[00:02] Hey.

[00:02] Hey, guys, what is up? Welcome back to another episode of the Smart Flip with me and Matt. And today, guys, we're going to be talking about the buyback funnel, how I discovered the best lead sources.

[00:13] And we're going to be jumping into that. For those of you who don't know who we are, my name is Chris Roeder. This is Matt Shirley. He's the console.

[00:21] We run a program called re Accelerator where we help people start growing, scale their phone flipping businesses and turning them into buyback businesses,

[00:30] which ultimately, you know, helps them make more money, live the life they want, stuff like that.

[00:36] With that being said, we do have a. I do have a book called Tech Flips to Profit. You can find it on episode 11 of the podcast for free,

[00:45] or you can download the PDF version and all that good stuff. And then we have a bunch of resources and stuff below in YouTube and on Spotify and all of that stuff.

[00:56] So with that being said, we're gonna, we're gonna tap in. So, guys, today we're gonna be talking about the buyback funnel,

[01:04] or this is what I'm calling it now. It used to be called mostly the core four, but I feel like it's better termed as more of a funnel, funneling leads in, right?

[01:14] So, yeah, how I discovered the best lead sources.

[01:19] So,

[01:21] um, most people in this business specifically, especially in the beginning, only rely on one source for leads. Meaning.

[01:30] Meaning they only. Like that can be Facebook Marketplace, it can be Facebook, it can be Instagram, it can be multiple, it can just be random. Like I've seen that. So, but one thing that like people don't realize is like one change in the algorithm or,

[01:46] you know, something in their business can change overnight or something, or you're the plug that you currently have, could disappear and then bam, your business comes to a screeching halt, right?

[01:59] So I've seen this many, many times and I always tell people, I'm like, look, you need multiple lead sources all the time because if one goes down, the others can kind of hold it up.

[02:10] It's like having a chair, right, that has all four legs.

[02:14] If you only have three legs, right, it'll still stand up. If it only has two legs, probably not, right? But if you only have one, it's definitely not standing up.

[02:25] So you, if you add more legs, imagine a chair with eight legs, you know, pretty sure it's going to stay up, right? So I want to walk you guys through the moment my business almost died from, from this, okay?

[02:41] Not having a buyback funnel.

[02:43] So I'll Never forget logging into Facebook Marketplace one morning. This was something that I had never seen before.

[02:51] Your listing violates our policies.

[02:54] So back then, guys, we were doing Craigslist. We were doing Facebook Marketplace ads. Right? This is back in 2016, 2017 days. Matt remembers those days.

[03:05] I do.

[03:06] I remember. I remember, guys. My heart dropped. I built my entire flipping business on marketplace using ads. Seeing that notice felt like somebody pulling the rug out from under me. Instantly, my inbox was silent, my leads dried up, and my entire business felt like it was on life support.

[03:22] So I had to figure something else out fast.

[03:26] This is one of the terrifying moments that births the buyback funnel system that basically guarantees that I never depend on a single lead source ever again. Now, what's crazy is, like, when people logged in, like, it didn't happen just to me.

[03:42] This happened throughout.

[03:45] Phone flippers and people like that.

[03:48] A lot of them just gave up on the business. Funny enough.

[03:51] Like, that's true. Yeah, that is true.

[03:53] I mean, you remember those days, like, as soon as they figured out that they couldn't get leads for free, like, it's up and left, man.

[04:01] Yeah. No one wanted to pay to play, that's for sure.

[04:06] So.

[04:09] So talking about the buyback funnel, there's a couple core pieces to the buyback funnel that I want to talk about. And we're going to jump into talking Matt's wheelhouse here.

[04:20] Reach outs going from passive to aggressive.

[04:25] Um, so I used to think leads really only came from ads. Like qualified leads, you know, post weight, all that.

[04:33] Right.

[04:33] It changed when my student turned coach. Matt here showed me his sniping method for flipping game consoles. Matt systematically targets specific deals on the marketplace. And he's actually trained the algorithm, actually,

[04:50] in a way for on marketplace where it just shows them the best deals all the time.

[04:56] Around the same time, though, I was listening to hor moi a lot, Alex Horosi, and he talked about gym launch and he. He talked about how half of his multi million dollar business with gym launch came from outbound messaging.

[05:12] So he said. But he. One of his quotes is like, waiting for leads is gambling. Reaching out directly is how you print money. Hey, like, okay, so I actually put a couple of Matt's processes in into action.

[05:26] I picked up the Nintendo Switch and then an Oculus Quest, and then soon after that, I actually bought my very first Valve index.

[05:34] So it works. I remember literally thinking to myself, I'm like, why haven't I been doing this? Like,

[05:41] it was like, I felt dumb. It's money.

[05:44] Money.

[05:44] It's out There for real. Like, if you know what you're doing, it's money, right? Like, if you don't know what you're doing and you're just sending like high, is it still available?

[05:52] Right.

[05:52] You know, you're not. Not doing it. Right. Right. So, yeah, do you want to talk a little bit about that? I know, you know, I know I had you come in and kind of teach the students and stuff and.

