About the Company

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Carson Group is an Omaha-based Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) that has acquired 40 additional RIAs and partnered with over 165 organizations since the firm began pursuing M&A as a growth lever. Their platform helps financial advisors manage their businesses more efficiently through technology, compliance, and operational services. By allowing these advisors to “find their freedom” from tedious administrative tasks and logistical challenges, Carson Group empowers them to continue expanding and achieving financial success. The group was founded in 1983 and received a large investment from Bain Capital in 2022, at a valuation of over $1 billion.

Challenges

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About five years ago, the Carson Group team decided to make M&A a major strategic growth lever. Their handful of past deals delivered impressive ROI, and the firm saw significant expansion opportunities, particularly if it shifted from an ad hoc, reactive M&A approach to a buyer-led one. When they were managing only a handful of deals per year, their spreadsheet-heavy workflows were sufficient to get the job done, but as that number increased drastically, the bottlenecks became apparent.

During their first few acquisitions, the Carson Group team struggled to define their processes. Deal data and documents were spread between OneDrive, spreadsheets, Ignite folders, Salesforce, and even emails. No data was synced, and critical numbers could be significantly out of date. Stakeholders had no way of knowing whether a particular piece of information lived in Google, a spreadsheet, or Salesforce, leading to reporting and communication delays.

Setting up the initial data room took a lot of time and effort, and permissions quickly became a headache, often requiring IT preauthorization for seller domains before documents could be shared. All due diligence tasks were managed manually across various spreadsheets, and there was no overarching view of the deal pipeline, diligence status, or next steps. Key stakeholders frequently found they lacked permission to view the data needed to complete their due diligence tasks, resulting in constant edit requests. Reporting capabilities were limited, and customization options were either nonexistent or difficult to implement. 

Negative Business Impacts

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Time Wasted Building and Maintaining Data Rooms: Setting up each data room was a lengthy, manual process that required IT preauthorization for seller domains before documents could even be shared. What should have been a quick administrative task consumed hours of setup time per deal, capacity that an M&A team with aggressive growth targets couldn't afford to lose.

Inefficient Operations and Miscommunication Due to Dispersed Tools: Deal data lived across OneDrive, Ignite folders, spreadsheets, Salesforce, and email with no syncing and no single source of truth. Stakeholders had no reliable way to know where the latest document lived or whether the numbers in front of them were accurate, creating frequent miscommunications and costly reporting delays.

Negative Seller Experience From Permission Failures: Without granular permission controls, confidential seller information, including HR and financial data, couldn't be properly protected. Sellers and key stakeholders routinely found themselves locked out of documents they needed, triggering constant edit requests and sending the wrong message to partners about Carson Group's operational maturity.

Poor executive-level pipeline visibility deteriorated confidence in the M&A team: With no overarching view of deal status, diligence progress, or next steps, executives were left in the dark and the M&A team was always playing catch-up. For a firm positioning itself as tech-forward and data-first, operating on clunky, disconnected tools created a credibility gap that undermined trust on both sides of every transaction.

Solution

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“Out of all the different options, DealRoom was the one that could grow with us. It was a very scalable platform.” -Mike Wieger, Vice President of Mergers & Acquisitions

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Initially, all Carson Group was looking for was an improved version of their OneDrive and Ignite folder structures. However, their early conversations with DealRoom uncovered several potential use cases and showcased the platform’s extensive functionality. One capability of particular interest was the “trigger” option, which could move a deal from one phase to the next when certain conditions were met, and automatically notify the individuals responsible for the next stage. The team could also customize these phases to their own specifications, as well as easily edit all fields in each deal card. 

Rather than spending hours spinning up an initial data room, the team could now build one with just a few clicks. Permissions were far simpler to manage, and sellers had all of their tasks and documents in a single location. Pipeline data was also available from the beginning of conversations with potential sellers through every stage in the M&A lifecycle.

“When we were talking to DealRoom, there were a few things that we didn't even know we wanted, and when they showed us the capabilities, we were so excited.” - Mike Wieger, Vice President of Mergers & Acquisitions

Why DealRoom?

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Transparent Pricing Structure: DealRoom’s pricing is based on the number of individual rooms rather than per seat or the number of documents/attachments, providing significant transparency and cost predictability.

High Degree of Scalability: After committing to M&A as a key growth driver, the Carson team knew they needed a platform that could grow with them. DealRoom had the functionality to support an ever-expanding deal pipeline.

Reliable Reporting Capabilities and Real-Time Data: Executives at Carson Group could now receive auto-generated reports with the information most relevant to them without digging through multiple files. Also, they could rest assured that all deal data was up-to-date and accurate.

Extensive Customization Options: With easy-to-edit templates and fully customizable fields and labels, the Carson team built an M&A CRM tailored to their specific processes and nomenclature. Filtered views and personalized dashboards saved time for Carson executives by surfacing key insights.

Outcomes

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Executive Trust That Fuels M&A Growth: When leadership can't see what's happening in the pipeline, M&A stalls. With real-time dashboards and auto-generated reports, Carson Group executives now have instant, accurate visibility into every deal, giving the M&A department the top-down buy-in it needs to move fast and scale with confidence.

Professional Execution That Sets Them Apart: In a competitive M&A market, how you run a deal is part of the pitch. Carson Group's streamlined, transparent process signals to sellers that they are organized, trustworthy, and serious. They’ve turned operational excellence into a competitive advantage that brings the right partners to the table.

A Single Source of Truth That Everyone Trusts: Chasing down the latest document version across five different platforms isn't just frustrating, it's a deal risk. With DealRoom as their single source of truth, every stakeholder at Carson Group works from the same accurate, real-time data, eliminating the confusion and miscommunication that used to slow everything down.

Deals That Close Faster: Every missed diligence item, permission delay, and reporting error adds time to the deal clock — and time kills deals. By eliminating the manual friction that plagued their process, Carson Group gets deals across the finish line faster, with fewer errors and less frustration on both sides of the table.

A Platform That Scales as Fast as Their Ambitions: Most tools break under the weight of a rapidly growing pipeline. DealRoom's customizable templates, flexible workflows, and unlimited deal capacity mean Carson Group never has to slow down their M&A strategy to accommodate their software — the platform grows with them, not against them.

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