Here is a list of my personal favorite search fund podcasts to make the acquisition entrepreneur journey more successful, less risky, and dare I say more fulfilling and community focused.
- Acquiring Minds
- ETA Insider
- Acquisitions Anonymous
- Think Like an Owner
- Deal-by-Deal
- M&A Talk
- Think Big, Buy Small
Community can be hard to come by in the fragmented search fund universe. Finding voices of experience and wisdom in the space used to be a lot harder than it is today. Conferences are fantastic, but they aren’t always available.
Podcasts provide a convenient and entertaining way to learn from experienced searchers, entrepreneurs, CEOs, investors, and other business professionals. They allow for diverse perspectives and formats including interviews that share practical advice, discussions of market news and trends, or in-depth case studies.
Here are the best search fund podcasts for entrepreneurs and investors interested in learning more about the search fund model, or looking to level up their knowledge.
1. Acquiring Minds
A popular search fund podcast featuring real-world success stories and lessons from operators and entrepreneurs who acquired established businesses.
Host: Will Smith
Acquiring Minds is a popular podcast about buying, owning, and operating small businesses. Its library includes hundreds of interviews with business acquirers and real-world entrepreneurship through acquisition (ETA) success stories.
Listeners can benefit from the step-by-step breakdowns of real world acquisitions, including strategies for evaluating companies, deal structuring, finding investors, and common pitfalls encountered along the way. New episodes drop twice per week, on Mondays and Thursdays.
Acquiring Minds also hosts regular webinars on a variety of topics that pertain to search investors, searchers, and other acquisition entrepreneurs. You can register for an upcoming webinar and watch recent recordings on the Acquiring Minds website.
2. The ETA Insider Podcast
A search fund podcast featuring deep dives into important ETA subjects with a diverse lineup of highly experienced entrepreneurs, investors, and other ETA professionals.
Host: Brian O’Connor (Chicago Booth)
ETA Insider features in-depth conversations with experienced entrepreneurs and investors. The podcast features diverse guests who discuss a variety of topics central to the ETA model, including deal sourcing, successful exits, operational best practices, and search fund investing.
Listeners will hear perspectives from different kinds of search entrepreneurs, including traditional, self-funded, and incubated searchers. They can also benefit from the advice and reflections of accomplished professionals in the ETA universe.
The podcast is produced by the Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Its academic backing provides listeners with a mix of academic and first-hand experiential perspectives. A new episode comes out around the end of each month.
3. Acquisitions Anonymous
A well-established, highly rated podcast where the hosts analyze real business listings and discuss the pros and cons of potential deals.
Hosts: Michael Girdley, Mills Snell, Bill D’Alessandro, Heather Endresen
Acquisitions Anonymous is a long-running podcast in which the hosts evaluate actual business listings and debate the merits of potential deals. They provide thoughtful commentary and highlight the potential risks and rewards during their discussions about whether they themselves would buy or pass on each business.
This format offers listeners a window into how experienced entrepreneurs and investors evaluate acquisitions. The show’s content helps aspiring acquisition entrepreneurs better understand the entire process, including discovering opportunities, due diligence, securing financing, and valuation.
The podcast’s casual and engaging tone helps make the complex world of ETA deals more accessible and entertaining. The show has recorded more than 300 episodes and counting, and is one of the top rated podcasts in its category. New episodes drop roughly twice per week, typically on Tuesdays and Fridays.
4. Think Like an Owner
A long-running podcast emphasizing the operational side of small business ownership to help entrepreneurs grow and sustain a successful business and create long-term value.
Host: Alex Bridgeman
Think Like an Owner is another long-running podcast that focuses on search funds and micro private equity. The show helps search fund entrepreneurs and investors learn how to effectively acquire and run small companies.
The podcast features ideas and insights from talented experts in the small business world. It provides knowledge, ideas, best practices, and frameworks for operators trying to grow and build transformative businesses.
New episodes drop weekly, usually releasing on Tuesdays. In addition to the podcast, Think Like an Owner also produces an informative weekly newsletter and original research. Its website includes a search function designed to provide operators with a database to look up info related to their specific challenges or questions.
5. Deal-by-Deal
A podcast focused on private equity deals in the middle market and lower-middle market, with an emphasis on the independent sponsor model.
Host: Greg Hawver and Jeff Brooker (McGuireWoods)
Deal-by-Deal is an ongoing series that explores private equity dealmaking, especially focused on the independent sponsor model. It invites legal experts, financial professionals, and experienced independent sponsors to explore different aspects of lower-middle and middle market private equity deals.
The podcast offers thoughtful insights into how private equity professionals and independent sponsors go about acquiring and operating businesses. Listeners can enjoy deep dives into the technical side of these deals, including legal, financial, and operational considerations.