[06:02] Yeah,

[06:03] yeah, of course.

[06:04] Well, I think a lot of people just expect. First of all, they. There's two kinds of. There's two ditches within this process. There's people that think that there's,

[06:14] you know, obviously, like, no stuff out there and the market's saturated or everybody wants full price for their stuff. And that's not true. And then there's people that think that every deal that they're going to go look for because maybe they watched me on like a video or something,

[06:30] you know, it's just, oh my gosh, I'm just out here picking up money like blades of grass. And that's not necessarily true either.

[06:38] If you are a discretionary individual and you know what you need to find and you can shrewdly look for those things, then, yeah, those deals are out there way more than most people think.

[06:47] Way, way, way more. I was looking at a zip code yesterday for a new student in Console Kings, and I was about to switch over to my zip code and I was like, oh, man.

[06:58] I saw these four quick deals literally above the fold of the page.

[07:03] Let me send them your way. They're almost each in a different category of like, electronic in a manner of speaking. One was a VR, one was a console, one was an under the radar flip.

[07:14] We know about those. And then like another one was like just some, some item that looked like it was a good deal and I ended up not sending it to them because I think it was broken.

[07:23] Now, broken's good, but this was like really, really broken. And I didn't want to overwhelm them being new. So the thing people gotta be aware of is when you have the right framework and boundary to color within and you know exactly what colors you're supposed to use, you can find deals on reachouts all the time.

[07:42] And so I think my contribution to helping Chris or helping students in accelerator was I brought such a plethora of things to the table says, you know, okay, well, what if I.

[07:52] What if I only have one bullet right now called reach out, and I'm new to reselling? Well, if I can learn a large variety of things.

[08:01] I still have a lot of bullets. Yeah.

[08:04] And that makes it really simple. And so, you know, within our course, on our price sheets, we have over 70 different items, you know, within the realm of consoles and VR systems, and also some under the radar flips, which are just, you know, one off electronics that people probably aren't looking for that are still valuable.

[08:19] And so I think total. It's probably somewhere like, close to, like, 90 different things. And you can find a lot of stuff on an online marketplace like Facebook Offerup or Craigslist, when you know what to look for and you know the right price points.

[08:34] And so it really is a very powerful thing. Now, let me parlay that back into our conversation here together, where it's like, okay, cool. Think of that as just being like one leg of your stool, like Chris was saying.

[08:46] Right. That's. That's really powerful. Because if you want to. Let's say you're. You're just bored and you want to flip something, just go online and find it. Yep. Right. And keep looking till you find something.

[08:56] And that was my goal, to find something till I can make 50 to 100 bucks whenever I wanted.

[09:01] But now you got Chris Schroeder over here who brings ads to the scene. Right. Who also brings, I think, some automated methods to the scene and systematizing this process,

[09:13] helping our students to build out a system that ultimately, I don't feel like people can lose. It's just.

[09:18] It's just win a lot.

[09:19] You can only lose if they don't do anything. Right?

[09:21] That's fair. Yeah. Don't take action. You always lose.

[09:24] I mean, I like to. On the webinars we do, I always say that Matt literally would, like, remove the blinders from my eyes. Right.

[09:34] And that. That is what happened. Because I didn't know I had bought more than just an iPhone and stuff before. Like, but it was always from ads.

[09:42] But I also didn't know how many different opportunities there were. And that's not saying you have to take all of the opportunities and all the items. Like, you pick the ones that you, you know, know, like, choose.

[09:53] I'm. I'm down to, like, four to six items that I mostly flip.

[09:56] Yep.

[09:58] But I know what I'm looking for now. When I go into the market, like, the first thing I look for is a Valve index almost every day, like, because I know that that's the highest profit item that I'm gonna flip by far, you know, and when you're constantly on, like,

[10:12] a lot of you guys don't Even know what that is, you know,

[10:16] fair. So like, I was talking to a guy this past week who,

[10:21] he'll be on the podcast eventually.

[10:23] Awesome.

[10:24] But he does a lot of backend stuff for some very large buyback companies. And I was like, do you know what a valve index is? And he's like, no, what the heck is that?

[10:32] I'm like, like, this guy, you know, helps a lot of people.

[10:36] He had no idea what it was.

[10:38] By the end of the day, by the end of the call, he knew what it was.

[10:41] So yeah, he did.

[10:43] He's like, what? Like, like, yeah, dude, this thing is, we make crazy profits off this thing all the time. I love it, you know, and I, you know, I mean, Matt has this three ping method.

[10:53] I ended up creating my own kind of script that was more copy and paste for me.

[10:59] For those of you that, that are aware, probably,

[11:03] you know, it's, you know, hey, I run a, a business in the area that buys use and damaged electronics. If I were able to pay cash today, would you take a lower price?

[11:11] Very simple. But that one simple message will skyrocket your response rate.

[11:16] Most people are just like either number one sending a number as an offer or they're just saying hi, is it still available? And looking like everybody else.

