{"id":5064,"date":"2021-06-03T23:35:41","date_gmt":"2021-06-03T13:35:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/the-exit-podcast-non-negotiables-of-an-exit-with-melissa-kwan\/"},"modified":"2021-09-02T17:19:41","modified_gmt":"2021-09-02T07:19:41","slug":"the-exit-podcast-non-negotiables-of-an-exit-with-melissa-kwan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/the-exit-podcast-non-negotiables-of-an-exit-with-melissa-kwan\/","title":{"rendered":"The Exit Podcast &#8211; Non-Negotiables Of An Exit with Melissa Kwan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-listen-on-apple-podcasts\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/non-negotiables-of-an-exit-with-melissa-kwan\/id1532346146?i=1000523268591\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\">Listen on Apple Podcasts<\/a><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-listen-on-spotify\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/episode\/0TiRFWb90bn0eJUcODmHI1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Listen on Spotify (opens in a new tab)\">Listen on Spotify<\/a><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-listen-on-google-podcasts\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.google.com\/feed\/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5zb3VuZGNsb3VkLmNvbS91c2Vycy9zb3VuZGNsb3VkOnVzZXJzOjg4MjY1MjIyOC9zb3VuZHMucnNz\/episode\/dGFnOnNvdW5kY2xvdWQsMjAxMDp0cmFja3MvMTA1NjIxNDE2NQ?sa=X&amp;ved=0CAUQkfYCahcKEwjQq6G6z_zwAhUAAAAAHQAAAAAQAg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Listen on Google Podcasts (opens in a new tab)\">Listen on Google Podcasts<\/a><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<iframe width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" allow=\"autoplay\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=https%3A\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/1056214165&#038;color=%23ff5500&#038;auto_play=false&#038;hide_related=false&#038;show_comments=true&#038;show_user=true&#038;show_reposts=false&#038;show_teaser=true\"><\/iframe><div style=\"font-size: 10px; color: #cccccc;line-break: anywhere;word-break: normal;overflow: hidden;white-space: nowrap;text-overflow: ellipsis; font-family: Interstate,Lucida Grande,Lucida Sans Unicode,Lucida Sans,Garuda,Verdana,Tahoma,sans-serif;font-weight: 100;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/theexitpodcast\" title=\"The Exit - Presented By Flippa\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Exit &#8211; Presented By Flippa<\/a> \u00b7 <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/theexitpodcast\/ep037\" title=\"Non-Negotiables Of An Exit with Melissa Kwan\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: #cccccc; text-decoration: none;\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Non-Negotiables Of An Exit with Melissa Kwan<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Today we\u2019re talking to Melissa Kwan, co-founder and CEO of eWebinar, a company that takes any video and turns it into an interactive, automated webinar.\u00a0 Having always been in sales, Melissa found herself working in real estate right out of university.\u00a0 Ten years ago she found herself starting her first real estate tech company.\u00a0 Four years later she was starting her second real estate tech company.\u00a0 Listen in as she talks about a successful exit and all that led up to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-little-to-no-venture-capital\"><strong>Little To No Venture Capital<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>One of those companies was Spaceio, a real estate open-house application.\u00a0 Rather than signing in at an open house with paper and pen, it\u2019s done on an iPad.\u00a0 They then feed all data back to the company and automate all the follow-ups for the agent.\u00a0 As they weren\u2019t venture backed, their main KPI for success was revenue.\u00a0 While they had some private investors, Melissa says it was always a race to break even.\u00a0 A main misconception with venture capital is its a choice to have it.\u00a0 Melissa says they simply couldn\u2019t raise the capital, so she used revenue from a previous company and took out a loan.\u00a0 Melissa says, looking back, she\u2019s glad they didn\u2019t get the venture capital, or they wouldn\u2019t have been able to sell for what they did.\u00a0 They\u2019d always been a small company, with six people at their peak, but got over one hundred enterprise customers before they sold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-ready-for-something-new\"><strong>Ready For Something New<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>By the time Melissa wanted to sell she had already been in real estate for ten year, and she was tired of doing what she was doing.\u00a0 She says so many things were happening in the world around her that she just wasn\u2019t a part of.\u00a0 Melissa was excited to try something new but felt trapped in the company.\u00a0 She had a mentor and a friend in the same industry that she would meet with monthly.\u00a0 At one such meeting, Melissa found herself wondering aloud if her co-founder would let her sell.\u00a0 Melissa\u2019s friend said if she was serious, his company was looking to make their first acquisition.\u00a0 The kicker was she would have to stay on for at least two years.\u00a0 Melissa says they didn\u2019t shop around, and maybe could have gotten better terms, but it was more important to sell to someone she would want to work for.\u00a0 They also didn\u2019t really negotiate and from the initial conversation to closing was two and a half months.\u00a0 Melissa&#8217;s says one thing to streamline the process is to know up front what your nonnegotiable are.\u00a0 For Melissa, working with someone she liked was a non-negotiable.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-preparing-to-sell\"><strong>Preparing To Sell<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Melissa is a firm believer that companies are bought and not sold.\u00a0 She says if you have an attractive business people will come knocking on your door.\u00a0 Once you hit the one million dollar mark people start thinking you&#8217;re a serious business.\u00a0 Once you hit the ten million dollar mark people know you\u2019re a company that\u2019s not going anywhere.\u00a0 When it comes to preparing for an exit, Melissa says you need every document ready.\u00a0 You need every employee contract, every financial statement, all your minutes, etc. and everything needs to be extremely organized.\u00a0 Another important piece is projections.\u00a0 Melissa says they don\u2019t have to be perfect, but you need to have some sort of projection to show the acquirer what you\u2019re thinking.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-knowing-what-you-know-now-what-would-you-tell-yourself-ten-years-ago\"><strong>Knowing What You Know Now, What Would You Tell Yourself Ten Years Ago?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Melissa says you should ask yourself what kind of life you want to lead.\u00a0 After selling her first company she was able to ask herself that before starting a new company.\u00a0 She says people usually start a business because they\u2019re good at one thing, which is what she did with real estate.\u00a0 The key is knowing the life you want to lead and creating a job around that.\u00a0 She says because of that she\u2019s been able to build something with the most potential and something that gives her freedom.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-where-to-learn-more\"><strong>Where To Learn More<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Melissa is currently working on her company eWebinar, a company that takes any video and turns it into an interactive, automated webinar.\u00a0 If you\u2019d like to learn more, visit ewebinar.com or find Melissa on LinkedIn @melissakwan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Listen on Apple Podcasts Listen on Spotify Listen on Google Podcasts The Exit &#8211; Presented By Flippa \u00b7 Non-Negotiables Of An Exit with Melissa Kwan Today we\u2019re talking to Melissa Kwan, co-founder and CEO of eWebinar, a company that takes any video and turns it into an interactive, automated webinar.\u00a0 Having always been in sales, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":130,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","content-type":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"dipi_cpt_category":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5064"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/130"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5064\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5064"},{"taxonomy":"dipi_cpt_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flippa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/dipi_cpt_category?post=5064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}