By Brett Kaufman. 8 years using relationships to build sales pipelines, from political fundraising to a 7 figure business to running matchmaking for two communities. Over 1,000 introductions facilitated.

The 48 hours after the M&A Source Deal Market belong to the buyers who asked you for a teaser. Text them first, by name, with the deal and the question they asked at the table, then work outward to the groups that fit a mandate you expect to sign this year.

It is your last night in Houston. The Deal Market sessions are behind you. Your bag has a stack of business cards from private equity groups, family offices and search funds, and you walked maybe 25 tables. Three of them leaned in on your Texas HVAC deal. One said “send me the CIM tonight.” You can picture her face. You cannot remember her firm.

I run matchmaking for two communities, so most of my attention goes to the week after a room like this, when the cards are still in the bag. Here is how I would run it.

How this room is built

The M&A Source Deal Market does not run on meetings booked ahead. In M&A Source’s own guide to making the most of the conference and Deal Market, PE groups are seated at tables and intermediaries walk around them “at an unscheduled pace.” A conversation runs 5 to 10 minutes. You leave a business card or a teaser so a follow up call can be scheduled. The guide is blunt about the goal: “make contact, not negotiate the deal.”

That format decides your follow up, and it is the part I would study first. Nobody booked you into a calendar slot, so nothing on the buyer’s side records that you met. They have a pile of teasers and cards, like you do.

The volume is real. In M&A Source’s 2024 Spring Deal Market prospectus, the organization reported from its Spring 2023 survey of attending PE groups that each group saw an average of 30 deals and signed roughly 10 NDAs. If you are the advisor, you are one of 30. If you are the buyer, you have 30 to sort.

M&A Source runs a Conference and Deal Market every spring and fall. Per its July 2026 release, the 2026 Fall Conference and Deal Market runs November 2 to 4 in Houston, at the JW Marriott Houston by The Galleria. For the spring 2027 event, check the official site for dates.

Before Houston: who to research, who to walk to

What I tell people before any event: the work starts before you get on the plane. Here, that means the conference app. M&A Source’s guide says the app arrives about a week before, with attendee bios, room maps and schedules, and that no paper information is handed out. The prospectus adds that Deal Market buyers get attendee lists before and after the conference.

If you are the advisor:

• Pull every buyer table from the app and sort it against the deals you are bringing. Mark the five tables you must reach in the first session, before the room fills.
• Note which of those groups you have met before and when. A table you met last fall and never texted is a warm reopening, not a cold pitch.
• Have a one line teaser for every deal, including the ones that are not ready. Alex Welles of Union Capital, writing from the PE side in M&A Source’s first Deal Market guide, says groups want to hear about the right size and sector “whatever stage they are in,” even a business that is a few years from a transaction.

If you are the buyer at the table:

• Search the app for advisors in your sectors and geography. They are coming to you, but the ones you name in advance are the ones you remember after.
• Write your criteria on one card. Size, sector, geography, what you will not do. Hand it to every advisor who stops.

In the room: capture in 10 seconds

A 5 to 10 minute conversation leaves one detail worth keeping. Get it down before the next person steps up.

Three things, every time: who it was, which deal or criteria came up, and what they asked for. “Dana, Houston family office, HVAC deal, wants customer concentration and the lease terms.” That is the whole note. Say it into your phone or snap their badge and add a sentence.

Do this between tables, not at the cocktail party that night. By then, three conversations about HVAC have merged into one. When I was fundraising, I logged details after every call for the same reason. The note you take in the moment is the only one that is accurate.

The 48 hours after: who first

I would sort the stack into three piles before texting anyone.

1. Asked for something. A teaser, a CIM, an NDA, a call. These go out that night or the next morning. They are a deal in motion and a buyer who expects you.
2. Fit a mandate you expect. The group whose criteria match a business you are talking to now. No deal yet, but a reason.
3. Peers. The advisors from workshops and the cocktail parties. The other side of the fee split, the referral that comes back.

For ranking inside each pile, see who to follow up with first after a conference.

Advisor to a buyer who asked for the teaser:

Good meeting you at your table in Houston. The Texas HVAC deal, $2.1M EBITDA, owner stays two years. You asked about customer concentration. Sending the teaser and NDA now. Call Thursday?

Advisor to a buyer with no deal yet:

Enjoyed the Deal Market. You said food manufacturing, $1M to $5M EBITDA, Southeast. I’m talking to an owner who fits, probably 2028. Want me to keep you posted?

Buyer to an advisor who pitched:

Thanks for walking our table in Houston. The plumbing business you mentioned is in our range. Can you send the teaser? Also, what else are you working in home services?

Advisor to a peer:

Good to meet you at lunch in Houston. You mentioned a client in auto collision who’s too small for you. Happy to take a look, and I’ll send you anything in your area.

Under 40 words each. One deal, one detail from the table, one next step. More examples are in follow up texts after a conference.

30 days after

This is where I see most of the value leak. The Deal Market produces relationships that pay off on a long clock. Deals in the lower middle market take months to close, and your next mandate may not arrive until spring.

• Week two: anyone in pile one who has not replied gets a second, different note. Change the channel. If you emailed the teaser, text.
• Week three: pile two gets a criteria check. “Still food manufacturing, still Southeast?” Two lines. It updates your notes and reminds them you are working for them.
• Day 30: go through every card from Houston. Anyone you have not touched since is going cold. One short text now is cheaper than a reintroduction at the spring conference.

The buyers you met will hear from 30 advisors this month. The ones who hear from you again in January, with a real reason, are the ones whose names you will see on the next LOI. For keeping that going over a full cycle, see how to stay top of mind with brokers during a 12 month deal cycle.

The system that does this for you

I built FRONT OF MIND because I watched people meet the right buyer, have a real conversation, then go quiet for months while someone else kept the relationship. It is built for the week after a room like this. Capture each table in seconds: say a name and a sentence out loud, snap the badge or the business card, and it is filed under the event. The next morning it opens on your 10 minutes for today, with each person’s one line reason why. You met at the Deal Market two days ago and never followed up. A deal in your pipeline has been quiet seven days. Their company was in the news.

Every draft is a text style message, 40 words max, and nothing sends without your tap. It learns from your edits, so the drafts start to sound like you. Ask Liala out loud, “who do I know that buys HVAC in Texas,” and get the right people with why. Your contacts are encrypted. No one on our team looks at them.

Start free with your first 25 contacts and see which table from Houston comes up first.

See how it works