[11:26] The thing I really like about that, Chris, is essentially it's a more professional way of saying like, hi, I buy things and I want to put cash in your hands, bring more stuff to the table so I can put cash in your hands.

[11:36] And so, you know, like you've said before, you're selling the person on the idea of giving them cash. Which when people find out that you're professional and that you buy all this stuff,

[11:46] you know, I, I think, I think some people kind of get caught in the weeds of wanting to negotiate the perfect price on that one item. But, and maybe conversationally this has like emerged before.

[11:58] But you know, when you start asking people for multiple things, it seems like they very easily lose that scarcity and mentality. They let go of that one specific thing, they've got like absolutely wrenched in their fist and, and now the world's your oyster.

[12:10] You can buy, you know, four or five things. And I know you have done, you've been in Starbucks before. Buying 3, 4 items from a person that started with maybe a phone.

[12:20] Yeah, happens all the time. You just gotta ask the question. I call it the upsell sandwich. Right? Like you hit em first, let em know everything you buy and then you hit them at the end after you close them.

[12:30] Be like, what Else you got, you know, like, yeah, you know, like, you're. I. I call it the greatest offer in the world. You know, like, we're giving people money.

[12:39] Like, how do you say no?

[12:41] You know, like, I mean, of course there are going to be people that say no, but, like, if you insistently are, you know, just keep reaching out and you're like, can I give you money?

[12:52] Can I give you money? Can I give you more money? You know, like, yeah, people eventually, you know, you just got to talk to enough people, and a lot of people take that.

[13:03] All right, so moving on to the next one is Facebook ads or social media ads.

[13:11] So, initially, guys, I was terrified of Facebook ads. I thought I was going to burn money, you know, because I didn't really know what I was doing at first. I did.

[13:22] I remember David launched a small course on Facebook ads and, you know, I got it and everything, started incorporating it. Didn't listen, obviously.

[13:34] I mean, of course, his. What he didn't, you know, he didn't fully understand all of it yet either. But at first, guys, I did burn money. I'll be real.

[13:44] My ads were too polished, too professional, too corporate.

[13:49] And ironically, I discovered the uglier the ads are and the more simple they are, the better.

[13:56] People didn't like professional. They wanted human.

[14:00] So nobody explicit. Now, now there's a. There's a second part to Facebook ads. There's, number one, generating the lead, right? Getting somebody to actually respond to your ad. And this goes for Facebook and Instagram.

[14:13] But no, nobody explicitly taught me how to follow up.

[14:17] To me, it's. It seemed obvious because, guys, when you're running Facebook ads, it's called what I like to call interruption marketing. You're interrupting somebody's newsfeed every three or so posts in Facebook.

[14:29] Same thing with Instagram, right?

[14:33] You're interrupting their news feed.

[14:37] They're not looking for you. They're not searching for you. They're. They just like, oh, wow, I can sell my phone.

[14:42] Cool. Boom.

[14:44] Click, sends message, right?

[14:46] It is your job to follow up with those people. They're not looking for you. Remember that. They're not going to remember you. Most of the like, think about it. We're in the TikTok generation.

[14:56] Three seconds, bam, off to something else,

[14:59] right? It is literally our job as the business owner to follow up with these people and most of you. So I got a quick story. So I helped somebody launch their Facebook ads last week, right?

[15:11] We have a little.

[15:13] This may or may not be available. When you're watching this, this is Something I was trying out.

[15:19] I launched somebody's Facebook ads for 150 bucks one time fee because we can do it stupid easily. Now once again, may or may not be available. It was something I was testing out.

[15:29] You can reach out and ask me. But I launched his ads, he got some leads coming in and he's like, dude, I can't close any of these leads. And I was like, he's there.

[15:39] He's like, they're all bad. And I was like. So I, you know, I popped in and I was like looking through iPhone 13 Pro, iPhone 13 Pro Max, iPhone 14,

[15:50] Samsung Galaxy S,

[15:53] or FE12, you know, it was one of those crappy phones. And I'm looking through these leads and I'm like, bro, not all of these are crappy leads. But one thing I'm noticing over and over and over again is half of them weren't even responded to.

[16:09] And I was just like, so what do I do, bro? I just start going through and messaging him without his permission.

[16:16] And you know, I, I closed a.

[16:20] Well, he was also, he was also asking too many questions. Was number one. Like he was going through.

[16:25] Right, of course he was.

[16:26] What phone is it? What's wrong with it? What carrier is it with? What's the battery health percentage? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[16:31] What's your blood type? Yep.

[16:32] Yeah, obviously the customer is like, screw you. Like, this is too many questions.

[16:39] So I went through and I saw there was an iPhone 13 that he hadn't responded to.

[16:44] They were like, I have an iPhone 13. I'm like, great,

[16:47] we've been paying $120 for the iPhone 13.

[16:53] And the person was like, and the back is also cracked. I'm like, all right, well we've been paying up $50 for the iPhone 13 with a cracked back. And the person was like, great, where do I go respond?

