[Israel Business Series] 2 Big Mistakes When Buying or Selling a Company with Yadin Shemmer, Founder and CEO of Intrinsic

Yadin Shemmer is the Founder and CEO of Intrinsic, an acquirer and accelerator of Amazon-focused health and wellness brands. Before founding Intrinsic, Yadin spent 15 years building and running consumer health businesses, including Mango Health, which sold to TrialCard in 2019. He also ran the consumer business at Everyday Health, which sold to Ziff Davis in 2016 for $467 million and Better2Know. Yadin had started his career in finance as both an M&A advisor and later as an investor.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

• How Yadin Shemmer attracts super advisors for Intrinsic
• What makes the health and wellness niche unique?
• How Intrinsic decides on a company to acquire
• Yadin shares how he built his core team
• Why Yadin started Intrinsic and how it operates
• Lessons in trying to sell a public company
• What’s different about selling a private company?
• The mistakes people make when buying and selling a firm
• How to integrate culture when acquiring a business
• What Yadin wanted to do when he was younger
• The culture difference between Israel and the US

In this episode…

As a vision-driven entrepreneur, you build businesses to last. But when you have to sell it or acquire another company along the way, you want to make sure it aligns with your vision. Unfortunately, we tend to make many mistakes when trying to buy or sell a company. According to Yadin Shemmer, Founder and CEO of Intrinsic, one of such mistakes is making your choice to sell or buy a company primarily about financials.

You may think, “this company is profitable. I’m just going to buy revenue and profits, put it together, and it’s going to work.” If business is about revenue and profits, what’s wrong with deciding on that basis? The issue is that there’s a whole strategy you’re missing. Want to learn more about this strategy — and other mistakes to avoid?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Yadin Shemmer, Founder and CEO of Intrinsic. They talk about how Yadin began his journey building, selling, and acquiring companies — and the lessons he’s learned. They also discuss how Yadin’s attracted top advisors, the types of companies he buys or partners with, and of course, the big mistakes people make when buying and selling a company. Stay tuned.

Resources Mentioned in this episode

• Intrinsic
• Yadin Shemmer on LinkedIn
• Chris Giacolone on LinkedIn
• Paul Miller on LinkedIn
• Erum Hasnain on LinkedIn

Special Mentions:

• Dr. Mehmet Oz on LinkedIn
• Tony Robbins on LinkedIn
• Laurie Ann Goldman on LinkedIn
• Nick Denissen on LinkedIn
• Good Day Chocolate
• Mike Duffy on LinkedIn
• Amazing Exits podcast
• Ben Wolin on LinkedIn
• Mike Keriakos on LinkedIn
• Covetrus
• Natural Stacks

Books Mentioned:

• What You Do Is Who You Are: How to Create Your Business Culture by Ben Horowitz
• The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers by Ben Horowitz
• Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek
• High Output Management by Andrew S. Grove

Related Episode(s): 

• “[Sweet and Snack Show Series] Why Following Trends and Fads Isn’t Always the Best Idea with Dr. Andrew Goldman Co-Founder of Good Day Chocolate”
• “[One Question] Slowing Down to Connect with What Matters Most with Roy Krebs Co-Founder of Natural Stacks”
• “[Israel Business Series] The Unstoppable Startup: Mastering Israel’s Secret Rules of Chutzpah with Uri Adoni”
• “[Israel Business Series] It’s Easier after 100 Million Users: Creating Record Breaking Software Products with Yossi Vardi”
• “[Israel Business Series] How to Manage Over 20K Square Feet of Warehouse with Tiny Robots – Guy Glass and Reuven Della-Torre, CO-Founders, Caja Robotics”

 

