether you're a first-time buyer or an experienced entrepreneur, our course equips you with the tools and insights needed to make informed decisions and achieve your acquisition goals. Join us and embark on your journey to buying a business with Clearly Acquired.

Easy as 1, 2, 3

Create Your Account. Get Verified. Start Searching.

1

Create an account

Every day, lenders, investors, brokers, and sellers come to Clearly Acquired looking for qualified operators like you. Creating an account and getting verified helps you stand out and build trust.

2

Build your profile

Build your profile to get matched with capital and opportunities. Showcase your expertise and resume, to connect with the right capital and acquisition partners—making every opportunity count.

3

Search & Connect

Browse Verified listings, source off-market deals, & manage deal flow with powerful tools to underwrite opportunities, and connect with capital to streamline the entire acquisition and funding process

Join the Clearly Acquired Search Community

Create Your Profile & Get Verified for Free