[17:06] Answer your leads. Yeah, so this is, this is a common theme that I see whenever people say the leads are garbage. An iPhone 13 is not a garbage lead,

[17:18] especially if you're getting it for 50 bucks,

[17:21] you know?

[17:22] Yeah.

[17:22] So,

[17:23] um,

[17:25] that's just some, that's a common theme that I see with Facebook ads. And I just had to go on a little rant there. Um, yeah, talk to your leads, follow up with your leads.

[17:33] If you don't follow up, you will burn money. A hundred percent rant.

[17:38] Valid.

[17:39] Yeah. So Facebook is interruption marketing. They're not looking for you. It's your job to follow up. And if you don't,

[17:46] then burn your money. Um huh. But yeah, Facebook ads Are not broken.

[17:52] People's follow up is now the closing rate on Facebook ads is more like 1 out of 10. Just gonna be real. It's higher than reach outs though. Reach outs is like one to three out of a hundred.

[18:02] Facebook is one out of ten. So 10% closing rate, 10 to 15% is not terrible. Right?

[18:07] Yeah, it's true.

[18:09] So and to that similar note, guys, like I cherry pick the items that I do reach outs on most of the guys in our group or women as well. Cause we do have female flippers.

[18:20] Shouts out to all the female flippers out there. But you know, a lot of guys,

[18:25] they just adopt a method where they just reach out to everybody. Right. They throw, they throw all the opportunities out there. That's not how I approach this. So my close rate is probably about two out of every five,

[18:37] which is quite high. But again, I'm cherry picking. So for those of you that hear this and you're like, man, I'm just going to go out right now and like, okay, well statistically speaking, if you're just doing it in that method, you're probably going to get the same level of success that Chris is talking about.

[18:49] Just want to be realistic with you folks out there. Yeah.

[18:53] You know, I want to, I want to lower your expectations so that we can deliver higher whenever you. So that's usually how it works.

[19:01] Under promise and over deliver, right?

[19:04] Yes.

[19:05] So the next one, guys, is Google my business or Google business profile, whatever you want to call it.

[19:11] Now.

[19:11] This was like an accidental gold mine for me.

[19:15] So Google business for me was more of a basic box to check off in the beginning. This is back when I was in Beaumont, Texas. I was just like, well, I should probably get on Yelp and Google my business and these other platforms.

[19:30] It makes sense, you know? Yeah.

[19:33] What's crazy is my phone started ringing nonstop due to that. And I quickly realized that these leads were uniquely powerful.

[19:44] Number one, they didn't need convincing. Number two, they weren't shopping around. They needed to sell quick. And number three, all they cared about was getting a better deal in Eco atm.

[19:55] So early on, I incentivized reviews by actually paying sellers an extra $5. Eventually, I streamlined this to literally taking their phone and writing a review myself.

[20:07] Teach in my program. That way I can carefully pack it with keywords, which drastically boosted my visibility whenever it came to people searching.

[20:19] One memorable lead that I remember specifically, who had been driving around town and here in Houston actually was trying to sell a Samsung phone when he found me,

[20:31] he was like, do you Buy Samsung's. He's like, thank God I've. You know, he's like, I've been driving around and I'm trying to find a repair shop or some sort of shop that buys Samsungs and all I want is iPhones.

[20:41] But, you know, he reached out to me and I made like $200 in profit on that.

[20:46] Incredible.

[20:47] All because I answered the phone number one and I wasn't rude and I bought more than an iPhone. So that goes back to. To the diversification that I always talk about.

[21:00] If you buy more than an iPhone, you will make more money.

[21:03] But just. Guys, guys, remember Google my business leads? They're ready to close.

[21:08] Just don't mess it up.

[21:13] The next one is Google Ads. Google Ads and Google my business are separate. All right? So this is important to know. They're two different things. You can set them up separately.

[21:24] My first two years with Google Ads was incredibly painful. I remember talking to Dave, my mentor, and him, you know, I told him, I was like, I'm gonna figure Google Ads out.

[21:35] And guys, it was constant account suspensions,

[21:42] complicated websites with ineffective auto quote generators, and like, I built all of that myself to too. Like, I went through four different website iterations.

[21:51] Oh, bor.

[21:52] Zero profitable deals despite burning a bunch of money.

[21:56] Honestly, it wasn't even like zero deals. It was like zero leads because I didn't know what I was doing.

[22:02] And I was trying to figure it out.

[22:04] And I actually went to a mastermind that I made $24,000 to be in.

[22:10] And it was in real estate, right?

[22:12] It was, yeah. The dude was doing real estate.

[22:15] And I asked him, I was like, do you do Google Ads for real estate? And he is like, yeah, absolutely. I was like, okay, so can you like, help me figure out what I'm doing wrong here?

[22:24] And he was like, oh, yeah, dude. You're just like. Like you're hitting all of the. The wrong headlines and you're getting suspended because you're pretending to be another business.

[22:34] And I was like, oh.

[22:39] And then.

[22:40] And so I fixed it and my account stopped getting suspended.

