How to sell your business in 10 days
Final Puddle Pod story. First Raphael story.
SmartCompany asked me to write up the full story.
Here is the original ❤️
Two pink lines.
I stared, heart thumping.
It was just like in the movies—except real life doesn’t come with a script.
The pregnancy test was positive.
Except that we didn’t know whether we should be happy or curb the excitement. Miscarriages are still way too common. The rollercoaster of excitement, sadness and hope can crush even the most resolute. While I tried to temper my expectations, it was impossible not to let the dreams of becoming a dad colour my thoughts with hope and wonder.
I kept coming back to the same question: How can I be the greatest dad possible?
Big question, with a myriad of answers, and all fraught with their own mistakes, but they all had one thing in common: I needed more time.
I knew I had to let something go.
The choice was obvious but still painful.
Letting go of Puddle Pod, the side hustle I’ve built pouring in blood, sweat, tears and every last minute I had in my evenings and weekends over the past 4 years.
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Back to Day 0 - how did I get here?
In hindsight, where my side hustle started is so obvious.
At the time, I had no idea.
Nervous, I walked into Cicada Innovations coworking space for my first day of work at Startmate. Brains do that funny thing on Day 1 in a new job. They work overtime. Observe everything and everyone, taking in every scene, stupid detail and emotion.
My unreasonable brain kept looking over Nick’s shoulder at his screen. I was in disbelief. Shocked at the overloaded inbox, and the non-existent Slack setup and kept holding myself back from saying anything. “For god’s sake - it is your first day! Stop it.” Until I couldn’t hold it any longer, “if you click here instead, you’ll save yourself a couple of minutes every day!”.
Before I knew it, we booked 30mins for a holistic workflow upgrade. One thing led to another, the 30-minute session led to more friends asking for 1:1 help, which started me off writing LinkedIn articles with tips and finally preparing whole 1-2h presentations for coworking spaces, accelerators and VC firms.
Ten presentations in, walking out of another coworking space after speaking with 20 founders, it hit me. As energising as these sessions were, the impact felt fleeting. A few hours with a few people—it wasn’t enough. Frustrated, I pulled out my phone and typed a quick LinkedIn post: ‘If I built an 8-week productivity course, would you take it?’”
Within the week, I had 15 guinea pigs, all long-term friends, who were keen.
But I had nothing to show for it.
In the 2020 Christmas break I stared at my usual 1h productivity presentation and felt stuck. I had promised 15 friends an 8-week course—but all I had was a deck. The weight of that promise shattered the block. Week after week, I published content on Sunday night, always just in time—because my friends were counting on me.
How do you sell a business?
🚀 4 Years Later…
Puddle Pod had turned into something real.
A quarterly cohort-based course.
500+ alumni.
A community. A vibe. A place where founders got serious about time.
But now—I needed more of my own.
But how do you sell a business?
🤷♂️ well, I don’t know either!
True to the mantra that most founders know me by “increase your surface area for luck to strike”, I put my ask out publicly.
On Wednesday the 11th Dec, I posted on LinkedIn announcing that my wife and I are excitingly expecting a baby and therefore I'm discontinuing Puddle Pod in case anyone would like to buy it. 48h and 13k impressions later, 15 people DM’d me interested in hearing more.
I took the weekend to write up a 16-page summary about the business. I covered everything from the history, revenue, customers, marketing, what worked, what didn't and what the future holds. On Monday 16th December, I even posted that 16 page document on LinkedIn adding another 10k impressions and more interest.
With a baby on the way and Christmas fast approaching, I had no time to waste. I gave everyone 5 days until 5pm on the Friday before Christmas to make an offer. With the rules set, publicly, and transparently, applying a real pre-Xmas deadline created a sense of urgency, FOMO and competition.
For the 5 days, I held my breath. A bold, very public bet, if it didn’t work out it was all going to zero. Did I do the right thing? I poured all my passion for 4 years into this, do I even want to sell it? What if I can’t sell it?
Living up to the competitive tension, like clockwork right before 5pm that Friday, the offers rolled in one by one. 7 offers, including from an ASX-listed company, all roughly in the same ballpark. The ball was back in my court, I had the weekend to review and consider what’s important to me; (1) an aligned buyer (2) fast and easy sales process and (3) a fair price.
The pre-Xmas handshake agreement followed quickly. The sale process only took a couple of days as everything was already so clearly outlined in my document and the written offers I had received and we announced it in the new year.
Puddle Pod is in safe hands with Philippe Hong from Founder Foundry who was the most values-aligned buyer, fast-moving and at the right price. Philippe has a vision of bringing online courses for founders together in one place to help their rapid growth. I’m pumped to know that Puddle Pod will keep helping founders beyond my sweet 4 years of building it.
The Lessons
Building Puddle Pod has been an incredibly enriching journey which came with so much empathy for the daily struggles of founders.
As my journey with Puddle Pod just came to an end, I wanted to finish with my biggest lessons:
On Side Hustles
What gives you energy?
Your sweet spot is what feels easy to you, but hard to others.
That’s your edge.
On Building vs Selling your Business
Selling is easy, building a company worth selling is the hard part.
If you’ve created something of value, you’ll be able to sell it.
On Focus
I thought I was a productive person, I mean…. I literally ran a productivity course.
Want ruthless focus? Have a kid. Your priorities will become clearer overnight.
I built Puddle Pod to help founders be more intentional with their time.
In the end, it taught me to do the same—for the people who matter most, your family.
🛠️ 4 years to build.
🎁 10 days to sell.
❤️ 1 heartbeat to know I made the right decision.
