Best Tools For Searching? - Searchfunder

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Frequent asked questions:

What is Searchfunder.com?

Searchfunder.com is an online community of searchers, investors, lenders, brokers and other professionals. Over 80% of those involved in searchfunds maintain a Searchfunder account to help them network, hire, and mentor others.

What are the benefits of membership?

In addition to accessing the most active online network of business buyers, Searchfunder licenses research that is simply not cost effective for individuals. Access over 15,000 industry reports and 50,000 transaction financials. You also get monthly credits for contact information for your company sourcing campaign with the option to purchase more at drastically discounted rates. Searchfunder has pre-purchased access from these data providers in order to empower individual buyers and to help searchers level the playing field versus private equity.

Do you have deals?

While we are primarily a buy-side network, we do have hundreds of brokers that regularly post deals to the community.

Can I find an internship on Searchfunder?

Absolutely! We have the industry's largest intern job board. If you are considering a search, the first step is to help another business buyer so you can hit the ground running.

What does it cost?

Searchfunder is a subscription service. We offer flexible monthly, annual and lifetime memberships.

Monthly

$29 / month

Annual

$19 / month

Lifetime

$432 / once

Those who maintain an account with us for over 4 continuous years are permanently added to the community without the need for a membership.

Do I need an MBA to join?

While a large number of our members come from dedicated programs at Harvard Business School, Stanford GSB, Chicago Booth, and other top programs, searching is no longer reserved for the elite. With the current abundance of dry powder in private equity, and an increasing number of business owners reaching retirement age, good deals rarely go unfunded.

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by a searcher from The Johns Hopkins University
in New York, NY, USA

1mo ago

Best Tools For Searching?

Curious if there are any new sites/tools people have used for searching? I know the big ones such as bizbuysell but more interested if any new sites or AI tools that have proven to be more effective. Thanks!

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reply by a professional 1mo ago
from Duke University in New York, NY, USA

@redacted‌ appreciate the kind words and great that you're loving the platform. Anon, generally speaking, there are a couple camps of sourcing tools out there (independent of AI). The first are aggregators that consolidate listings from sites like BizBuySell and broker listing pages. Some of the big ones are Kumo and Larvato, but there's a handful of other companies in this space given that this listing info is inherently public. If you're comfortable with building internal tooling, you could also create a scraper yourself. I know @redacted‌ has spent time diving into this w/ DIY Claude Cowork / Code sessions. The second are off-market / proprietary search for all companies, not just listed ones. These tools typically use a combination of scraping raw company data and partnering / purchasing access to private data for distribution to end users. We focus on this specifically for the LMM at DealDogs. I'm not sure your exact buy box criteria, but I'm including a sample search of HVAC businesses in Ohio here: redacted (note: desktop only). You could filter this based on your deal criteria, get owner contact info and run similar searches for other industries and geographies. It really comes down to what you're trying to solve for. If you'd prefer brokered search, go with the former. If you're willing to put in the work or have a structured way to do proprietary outbound, go with the latter. Frankly the best results come from having more lines in the water and doing both. Also, friendly suggestion, I know going Anon can feel less ~risky~ but a lot of the folks on here are super kind and keen to help one another out -- worth a shot to just post with your profile, you never know what conversations can happen. And, if you're a part-time searcher worried your work is going to find out, just remember that if they see your post that means they're on this site too :) Hope this helps and feel free to DM with any questions!

reply by a searcher 1mo ago
from New York University in San Diego, CA, USA

If you’re looking for specific tooling, here’s a list that I’d recommend: Claude- AI Instantly- cold email Apify- web scrapers LinkedIn Sales Nav- data & outreach ClickUp- CRM Clay- aggregator & waterfall enrichment Just to name a few..:

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