Welcome back to another episode of the Reseller's
Mindset Podcast. My name is Mike, also known
as the Used Book Guy on YouTube, along with my
friend and fellow full -time reseller, Johnny
B. We help people start and grow their reselling
businesses from the ground up. We also have a
weekly Zoom call and private Discord for all
YouTube members. Head on over to youtube .com
backslash usebookguy to join the channel and
gain access to the full -length podcast, Zoom
call, and private Discord today. Let's get into
this week's episode. What is up, everybody? Welcome
into another episode of Reseller's Mindset Podcast.
Mike next to Johnny. We both joked about this
could be the quickest podcast episode ever, but
I do think this is an important topic. And I
apply this to business and my personal life.
And that's who gets a vote in your business,
right? So when I say who gets a vote, who gets
to make decisions for what you do in your business?
And I think being somebody that... puts educational
content out there and try to try to help people
um make changes in their business or offer insights
and things like that i will go on record here
and say i still should not get a vote in your
business not johnny's business not the person
listens to this business because at the end of
the day it's your business it falls on your back
now There are some caveats to this, right? Because
if you do follow Mike's rules and you go bankrupt,
you can blame Mike and not yourself, right? So
that is like, I guess, the one upside to this.
But I think about this. I've been doing this
now for way too long, many, many, many years
ago. And if I would have listened to all the...
bozos along the way and all the different like
ways to do things. And everybody's got a different
idea on how to run this or do this in your business
or hell, how many times I've been approached.
People tell me, thankfully, they've given up.
But I used to get at least once a week, Mike,
why are you still selling books? Why don't you
go sell? Why don't you go do wholesale? Why don't
you do online arbitrage? Like that used to be
at least once a week, somebody in my ear about
it. Thankfully, that's gone because they realize,
Mike, only gets a vote in his business. And I
challenge everybody here to, you make the decisions
in your business. Now, I'm not saying don't listen
or don't take advice from people that actually
know what they're doing. But that also comes
with the caveat is, how can you decide if somebody
knows what they're doing in their business? How
can you actually weed through the crap and see
what people are actually doing in their business
and the results they present? Because me and
Johnny talked about this. When we do things and
we present different ideas to level up your business
or maybe try something, we present factual base
evidence, right? I think that the misconception
here is everybody's got an opinion. And since
this whole Amazon buy box thing has happened,
I've never seen so many asinine, idiotic opinions
out there in the history. Sure, some of them
are funny, why they're doing it, why they're
not doing it. Here's what you should do. Here's
what you shouldn't do. But when I present something
to the table, it's based on facts. I don't tell
people to do X, Y, Z just because I think, right?
I think a lot of 95 % of people, they think they
know what's going on, but they really don't know
what's going on. So I'm telling you 95 % of the
information you're getting is opinion -based
and not in the realm of facts. I think that's
kind of the misconception here. I'm going to
shut up, Johnny, because you're not even going
to be able to talk and this episode is going
to end. Everyone's free to run their business
how they see fit. Done. That's it. But no, on
a serious context, yes, that statement is very
much true. We say it a lot on the server, especially
me, especially when I want people to shut the
fuck up. But any advice I give, any advice Mike
gives, any advice Max or Fida or somebody else
who's performing on the server, is active on
the server, You can just absorb that information.
You could try it out if you're unsure about it.
And if it works, it works. Great. Proven. And
that's the best way to do it. Advice until proven,
like you doing it, is just advice. It doesn't
mean it's going to work. It may work for the
person that said it, but it may not work for
you based off a multitude of variables that may
or may not be outside of your control. Like maybe
somebody has access, backroom access, and you
don't. So their methodology is going to work
and it's not going to work for you given that
specific variable for whatever reason. Now, if
you get backroom access and your source isn't
as good as theirs, same kind of thing. Your source
isn't good. It's a bad source. Doesn't mean backroom
access doesn't work. And we can apply that to
any kind of stratagem or strategy that somebody
comes up with. It may or may not work based off
certain variables. And then we got naysayers.