Presented by the business law firm McGuireWoods, the Deal-by-Deal podcast has been around since 2021. Although there can be long draughts between releases, the show averages around six new episodes per year.
6. M&A Talk
An M&A-focused podcast designed to help business owners maximize the value of their companies, with an eye toward a profitable exit.
Host: Jacob Orosz (Morgan & Westfield)
M&A Talk is the #1 podcast about mergers and acquisitions. The show features interviews with experts in business sales, valuation, law, private equity, and investment banking. It also includes useful case studies in real-world SMB acquisitions packed with valuable lessons and insights.
Listeners benefit from the wisdom and guidance of a variety of industry experts focused around the buying and selling of privately held companies. This knowledge can empower search fund entrepreneurs to grow their company’s bottom line and maximize value for eventual sale.
The podcast is presented and hosted by Morgan & Westfield, a leading M&A firm for small and mid-sized businesses. The show drops 1-2 new episodes per week.
7. Think Big, Buy Small
A new search fund podcast that explores the path of entrepreneurship through the acquisition of an established small business with two Harvard Business School professors.
Hosts: Rick Ruback and Royce Yudkoff (Harvard Business School)
Think Big, Buy Small is a young podcast hosted by renowned Harvard Business School (HBS) professors Rick Ruback and Royce Yudkoff. Each episode introduces listeners to expert guests from the HBS community who offer their insights into the advantages and challenges of acquiring small businesses.
The show offers listeners an introduction to entrepreneurship through acquisition and guidance along the journey of acquiring an enduring, profitable company. The audience can get a peek into the world of one of the world’s top business schools and learn from members of its thriving ETA community.
The podcast’s concept is an extension of the co-hosts’ popular HBS field course and the book they co-authored in 2017, “HBR Guide To Buying A Small Business: Think Big, Buy Small, Own Your Own Company.” The show debuted in June 2024 and released new episodes weekly during its inaugural season.
Other Podcasts You May Enjoy
As you might imagine, there are lots of other podcasts about business and entrepreneurship that aren’t specifically about search funds or ETA. Many of these shows have a lot of crossover appeal and regularly cover topics of interest to listeners in the search fund space.
Here are a couple other podcasts that have plenty of applications for the operators, investors, and entrepreneurs that make up the search fund universe.
8. Tropical MBA
A popular, long-running podcast featuring guests who discuss the ins and outs of operating and growing location independent businesses that scale.
Host: Dan Andrews and Ian Schoen
Tropical MBA (TMBA) began way back in 2009 as a pair of digital nomads sought to meet other entrepreneurs and learn how to grow a location independent business. Over the years, the hosts have chronicled their journey through their own multi-seven figure exit and shared conversations with the many like-minded entrepreneurs they’ve met along the way.
Although not focused on search funds, listeners with interest in acquiring and building global, scalable businesses in the digital age can find inspiration and wisdom aplenty in this podcast. Subscribers can also apply to get free business coaching from the hosts live on the podcast, which exposes listeners to real-world case studies and coaching by extension.
The podcast is a well-established show with more than 750 episodes and 10 million downloads. New episodes drop like clockwork every Thursday.
9. Acquired
A top-rated business podcast featuring in-depth interviews with big-name technology founders, CEOs, and investors.
Host: Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal
Acquired is a top-30 podcast across all categories, with nearly 1 million listeners to each episode. Although this show isn’t specific to search funds either, The Wall Street Journal dubbed it “the business world’s favorite podcast.” The show and its guests discuss the stories and strategies of some of the greatest companies on Earth.
The star power of the guests on this podcast is hard to overstate. The show has featured interviews with some of the world’s most recognizable founders and CEOs, including Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang. They’ve also interviewed investing luminaries like Howard Marks and the late Charlie Munger.
Listeners can learn from the lessons and stories of how the world’s greatest companies were built and apply them as a founder, operator, or investor.
Each episode is a 3-4 hour deep dive into a subject or extensive interview with an industry leader. The podcast releases new episodes at a pace of around 1-2 per month, on average.
Final Thoughts
It’s sort of a running gag at this point that everybody and their brother has their own podcast. But far from the amateur stuff produced in someone’s basement, there’s a surprising variety of very good search fund podcasts.
With that abundance of content comes the need to be selective. It would be impossible to keep up with every business podcast out there. But you can’t go wrong subscribing to any of the shows on this list to learn about topics relevant to search funds. Each delivers plenty of valuable content for the time they ask you to invest with them.
By listening to any of the podcasts on this list, you can benefit from the insights and lessons of search fund veterans. That increases your chances of success and sets you up for a fulfilling and profitable search fund endeavor. Happy listening!