Episode Transcript

Jeremy Weisz 0:19

Dr. Jeremy Weisz here, Founder of InspiredInsider.com where I talk with inspirational entrepreneurs and leaders. I’m excited I’m gonna introduce Yadin Shemmer of Intrinsic in a second. And you know, I always like to say one of the episodes people should check out, you know and since Yadin is originally from Israel, we have a bit you know, Israel business leader series that I’ve done and I’ve had Uri Adoni, who you know was at Jerusalem Venture Partners, Yossi Vardi, who has done tons of investing and they had him for an interview we had a QA robotics Guy Glass talking about eCommerce since this is kind of in the eCommerce space, people can check out that interview with Guy Glass and many many more go to InspiredInsider.com and before I introduce today’s guest, this episode is brought to you by Rise25 at Rise25 we help it in the way I say is like we help businesses give to and connect to their dream 100 relationships. And we do that by helping a business run their podcast. And for me, the number one thing in my life is relationships. I’m always looking at ways to give to my best relationships, profile the people and the companies I admire, and I’ve seen no better way to do that over the past over a decade, then have them on a podcast. So if you have questions if you’ve thought of starting a podcast, you should if you’re a business I 100% believe that everyone is if you have a website, you should have a podcast like you wouldn’t have a business without a website. And I believe that will be the case for podcasts as well. You have questions go to Rise25.com and contact us we’re happy to answer any questions that you have. And today’s guest I’m really excited to Yadin Shemmer is the Founder and CEO of Intrinsic and Intrinsic is an acquire an accelerator of Amazon focus, health and wellness brands. And prior to Instrinsic. He spent 15 years building and running consumer health businesses including Mango health, which sold the TrialCard in 2019. EverydayHealthcare sold to Ziff Davis in 2016, for $467 million, and better to know and many, many more started his career in finances both an M&A Advisor and later investor just a breadth of experience over many years. So it didn’t. Thanks for joining me,

Yadin Shemmer 2:29

Jeremy, thank you for having me.

Jeremy Weisz 2:30

Now, I want to there’s so many questions I have for you. So the first is you have just attracted this amazing group of advisors. Okay, and I’m gonna name a few. But I’d love to hear your approach. why you chose the advisors, how you attracted the advisors, we have Dr. Mehmet Oz, Tony Robbins Laurie Ann Goldman, who is a former CEO of Spanx and Nick Denissen, former VP at Amazon. So what are you, you know, tell me about how you were able to attract some of these advisors?

Yadin Shemmer 3:04

Well, first, you know, just to say how honored we are, and fortunate to have them on board. Really, we think they’re going to be transformational for us. And, you know, there’s really, there’s no secret sauce or like magic, I think, to attracting these advisors other than being upfront about what you’re doing and why it matters. And if it aligns with, with what folks want to do, and what they believe in, folks Believe in your mission, and they want to be a part of it, you can get, you can get a lot of people involved. And, you know, I was lucky to have been introduced to the four folks you mentioned to Dr. Oz, Tony Robbins, Laurie and Goldman and Nick Denissen, I was lucky to be introduced to them. And I laid out the vision for what Intrinsic was doing, and the really the why it matters and what we’re doing how we help consumers, at the end of the day, find better solutions to health and wellness challenges, how we help founders realize their dreams. And that that resonated with the folks that were talking about. And they agreed to be part of it. And I think, you know, if I have one piece of advice to folks is, when you have conversations with with folks that can move the needle for your business, just be direct and upfront and focus on the why focus on what you’re doing, why it matters, and why the person should really care how it aligns potentially, with with what their mission is. So, you know, as an example, you know, Dr. Oz has dedicated his career to helping folks better manage their health better understand their health, and just, you know, becoming healthier every single day. So obviously, what we’re doing resonated with him because we’re out there looking for Better Health Solutions every single day to tough challenges. And from Tony’s perspective as an example, really, our mission aligned well with what he does because he first and foremost is focused on helping people achieve financial freedom and independence. And he’s also very focused on health and wellness. And so we, what we’re doing here aligns very well with some of his his mission in life. And Nick and Laurie Ann are two execs who built brands and build big businesses and ecommerce. And so from our perspective that align with them. So it’s really about alignment, both of mission and vision and what you’re doing.