[22:45] So what. What happened next though was like, I got that part fixed. The next part was actually the. The website.

[22:52] So the first website I tried was super professional and all of that and whatever didn't work.

[23:01] I had a guy reach out, literally, because I had a little chatbot thing embedded on the website that people could hit me on messenger with.

[23:09] And the guy was like, can you just give me a price? Like, I don't really want to go through all these steps. And like be told the wrong price.

[23:17] And I was like, yeah, sure. And then I realized like instant in that moment I was like, this is probably what most people are thinking. They're just not messaging me about it.

[23:28] So after knowing that, I was like,

[23:31] let me go build a just like stupid simple website that literally says sell a device, plug in a few pieces of information and see what happens.

[23:42] Guys, that website now converts at like 42%. Which means,

[23:47] which means 42 out of a hundred people fill it out.

[23:51] It's good, really good.

[23:54] So yeah, simplicity, complexity confuses customers. Simplicity always converts. Like the more simple you are, the more human you look.

[24:03] That's how it is, right?

[24:05] Yeah. I think there should be something said there. That trust is huge when it comes to simplicity. Guys, you make things too complex. People think you're hiding something,

[24:15] people think you're taking advantage of them. Think about yourself in a customer experience. Do you like to be on the end of, shrouded in mystery, unclear of expectations? All that stuff is just going to tank customers customer experience and opportunities.

[24:29] Yeah, it's true.

[24:31] Yeah.

[24:32] So a couple other pieces of the buyback funnel. We've gone through four of them now.

[24:37] The next one is.

[24:40] So there's two of them actually and I kind of categorize them to the same, but they are two different places.

[24:46] **** shops is number one. Hey Matt, you recently picked up some deals from some **** shops, right?

[24:52] I did. How'd that gonna be Great.

[24:56] Were they happy to sell to you?

[24:58] They were.

[24:59] I bought what like over almost 6,

[25:04] almost 500 in product from them,

[25:07] which for me was pretty inexpensive. But for them I think they still made some profit. They didn't make a ton, but they definitely got rid of inventory and you know, reinforced their bottom line, made a little bit of profit.

[25:19] And I walked away with a lot of bit of profit. I bought a gaming tablet, like a handheld PC console called an Asus Rog Ally and It was a Z1 extreme.

[25:31] And then I bought an iMac 27 inch 5k retina display computer and didn't have, I didn't pay a ton for them. You know, maybe for some people would consider a lot of money, but I didn't pay a ton for them.

[25:43] And the tablet is already, already sold. I only listed the computer two days ago, so I think it'll sell over the weekend.

[25:51] So I want to point something out. You used like three different parts of the accelerator process there, Right. Number one, you knew how to buy more than a phone, which gave you massive leverage.

[26:03] Yeah, truly.

[26:04] You were able to Negotiate based on the offers that you could make. And then you used the lead source, which was the **** shop.

[26:13] Yep.

[26:15] So without those three pieces, you know, you probably wouldn't have been able to do that.

[26:21] This stuff happens every day inside of Accelerator too, guys. Like, yeah, Spencer has been killing **** shops lately.

[26:29] Yeah, he has Start. It's starting to get a little ridiculous at this point. It's like he also just sent into.

[26:36] Sent in like 5 or 6, I think PS4s to like a larger kind of direct buyer that I clued everybody in on. Oh yeah, for sure.

[26:47] And I think I saw something about that, but I didn't tap into it very much.

[26:50] Yeah, we were talking about a few, a few console calls ago, guys. We do a console call every Tuesday and I talk to people about the state of the market, where's ways to make money to the point of what Chris is talking about Spencer Burke, who was on the call last week.

[27:02] If you guys watched the interview. Well, was it last week or the week before? I think it was two weeks ago.

[27:06] So he sent them in?

[27:08] Yeah, yeah, he sent away the company.

[27:10] On the call, obviously, but.

[27:12] No, no, of course not.

[27:14] We got to guard a few things here. We can't give you guys all the special sauce, but yeah, I mean, I've tested them as well and I've already gotten paid direct debit and he's going to get paid this coming week and I'm excited to see what this does.

[27:26] Yeah, that's great. Oh, man, we're going to have to. We'll talk a little bit more about that after this if you guys want to stay ahead of the market. Hello, Accelerator is the way.

[27:40] Cool. So the next one that I want to talk about is actually repair shops. Yeah, guys, for those of you who aren't aware, most repair shops do not buy phones or most electronics.

[27:54] Actually, most. So I've spoken at the Gadget Repair Expo twice now. I'm going to be speaking there in about two and a half weeks again, telling these repair shops that they need to do more buybacks.

[28:05] But I don't think they're going to listen to me anyway. They never seem to do because I don't own a shop. But yet me and my students make a lot more than most of them, which is kind of funny,

[28:18] but. Well, it is what it is. Anyway, a lot of these repair shops don't buy phones and therefore. And I found that it's. It's due to. They don't have the enough capital to actually do it.

[28:33] So. And that's Fine.