I tried that 10 years ago. That didn't work.
Hey, buddy, it's working for me right now. I
mean, I get it. Didn't work for you 10 years
ago. But have you tried this, that, and the other?
They don't want to hear this, that, and the other
because they tried it. They failed. They don't
want to try again. And I'm not saying trying
something over and over again, expecting a different
result because that is insanity. But if it's
not the same thing, it is an insanity. If they've
applied a couple of things that made it work.
Maybe you should try it to see if it works for
you. Now, when it comes to making your decisions,
you just take in every single bit of information.
I would say try your top one to three. Don't
do all of them at once because you won't really
know what's really working and what's not because
you're doing everything. Try them slowly and
keep the ones that work and drop the ones that
don't. Go ask questions of, hey, I tried this.
Billy Bob over here said it would work. It's
not working for me. Why? Ask the right question.
Why isn't this working for me? And then you'll
get a couple of different answers, and then maybe
one of those lines up. You try it again. Oh,
now it's working. Look at that. La -di -da -di
-da. It's like the buy box. You poke at it, so
you get it, right? It's the same kind of thing.
It really is. I think one thing people have to
be aware of is just because somebody has more
sales than you does not mean they are more credible
than you are. If anything, I've noticed over
the years, a lot of the small small time part
timers are a lot more credible than some of these
people that post these orange bars and Amazon
land. And so don't think just because somebody
is a six figure seller or a seven figure seller
that they got it all figured out and you can
just. Take what they say as the lay of the land,
and there's no other way to do it because, look,
they're doing seven figures or, look, they're
doing six figures. That don't mean absolutely
not a damn thing in Amazon land. Until you see
people's bottom line statements of how much is
actually going into their bank account in Amazon,
them bars mean nothing. I've taken things, right?
Like we've taken things from each other. I've
taken things from people in their group. I've
tried them. I've implemented a ton of them. I
made a lot of money off other people's ideas.
But at the end of the day, I made that decision
to try something and see if it would work for
me. Now, I told you there were some that worked.
Well, there's also probably the same amount that
didn't work. And now I've been doing this so
long that. It's hard. It's hard to get Mike to
try something different in his reselling business.
All right. Because like I said, it can't be Johnny
calling me at 2 a .m. in the middle of the night
on his Barbie phone. And I pick up on my iPhone
and he's like, hey, I got an idea. And I'm like,
Johnny, I'm sleeping. Leave me the hell alone.
And he's like, well, I think this can work. And
I said, well. Thinking ain't paying the bills,
buddy. Like, do you have any proof? Have you
tried this? Right. And I will say this. A lot
of things Johnny has brought to my attention.
He's tried himself. It's not just shit he makes
up. So when we do bounce these ideas off, but
I think that's like a rare case. I think we both
understand, like, if we're going to present an
idea to one another, there has to be like some
type of experiment that's been like ran. Right.
So like you can say, well, I've tried it and
here are my results. It's not like. hey, let's
try this together because neither of us want
to try this crazy shit out there. And there's
plenty of it out there currently, especially
with the Amazon land. And I think that's a big
part of it is we're not telling you not to take
advice from others. I'm just telling you at the
end of the day, it's your business. You get to
vote on how you decide to run it. I unfortunately
can't control whether you succeed or fail in
business. i can just tell you what works for
me and that's all the channel was ever set out
to be just a proof of concept that this thing
can be done by somebody basically from the ground
up it's not like hey you have to do it this way
if you don't do it mike's way you are losing
money that is 100 false there's more than half
of my paid members that pay to be in my group
do not do things the mike way and they're doing
a -okay all right so don't think what i do is
like Well, he's doing it. I got to do it. No,
no, no. If I'm doing it, I'm just proving that
I can do it in my my situation. Right. Everybody
lives in different locations, different sources,
different access to different things. I just
kind of show what actually works, provide the
proof on why it works. Then you can decide if
it's something you want to go down the road.
