{"id":32,"date":"2025-08-12T14:18:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T14:18:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/?p=32"},"modified":"2025-08-12T14:18:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-12T14:18:11","slug":"the-triangle-of-value","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/","title":{"rendered":"The Triangle of Value"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The \u201cTriangle of Value\u201d \u2014 The 3 Metrics Buyers Care About Most<br><br>When I talk to agency owners about M&amp;A, I share a simple framework I call The Triangle of Value.<br><br>It\u2019s built on 3 metrics every serious buyer obsesses over:<br>1\ufe0f\u20e3 Retention \u2013 High retention = recurring, predictable cashflow.<br>2\ufe0f\u20e3 Growth \u2013 More growth = more cashflow, especially at scale.<br>3\ufe0f\u20e3 Profitability \u2013 Obvious, but worth saying: profitability drives cashflow.<br><br>The question I get most often is: \u201cWhich one matters most?\u201d<br><br>Answer: All of them.<br><br>Why? Because most buyers (especially PE-backed) are really buying reliable, predictable, recurring cashflow \u2014 and each side of the triangle feeds it.<br><br>\ud83d\udcca Here\u2019s the key:<br> You don\u2019t need all three to be perfect all the time. You do need to measure, manage, and be able to explain your numbers.<br><br>&#8211; Investing in growth and taking a short-term hit to profitability? Fine \u2014 if you can show the impact.<br><br>&#8211; Pulling back on growth to shore up retention? Also fine \u2014 if you have the data to prove it worked.<br><br>Yes, buyers look at many other things.<br><br>But if you control these three metrics, you\u2019re already a long way toward maximizing your valuation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"614\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-35\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png 614w, https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value-300x220.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 614px) 100vw, 614px\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The \u201cTriangle of Value\u201d \u2014 The 3 Metrics Buyers Care About Most When I talk to agency owners about M&amp;A, I share a simple framework I call The Triangle of Value. It\u2019s built on 3 metrics every serious buyer obsesses over:1\ufe0f\u20e3 Retention \u2013 High retention = recurring, predictable cashflow.2\ufe0f\u20e3 Growth \u2013 More growth = more [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Triangle of Value - Herringbone Digital Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"The Triangle of Value - Herringbone Digital Blog\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"The \u201cTriangle of Value\u201d \u2014 The 3 Metrics Buyers Care About Most When I talk to agency owners about M&amp;A, I share a simple framework I call The Triangle of Value. It\u2019s built on 3 metrics every serious buyer obsesses over:1\ufe0f\u20e3 Retention \u2013 High retention = recurring, predictable cashflow.2\ufe0f\u20e3 Growth \u2013 More growth = more [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Triangle of Value - Herringbone Digital Blog","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"The Triangle of Value - Herringbone Digital Blog","twitter_description":"The \u201cTriangle of Value\u201d \u2014 The 3 Metrics Buyers Care About Most When I talk to agency owners about M&amp;A, I share a simple framework I call The Triangle of Value. It\u2019s built on 3 metrics every serious buyer obsesses over:1\ufe0f\u20e3 Retention \u2013 High retention = recurring, predictable cashflow.2\ufe0f\u20e3 Growth \u2013 More growth = more [&hellip;]","twitter_image":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":["Article","BlogPosting"],"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/"},"author":{"name":"herringbone","@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7316fda9199bd356f7e1c4d9685a87b5"},"headline":"The Triangle of Value","datePublished":"2025-08-12T14:18:10+00:00","dateModified":"2025-08-12T14:18:11+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/"},"wordCount":194,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png","inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/","url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/","name":"The Triangle of Value - Herringbone Digital Blog","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png","datePublished":"2025-08-12T14:18:10+00:00","dateModified":"2025-08-12T14:18:11+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7316fda9199bd356f7e1c4d9685a87b5"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/triangle-of-value.png","width":614,"height":450},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/2025\/08\/12\/the-triangle-of-value\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Triangle of Value"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/","name":"Herringbone Digital Blog","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7316fda9199bd356f7e1c4d9685a87b5","name":"herringbone"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32\/revisions\/36"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonedigital.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}