[28:35] But what I found is a lot of these repair shops will actually send deals to you. Same thing with the **** shops. Like, if you leave your business card there, they will usually keep it.

[28:45] And a lot of **** shops actually don't buy phones either.

[28:48] But they will send you deals all the time if you leave your cards.

[28:52] Yep.

[28:53] Which is what I do.

[28:55] So **** shops and repair shops, guys, add them in because they are very good lead sources for sending you qualified leads.

[29:03] Because these people are looking to sell immediately and they're going to a **** shop where they know they're going to get low balled. Right.

[29:10] So then the last two that I want to talk about as part of the buyback funnel is. Well, the first one I want to talk about is repeats.

[29:20] Repeats are always part of the buyback funnel. They're always going in and out of it. Right.

[29:25] I always tell our students, like, you need to be aiming.

[29:28] Well, I want to define what a repeat customer is first. A repeat customer is somebody that has sold to you more than twice. Okay? So like they came back one time and then they came back a second time.

[29:38] And then, you know, you want to reach out to them. You want to be proactive with repeat customers because,

[29:45] you know, the more proactive you are about giving people money, the more likely they are to take it.

[29:51] You want to, you want to look like an ATM to these people. Right.

[29:58] So with repeat customers, I tell my students to aim for 500 to $1,000 in profit per repeat customer per year.

[30:06] Right. If you do that, think about this. If you got like 30 repeat customers, you know, over the course of, I don't know, six months to a year, and you're making, let's say, $500, you know, a year, which is, you know, like five devices, six devices isn't a lot.

[30:23] But if you're making 500 to $1,000 per repeat customer per year, and you got 30 of them, you know, what is that? 500 times 30?

[30:32] What is that?

[30:33] 1500?

[30:34] 15. 15,000.

[30:35] Excuse me.

[30:36] Yeah, it's like $15,000 in guaranteed income per year, right? Yeah, that's not bad. You know, so on top of that, adding on, and this is the eighth one is referrals.

[30:53] So referrals are huge. Always ask. All you gotta do is ask. It's just like upselling. It's like, you know, who else do you know that might need some money that has electronics just sitting around?

[31:04] Right. Navon is actually a great example of this. And I always like to kind of tag him in on this. A Little bit is because in the beginning he only did reach outs, but he, you know, he took the reach outs and the referrals and he basically combined them together and he would,

[31:21] he would aggressively ask for referrals. He would tell. He would pay people $5 extra to post in their family group chat to, you know, try and get more people to sell them devices.

[31:30] And it worked.

[31:32] So take that knowledge, know and use it because it is powerful. Very powerful.

[31:40] So. And that's the buyback funnel, guys. And then obviously there's a negotiation part of the buyback funnel and all that. We're not going to get into that. I wanted to talk about leads today because a lot of you guys don't.

[31:53] Because leads is the first part,

[31:55] right? If you're not. If you're not in contact with enough people per day, you're not going to make money. Like, it's just not gonna happen.

[32:02] That's true.

[32:02] Yeah.

[32:02] Let's be real.

[32:03] Like, you can be the best negotiator in the world, but if you don't have anybody to talk to, you're gonna suck.

[32:10] So,

[32:11] Matt, do you have anything to add to any of that?

[32:16] I think, I feel like that's pretty comprehensive. Like there's a lot of stuff there and I think,

[32:22] I think most people just really haven't really tried to think through this as far as what. What's the entirety of stuff in places that I could source and get leads and find inventory.

[32:35] Guys, once, once you solve that mystery, all you've got to be good at beyond that point, it's just getting stuff sold. Like once you have the product on hand, all you got to do is put it on ebay or sell it to a direct buyer.

[32:48] Boom, there's money. Right?

[32:50] Like this is actually something to go over actually.

[32:55] I love, I love how you brought this up because this is a problem we actually see in re accelerator that we are currently addressing.

[33:02] And luckily the co working sessions are helping massively with this is we. We teach people how to buy devices. Right. And how to get enough leads and everything.

[33:12] One, that one problem that we did not see coming was people holding inventory. Truly,

[33:19] I, I did. I never thought. Because I don't really have that issue,

[33:24] right. But I never thought that that would be an issue.

[33:28] So I had somebody earlier actually comment on one of my reels and was like, yeah, people being married to their inventory is killing their business.

[33:38] Truly.

[33:39] And I was like, oh, wow,

[33:41] that's so true.

[33:44] Like a lot of you guys probably listening to this. You're married to the Inventory that you have for some weird reason, you know, because you're, you're not going to profit as much as you thought.

[33:55] So you're just holding it weird,

[33:59] you know.

[34:01] Yeah. Your inventory is not going to keep the lights on. If you sell it, it will. But if it's sitting in a corner and you're playing, you know, Fisher Price, Best Buy, like, that's not you.

[34:13] You guys, you don't want to be in that situation. You're not trying to start a death pile. You want a profit pile.

[34:18] And so, yeah, you got to get that stuff listed. And so what I tell everybody is everyone loves the treasure hunting aspect of this business. People love to find deals.