And, you know, there's some things that you might
be comfortable doing or some things you might
not be comfortable doing. There's nothing wrong
with that. But don't just. Say, well, this person's
doing it this way. I got to do it this way or
I'm going bankrupt. That's not the furthest thing
from the truth. What's up, Amazon tellers? We
wanted to take a second to talk about GoToLister,
the software me and Johnny both use to list and
manage our inventory and grow our businesses.
With the fastest listing speeds out there and
building profit analytics, it's a no -brainer.
easily and quickly have items available for sale
using 2D barcodes and get more for your items
with its built -in smart pricing. Make sure to
check out the 30 -day free trial at gotolister
.com backslash Mike or using the link in the
description below. We talk a lot about networking
on the podcast, or at least we have the last
year and a half or so. And that's very much true
from which information you're going to try and
implement in your own business. there's a little
bit of trust factor built in. Like if you join
a group, you usually take the group leader's
advice and maybe it's 85 % successful. 85 % of
what they're saying works for you, but 15 % doesn't.
To that point, no one is infallible. And also
it leads to what I was saying at the very beginning
of variables. There's variables that they're
doing that aren't applying to you or applicable
to you that are causing that 15 % failure in
that. smaller percentage range now also in the
community whether it's a facebook group a discord
group some kind of weird forum um i don't know
on a zoom call you're trying some information
somebody else is giving a lot of it's working
so you cater to listening to what they have to
say a little bit more often than not they aren't
a stranger danger anymore they're okay a lot
of what they're doing is adding up i've applied
to my business it's working so i'm going to listen
to them a bit more concretely than i am i don't
know sally sue over here who's brand new who's
talking her head off knowing that they think
they're i don't know billy badass or hot shit
yeah it's it's it's tough because every zone's
lonely usually just you maybe your significant
other And you look for outlets to be around like
minded people. Like Johnny said, everywhere you
turn anymore, there's another group. There's
another reselling podcast out there. And, you
know, a lot of it is opinion based. Even this
is opinion based. Right. We're just telling you
how we run our business that none of you are
getting a vote. Sorry. You can try. Maybe you
can try to convince me in the comments section,
but I highly doubt it's going to happen. It's
my vote. And it's Deb's vote. Once you're married,
you'll quickly realize you're not the only one.
You have a 50 -50 partnership. So just take that
into consideration as well. And Deb's not super
involved in my business, but she saved my ass
plenty of times just by running big decisions
by her. Because by her not being knee -deep in
the business, it also gives her a different perspective
of it. She's not like... Yeah, go buy the 10
,000 CDs and DVDs. She's like, well, well, Michael,
here are the things that you should not do. This
is why you should not buy this. And, you know,
she does get a vote. And I think everybody that
does have a significant other quickly realizes
that they get a vote. But it's the same thing
in our personal life, right? Like what me and
what me and Deb decided to do. We're the only
two people that get a vote. I mean, that's just
the reality of it. And you should treat your
business the same way. And you can take bits
and pieces. And the whole purpose of this is
just I've seen so much BS out there lately. And
that's why I chose this topic, because it's a
lot of BS, a lot of opinions. And it's hard to
weed out the opinions, especially when it comes
from some people that are like higher up, like
even like myself. Right. I tell you. Change this
in your business and get these results. Do this
in your business and get these results. Just
take it all at your own expense. And don't, if
you are going to take advice from somebody, right?
Johnny comes to me and he says, hey, I'm going
to start doing something with books. I don't
know. He's going to start doing book lots, right?
He's like, I've been crushing book lots. I've
been killing book lots. I'm like, all right,
dude, like maybe this is something I want to
try. I'm going to go into this and like. I'm
going to start with five book lots, Johnny. I
think another thing is in the reselling space,
people are like all or nothing. Like if I'm going
to do book lots, Johnny, from day one, I want
to have 20 ,000 book lots. I'm like, no, like
a small test batch. Then we can graduate it to
a bigger size sample. Right. Once things start
selling, once you start getting results, I think
a lot of problems with reselling is. So it's
exciting to jump all in when you hear a new idea
that somebody else is getting results on. But
you have to try it out for yourself first, right?
