The best investors are believers, not money people!
My name is Martin Gladdish, and I’m a believer. I’m a deep-thinking, clean-living, God-fearing, nature-loving, book-reading husband, friend and part-time magician.
The Birth Of StoryDecks
One of my early writing contracts (from 2005 until the present day) is with a mergers and acquisitions consultant. For them, I write Information Memorandums, which are basically ‘presenting businesses for sale’ documents.
These documents tell the story and represent the full future value of small businesses to potential acquirers over and above the financials. The information Memorandum becomes critical in helping the M&A consultant attract quality acquirers to the table and create a market where they can sell their clients’ businesses for a premium, not pennies.
This, in essence, is where the idea for story-driven Investment Decks was born: Because every strategic investor I’ve ever met (and I know loads) speaks the same language as an acquirer.
From 2021 to 2023, I took on a full-time role, in what my wife calls ‘a proper job’ where I coached over 60 small business owners through the UK's most comprehensive, end-to-end, birth-to-exit, fix-to-scale-and-sale business growth programme (The Entrepreneurs Circle& Masterplan). It was an
amazing education and experience, and I learned so much from helping other small business owners take giant steps towards their dreams.
It wasn’t long before my dreams got the better of me once more, and now I am inviting you to help me make yours come true, too…
About Me
My story started in retail management, then telesales and eventually, the rough, tough battlefields of London City frontline sales. The truth is that I was rubbish at selling. I was far too gentle, dare I say 'nice' and afraid of people saying 'no'.
But put a pen in my hand, and the sales ninja came bursting through...
To cut a long story short, I became a freelance copywriter in 2005, eventually specialising as a ghostwriter of business blogs. In 2017, I took on the persona of The Business Ghost.
In addition to being the invisible pen behind over a dozen business books for other people, I am the author of The Lazy Optimist and Build Your Business in 90 Minutes a Day (with Nigel Botterill) in my own name.
My 7-Second Personal Bio
- Exceedingly happily married for over 30 years
- Pastor of a full-gospel, Bible-based church
- Lifelong (largely long-suffering) supporter of Reading FC
- Part-time Magician (I used to say 'amateur' but it led to assumptions that I was rubbish)
- Dedicated ParkRunner (Gadebridge Park, Hemel Hempstead)
- Whimsical poet & lover of words
- Birdwatcher & nature walker