[34:27] They like finding out where the deals are. Oh, look what I found, Matt. And they'll send me like a photo or they'll message Chris or they'll tag us or something and be like, whoa.

[34:34] And you're like, you'll see their haul. I'm impressed by a large sales haul. Like, show me that it's sold. Okay. Because what'd Steve Jobs say? It's not real till it ships?

[34:46] Yeah.

[34:47] Like ship it, ship it. If it's not in a box and it's sitting in the corner,

[34:52] how's that going to cover, I don't know, your kid's tuition or the mortgage or whatever it is you're trying to do. You know, you're not going to leave that 9 to 5 or whatever that a lot of people talk about or make that have that 10k month.

[35:05] If you're not equally as aggressive in your selling as you are in your sourcing. And everybody wants to get the deal.

[35:13] Well, that's only. There's two things in this business you gotta be really good at, which is assessing value and getting the product. I consider those kind of one thing. And then secondly, getting that stuff sold and out the door.

[35:25] Yeah. Which we're working on building a more robust way of actually making that happen. Because that is something that honestly I did not see coming.

[35:34] You know, we fixed the, we fixed the problem of getting the things right. But like I tell a lot of people now is like. And this is part of the, the buyback funnel too is like you have to be able to reinvest your profits to buy more stuff.

[35:47] Right. That way you make more profit.

[35:51] I, I tell people, stay in the buyer's high. You know, like as soon as you buy something, you, you get a dopamine hit. Yep. And that's a real thing. So like take the photos right then and there or draft the Invoice, right?

[36:05] Like, don't send it, but you can draft it. That way it's done.

[36:08] Right.

[36:09] Just get the part done that way. It's easy when you get home or whatever.

[36:15] Or just bring it home now, like I do, and just put it in the lightbox. If it's in the lightbox, like, it. It's going to get done for me. I don't know why that's.

[36:23] Just figure out what works in your flow. Right. Either way. I mean, the way that I used to. Used to do it and I still recommend it is like, if you don't have a lightbox, you don't need one.

[36:33] Just so you're aware, I haven't had one until three months ago.

[36:38] Starbucks has pretty good lighting. Just saying, like, not bad. Yeah, I would just as soon as I bought it, bam, listed or drafted the invoice or put it in my, like, purchased sheet that I could send to my direct buyer.

[36:54] That way it's done. Like, the hard part is done. That way it doesn't stack up.

[36:59] Yeah.

[36:59] Why do you guys just let things stack? I remember specifically it was Sean.

[37:05] Was it Sean? I can't remember.

[37:07] Somebody sent a picture of their living room one time, and they're like, I probably need to sell some things. And it was just stuff everywhere. And I was just like, bro, what is going on here?

[37:20] Yeah,

[37:22] yeah, valid.

[37:24] Valid. I think to that same point. And Chris and I are kind of really harping on this because we've seen this. Not for, like, the. This isn't like, oh, we've noticed this trend in the last 30 days.

[37:35] It's been like, since we started this with students.

[37:39] And I think that people just. You just gotta get your stuff sold, man. Like, you've gotta. You've gotta get it listed. And if you don't, like,

[37:51] maybe lower your expectations. I hate to say that. I hate saying that. I really hate saying that. But, like, that's. It's one way or the other. Like, you're not gonna sell.

[38:00] You're not gonna have 10 and 15k months if you're not selling stuff very aggressively. And you guys would be shocked at the guys that are doing, you know, 8, 10k months and how aggressive they are with moving product on a daily basis.

[38:13] Like, think about it. If you do $10,000,

[38:15] you've probably got about $500 in sales coming in and out just about every day. Like,

[38:21] that's a considerable amount of product that's going out the door, right? Like, so let me. Let me say that having said all of What Chris and I have just said.

[38:29] Let me also say this.

[38:31] Knowing your numbers is really going to paint a very clear picture for you guys of what it's going to look like to actually reach that real time goal. Like a real time goal, right?

[38:42] Not like NFL dreams. I'm talking about like realistic, daily. Like you're doing this, like you're, like you're doing this thing. Like, like you're punching a clock. You're doing this thing.

[38:52] And that's why you gotta know your numbers. And that's why I think also it's helpful to have a system that can help you prioritize and organize those numbers. That's what a KPI does.

[39:02] That's what a key performance indicator chart that Chris created does. It helps you put those things in order. And now how you arrange your stuff in your room is still up to you guys.

[39:11] After you take your flex photo though, get it listed on ebay so that,

[39:16] yeah, you can get it sold, make.

[39:18] Some money, get it listed, guys. I mean, I see a lot of you guys, like, you just, you buy stuff and you're like, I don't have any money and, but. Cause all your money is in your inventory and then you try and sell all of it and you're like, ah,

[39:30] ebay is holding my money again for three days. It's like, bro, if you would have just like done it as you bought it, like,

[39:38] it would have just been a little bit more consistent. Right. So.

