Sell-Ready From Day One
Acquisitions rarely just happen — seed acquirer relationships early, then run the sale like a fundraise.
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~months to results
- Steps
- 4
- Confidence
- 93%
Camille Hearst sold her startup Kit to Patreon in 2018. Her post-mortem produced two rules most founders get backwards: start building relationships with potential acquirers from the moment you found the company (long before any sale is on the table), and when the time comes, manage the sale as a structured funnel exactly like a fundraising process rather than waiting to be discovered. The relationship-seeding meetings are framed as vision-sharing and partnership, never as 'do you want to buy us?'.
Origin
Hearst's own exit: Kit (founded 2015, raised $2M+) started acquirer conversations late, and she met the CPO who would become her boss essentially for the first time during the deal. She learned the M&A process mechanics at StartX, the Stanford accelerator. Lenny corroborates from the Airbnb side of his own company's sale.
Core principles
- 01Most companies actively sell themselves; very few get scooped up unprompted.
- 02An acquisition is a funnel, structurally identical to a fundraise: many conversations in, one outcome out.
- 03The goal of early acquirer contact is not a deal — it's to be the name that surfaces in their head when they later have a problem you solve.
- 04The fifth meeting closes what the first meeting cannot: relationship and vision context compound over time.
- 05Never open with the acquisition frame. Lead with vision alignment and partnership.
- 06It always goes better when they reach out to you — but you can't control that, so you engineer the conditions for it.
How to run it
- 1
Build the acquirer map at founding, not at exit
From the moment you found the company, list the companies that could plausibly acquire you one day and identify the specific people at each (CPO, CEO, corp dev, relevant product leader). Treat this list as a live artifact, not a fire-drill exercise.
Pro tip This feels strange because you started the company to build the next big thing, not to sell it — do it anyway, because you never know what the future holds.
- 2
Seed relationships under a partnership frame
Meet those people early and repeatedly with no acquisition context at all: 'we're working on something cool, we have a great vision, it aligns with what you're doing, maybe there's a partnership here.' Share your vision and what you're trying to accomplish.
Pro tip The purpose is memory implantation: when they hit a problem in 12 months, you want them thinking 'Camille and her team could solve this for us.'
Watch out Being too direct — asking if they want to buy you — poisons the relationship. Hearst and Lenny both compare it to dating.
- 3
Recognise the decision point and pick the sell path deliberately
When the strategic options narrow (bridge round vs Series A vs sale), stop drifting. Decide explicitly whether you are running a sale process, and if so, commit to running it properly.
Pro tip Learn the actual mechanics of M&A before you need them — Hearst learned how to sell a company through the StartX accelerator, not on the fly.
- 4
Run the sale as a managed funnel
Build the full list of possible acquirers, identify who to contact at each, reach out, and push everyone through a structured process — exactly as you would with a fundraise where you meet many VCs to land one round.
Pro tip Widen the list early. The point of a process is competitive tension and optionality, not a single hopeful conversation.
Watch out Outbound is inherently harder than inbound; the earlier relationship-seeding is what converts your outbound into something that feels like their idea.
In the wild
Hearst founded Kit in 2015, raised over $2M, and grew key metrics — then hit a strategic crossroads between a bridge round, a Series A, and an exit. She had started acquirer conversations late, so when she met the CPO who would become her boss, it was their first meeting rather than their fifth. She ran a managed sale process anyway and joined forces with Patreon.
→ Successful exit in 2018 and a multi-year run at Patreon (where she later became head of product for creators) — but her stated regret is having started acquirer relationships too late in the company's life.
When Lenny's company started talking to one potential acquirer, they immediately built a list of everyone else who could plausibly buy them and figured out who to contact at each company, then explored in parallel.
→ The company sold to Airbnb — and Lenny's takeaway matches Hearst's: you need potential buyers to already have you in their head when a problem arises.
Common mistakes
Waiting to be discovered
For most companies an acquisition doesn't just happen. Passivity means you meet your acquirer for the first time when leverage and time are already gone.
Meeting your acquirer for the first time during the deal
A cold first meeting compresses relationship-building, vision transfer, and negotiation into one window. Five prior meetings would have given them time to think about it.
Opening with the buy question
Directly asking a company to acquire you signals distress and kills the partnership frame. Explore partnership; let the acquisition idea form on their side.
Is it for you?
Best for
Venture-backed founders who want optionality on outcome, especially those in a category where a handful of large platforms are the natural acquirers.
Not ideal for
Bootstrapped lifestyle businesses with no acquirer set, or founders whose fundraising and product focus would be materially diluted by parallel relationship-building.
From the transcript
“So I think that's one takeaway is treat it like a process and manage it like a process if it is something you're interested in.”
“And then the second piece of advice I would give, I think we should have been talking to potential acquirers from the beginning and sharing…”
“Start preparing to sell your company from the moment you found it, which is kind of a weird thing because obviously if you're starting a…”
“Or if the meeting is not under the context of buying at all.”
From the episode
Monetizing passions, scaling marketplaces, and stories from a creator economy vet
Camille Hearst (Spotify, Patreon, Apple, YouTube)