Because what he does with his lots are going
to be completely different than what I would
do with my lot. So I'm not going to jump in and
just go lot up every single. author that i have
right i just had a library pick up the other
day i'm not separating by authors and you know
just going crazy with it right off the beginning
that is how you sink the ship before it even
leaves port right but i think that's a balancing
act with this is when you do find something that
you want to try you just it's like in in middle
school when you do science experiments right
you got to do so many you got to repeat the experiment
the experiment's got to be repeatable for it
to ever become like This is how this reacts to
this. Well, you got to do it a thousand times.
Well, it's the same way in business. Sometimes
you get lucky. Maybe Johnny goes and lists his
lot. Maybe he lists one Nora Roberts lot. And
he typed in an extra zero and it sold for a thousand
dollars. And Johnny runs and says, oh, my. God,
he makes a YouTube video. You need to sell Nora
Roberts lots. I sold a five lot of Nora Roberts
for a thousand dollars. Right. And people are
like, no way. Right. Like people actually will
just run on that train and think they can replicate
it when probably it was a misclick, probably
got refunded. Right. Like there's so many layers
to this that we just choose to neglect because
resellers. We don't care. We love going bankrupt.
We just want to do whatever the hell we possibly
can and have as much fun and forget the bottom
line. There's an old proverb, and it's a good
one, and I think it applies to everything in
reselling. Trust, but verify. You got to verify
it yourself. You'll trust the individual or where
the information came from until you can verify
otherwise. Assume it to be true until you can
prove it false. Once it's proven false, move
on. and or ask questions that led up to a false
result. How come it was true for them but false
for me? So trust and verify, folks. You can't
take everything wholesale. And again, I mentioned
this before, if you're having 85 % success rate,
that's great. um from the information you're
taking in but find out why that 15 isn't working
for you verify why that isn't working again multitude
of variable reasons it could not be working for
you um and i'm going to go back to this significant
other thing it's your business but the income
is both of yours or however many is in the household
um so their opinion very much matters and Depending
on the dichotomy you've set the relationship
in, either they're a 50 -50 partner and all business
decisions have to be run through them, or they're
just giving a springboard opinion that you then
decide the final way to go. I would have that
conversation early on, because if you don't,
and you just do whatever the hell you want and
buy that 10 ,000 CD lot thing, they may have
some serious repercussion questions you're sleeping
on the couch for the foreseeable future circumstances
that roll your way. So be prepared for that.
It is your business and you're free to write
how you see fit, but check in with the other,
make sure. I think we need to get t -shirts made
that say that. I remember when you first started
saying it and I was just like, I was just like
making a meme of it. Like everybody can run their
business as they see fit. But dude, I think that
term has like, it's just been escalated to a
whole new level. Because it is that it is the
God's honest truth. Everybody can run their business
as they see fit. I've said that I feel like 1000
times in the past two months, because I've heard
so many crazy things. And all I can say is, here's
what's working for me. Here's the proof that
I have why it's working for me. But everybody
can run their business as they see fit. Like
it's so I just, you know, I'm excited for people
to try things. I'm excited for people to make
more money. You got to take risk in business.
I'm not sitting here telling you to just play
it safe and never do anything and never try anything.
You got to take risk in life and in business
to get it to the next level. Nothing good ever
came from somebody who just 100 % played it safe
and just went about their way. There's going
to be points in your business where you're going
to have to spend a lot of money or do something
that's absolutely crazy. And we've both been
there and we've had both sides of the coin where
we spent a lot of money and it was absolutely
shitty. And then we did something crazy and it
was absolutely wasted a half of our lifetime
trying to figure our way out of it. That is just
business, right? You always have to be looking
for that next opportunity. But changing, you
know, when we talk about like who gets a vote,
changing your actual business model and practices
because X, Y, Z said it's working for them. Sure.