[39:42] Or you know, with the direct buyers and all that. So stay in the buyer's high. Sell stuff fast. Unless there's like laws or something that say you have to keep it for two weeks, you know, like it goes by state.

[39:54] Right. So figure that out. But like, if you're just like a side hustler or you're under $10,000 in sales a month, typically it doesn't matter.

[40:05] You don't really need to. I don't think you need to. I mean, check your stuff, but you can run it in chat GPT and see what you need to be legit in this business in your state.

[40:16] But overall,

[40:18] sell your stuff faster. Stop, like just sitting on it.

[40:23] That's where we see a lot of people fail is like they just run out of money because they bought a bunch of stuff and they didn't sell it. So. And that is part of the buyback funnel is like you need to,

[40:33] you know, need to sell the stuff you buy.

[40:36] Yeah. So Chris, let me present a situation or scenario to you. Let's say we got two different resellers. Right. And they come to the table learning this newfound knowledge. One of them's got $1200, one of them's got $300.

[40:48] They both go out and they're. They're. They're itching, you know, just got to scratch that itch and get some product because they want to flip and make that money. Like,

[40:56] what do you think? How would you advise the person with.

[41:02] With each of those increments of income, how would you advise them to proceed into their business so as to learn the skill of selling? Well, would you say, hey, should I go out and, like, spend all my money first weekend?

[41:13] Or how should they play it? What would you tell them to do?

[41:19] Well, it depends on if they have an ebay account or not. We're just going to assume that they do, right?

[41:23] Sure. Assuming they do. Yes.

[41:25] The person with the $300, I'd actually recommend flipping, like, iPhone 11 through 14 first. And I would ship that to direct buyers. Like,

[41:35] it's like a guaranteed payout fast, right. Within two to three days.

[41:40] If they have, like twelve hundred dollars, I would say, you know, same thing. IPhone 11 through 13.

[41:47] But also add some game consoles in there.

[41:50] Right.

[41:50] Maybe the Xbox Series S or the Xbox One S, which has been selling very well.

[41:58] Oculus,

[42:01] you know, those have been selling well.

[42:04] But I would. I would hit the ones that are selling consistently. Right. Especially with the gaming consoles, because you can easily double your money.

[42:12] Easy.

[42:13] Easily.

[42:14] Easy. Yeah.

[42:15] But with the phones on the front end, I would say I would also do this, like, for both of them. I would also type in, like, Facebook Marketplace. Lot of phones or lot iPhones.

[42:27] All right, lot, lot. Okay. Because there are people that just have a bunch of stuff and they're selling it for cheap. And you can get, like, sometimes like, 20 phones.

[42:38] Yeah.

[42:38] Or like, 200 bucks.

[42:41] Yeah.

[42:41] Like, and sometimes you can. Sometimes they're icloud unlocked, and, like, you can make more money. And like, I. There's been many deals where I've found that are like that. Yeah, they're everywhere, too.

[42:51] Yeah.

[42:52] Same thing with cameras. There's a lot. A lot of that, too.

[42:56] Cameras are very high profit, usually low investment type of deals. So if you have an ebay account, that might be worth it to look into.

[43:04] Yeah, I like it.

[43:06] Um,

[43:07] so guys, like, those first few dollars, that's just kind of like a little, like, that's a microcosm of what it would look like if we were just saying, hey, your next two weeks, your next 30 days, here's what you should do.

[43:19] Um, I would also advise, like if you have a, if you say like, oh, I've got a bunch of money, the worst thing you might could do is just go out there and buy a bunch of stuff and then just be stuck with it.

[43:28] I think it's important we choose to try to tell people like slow roll your business at first because you got to learn the skill of assessing product negotiating,

[43:38] closing the deal,

[43:40] staging your product so that it does sell well, actually selling it and then shipping it out. Like there are stages to this that it's not just as simple as like I found a bunch of, you know, great deals and now I'm going to make money.

[43:52] But you've got to make the money, that's the thing.

[43:56] And you know, some people are able to do that faster than others. But regardless, guys, the thing we want you to bank on is the skillset that you can acquire from this and hope you found some nice nuggets in what Chris was sharing there.

[44:10] Yep, awesome guys. Well,

[44:13] you know, stop leaving your business a chance. Build a buyback funnel today. You know,

[44:18] start building all of that stuff out. If you need help, feel free to reach out to us because this is what we do. We're creating new resellers because we're buying from our students.

[44:27] So me and Aaron are always buying phones and things like that from our students.

[44:34] And then also apparently we have a direct buyer now for consoles. So that's fantastic.

[44:40] That's going to be a community only thing.

[44:44] But with that being said, guys, it's been another episode of the Smart Flip. Thanks for having you guys or coming on and looking forward to helping you guys crush it.

[44:52] If you decide you want to work with us,

[44:55] feel free to check out all of the resources below the ebook and all that good stuff. We got some good stuff coming up,

[45:02] so be on the lookout for my emails and stuff. Feel free to join my email thing below.

[45:08] That being said, guys, you guys have a fantastic day. See you guys next Friday.

[45:13] See you guys.