Our first advice is not even to talk to acquirers unless you want to sell the company now. It's remarkable how often founders who don't actively want to sell will talk to acquirers anyway, just to see if they'll make some offer too good to refuse. But acquirers never do that. When their offers are surprising, they are always surprisingly low. And the conversation is far from zero cost. Very far. That's the other big mistake.
My assumption would be if an acquirer is willing to make you an offer too good to refuse and you aren't actively looking to sell, then not talking to them would be the best way to actually spur that offer.
