Board-Certified Broker Tag

Business Broker Marketing: Virtual GABB Class on June 15

Learn how business brokers can identify their market, find clients and market businesses for sale in this class taught by one of Georgia’s most successful business brokers. The June 15 class will be held online and will qualify for the Georgia Association of Business Brokers’ Board-Certified Broker certification.

JEFFERY MERRY, Sr., MBA, J.D.

The class will be taught by Jeff Merry, MBA, J.D., owner and founder of the BUSINESS HOUSE, inc., of Gainesville. He is a lifetime member of the GABB’s prestigious Multi-Million Dollar Club and was the first Georgia broker in the GABB to receive the Phoenix award for being in the Multi-Million Dollar Club for 10 consecutive years. Jeffery has been a member of GABB for more than two decades, is a former GABB president, and is currently a GABB board member.

The class (GREC# 73188) will be held online via Zoom from 9 a.m. until noon, and students who arrive promptly and are on camera for the entire class are eligible to earn three hours of continuing education credit through the Georgia Real Estate Commission and the GABB’s Real Estate School, GREC #8074. 

The class will cover setting up a business brokerage practice, identifying your market and potential clients. Mr. Merry will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of practicing business brokering solo or in a group.  He’ll also address two different approaches to business brokering: horizontal and vertical business brokers. In the horizontal model, the broker works with a spectrum of businesses; in a vertical model, the broker specializes in one or two industries, such as restaurants, child-care centers, convenience stores.

The class will also teach students how to market yourself as a business broker as well as marketing your listings, including legal and ethical issues of documenting your work. Mr. Merry will cover basic marketing methods to market your business brokerage practice and listings:

• Post Cards
• Social Media
• Letters
• Cultivate Referral Base
• E-mail Campaigns
• Networking
• Trade Magazines
• Newspapers
• Billboards
• TV
• Radio
• Coupons – Should Business Brokers use coupons?
• Effective strategies when using different marketing media.
• Special considerations when marketing businesses for sale
  • Confidentiality
  • Due diligence

In the final hour of the class, Mr. Merry will teach students how to work effectively and ethically with other brokers, business buyers and sellers.  He will discuss the GABB Code of ethics, including ethical issues with working other brokers, co-brokering; ethical issues in working with both buyers and sellers and ethical issues in closing a deal.

The class fee is $49 for GABB members WHO REGISTER BEFORE MIDNIGHT on FRIDAY, June 11; $75 for non-members and any members who register late, and $225 to register for the BCB program and one class. Note that the BCB program is only open to GABB members. Contact GABB Executive Director Diane Loupe at diane.loupe@gabb.org or text her at 770-744-3639 for more information.

INSTRUCTOR: Jeff Merry, MBA, J.D., owner and founder of the BUSINESS HOUSE, inc., of Gainesville. After employment by a Fortune 100 company, Mr.  Merry, began the BUSINESS HOUSE, inc.^SM. Since its inception more than 20 years ago, the BUSINESS HOUSE, inc. ^SM has become one of the most successful business brokerage firms in the Southeast. As a Business Intermediary, Jeff has been involved in over 200 mergers and acquisitions that have ranged in acquisition price from $60,000.00 to over $15,000,000.00. Jeffery specializes in serving the manufacturing, distribution, veterinary, service, and medical industries. He is a lifetime member of the Georgia Association of Business Brokers (GABB) prestigious Multi-Million Dollar Club and was the first Georgia broker in the GABB to receive the Phoenix award for being in the Multi-Million Dollar Club for 10 consecutive years. Jeffery has been a member of GABB for 20 plus years and has held the Presidency and Board of Directors positions many years. Jeff holds a Bachelors Degree from Mercer University, a Masters of Business Administration from the University of Illinois, and a Juris Doctorate from Atlanta Law School. Jeffery is also a licensed real estate broker in Georgia and Florida. Further, he is an Adjunct Professor of strategic management, accounting, and finance in MBA programs.

Learn About the Board-Certified Broker Program: Aug. 4

Clients who want to buy or sell a business want to know they are working with a business broker who knows what they’re doing. That’s why the Georgia Association of Business Brokers is preparing a certification program to help train business brokers to better represent their clients.

Business brokers and those who aspire to become brokers are invited to the GABBs’ virtual meeting on Aug. 4, 2020, at 10 a.m. to hear about the Board-Certified Broker or BCB proposal.

The GABB believes that to be a successful business broker, a person must understand issues beyond those typically covered by real estate schools. That’s why the GABB has acquired a license from the Georgia Real Estate Commission (GREC) to operate a real estate school, the only such school in Georgia dedicated to business brokering. The proposed BCB program will teach business brokers what they need to know about accounting terms, federal tax returns, understanding financial statements, recasting financial statements, business and inventory valuation, financing a business sale, understanding legal issues, understanding business structures, confidentiality, marketing,  ethics, due diligence, securing business-for-sale listings, and setting up a business broker practice.

The GABB has posted details about the curriculum online at the GABB blog.

At the Aug. 4 meeting, members and others will be able to offer feedback on our proposal.

Under Georgia law, there is no specific licensing requirement to be a business broker. However, anyone selling or buying, offering to buy or sell, acquiring prospects to buy or sell or negotiating for the buying or selling of real estate for compensation must be licensed by the GREC. According to section 520.1-.19 of Georgia law, Business Brokers are covered by the same legal requirements as any Real Estate licensee if the sale includes the transfer of any interest in real estate, including leases.

For more information about GABB, please email diane.loupe@gabb.org or call or text 404-374-3990, or contact GABB president Dean Burnette at dean@b3brokers.com or (912) 247-3209.