But this thing needs to be validated. Try it
on your end. You know, it needs to be you got
to get smacked in the face with the proof that
this actually is going to work for you. Then
I'll be OK with it. I mean, Johnny probably gets
like a quarter of a vote in my business. It's
not like a full vote, but I mean, at least he
has some sway. And I do think it is important
what you know, what you're saying earlier is
you get around people. That's why I love the
group. Right. One hundred percent. I love being
around people that are out in the weeds every
day with me. in these stinky thrift stores scanning
thousands and thousands of items a day because
their opinions matter to me because they are
out here putting in time a lot of opinions that
exist in the reselling space on the internet
are people that go to a thrift store once a month
they make fives of dollars a month and they're
the loudest opinion in a room it seems like That's
why I love having a group that's just like, hey,
we're all out here trying to grow a media business
and we're actually out here putting in the work.
Sure, there are people in the group that probably
half -ass it and are squawking in the group.
Yeah, I can't verify how many times they go out
in a month, but I will say it's definitely a
lot more people out there that are actually day
in, day out. scanning media involved in the business
than any of these other groups that I've seen
out there when it comes to just selling media.
And, you know, that's why we really don't wind
up with a lot of the crazy talk and a lot of
the negativity about this sucks and Amazon don't
work because the majority of us - We do get the,
why are they doing this talk? That hasn't gone
away. I don't think that'll ever go away. But
you're right. We weed out a lot of the - craziness
that you're mentioning there because it don't
fit in right if you come to the discord and you
start squawking like somebody's going to give
it back to you it won't be me it won't be johnny
somebody else in the group will say hey like
you don't know what the hell you're talking about
yeah pretty much and um applying it to everybody
is saying no this won't work for x y or z reason
and you try it and it does work or i think has
some validity to it it is your business If you've
done the number crunching, you've done the research,
and you started to implement it, it works. What
I don't want to see happen is if everybody's
saying no, and then you double check everything,
and you agree with them, fine. If you disagree
with them and you decide to do it, you shouldn't
feel bad for that. They're not running your business.
You are. There can be a lot of people. The whole
world could be against you, and you could be
right, but you just gave up because they said
no, and then you'll never know. Then Billy down
the street does it, and he's a bajillionaire
now. I'll give an example. When Amazon rolled
out their auto enrollment so you could sell in
Canada and Mexico, I was the first guy to opt
out. If I got paid 20 bucks for every time somebody
told me they're a billionaire from selling on
Canada and Mexico, I would be rich and retired.
I'm just like, it's not for me. I don't want
to deal with whatever headaches come with that.
They started deactivating people's other country
stores. I'm pretty sure all of my non -U .S.
stores are deactivated. Right. Which is a choice
I choose to make. And I'm kind of in the same
boat with Johnny. You know, I think a good indicator.
This might be a little crazy, but I don't care
to me. When everybody's running one direction
and I'm kind of going the other direction and
I'm getting results, that tells me I'm doing
something right. Everybody's running south and
I start heading north and I'm reaping the benefits
of doing whatever it is that I'm doing. And everybody's
still running the other way, right? I'm just
like, well, wait a minute. I'm on to something
here. And this kind of leads to like big breakthroughs
in your business, more ways you can make money.
This has happened, probably happens about once
a year. I come on to some crazy new idea. that
can make more money. And unfortunately, I put
it out there in the internet, so everybody knows
how to do it. But that's a whole different story.
But I do think when the mass amount of people
are going one way, but you're going the other,
and you're getting results like that is proof,
but it's hard to keep going, you know, into the
storm. Even though you're getting results because
everybody else around you is yelling at you saying,
no, don't go that way. There's nothing there.
The monster lives north. Why are you going north?
I'm like, wait a minute. I'm making money on
my way to meet the monster. Maybe the monster
is really not a bad guy. Maybe he just needs
a friend. Sure. And then on the reverse, if it
doesn't work, everybody told you so, that's okay
too. Having a failed result because you tried
it. and it failed, and everybody said it was
going to fail before you started, but you need
to verify. That's fine. Always verify. Make sure.
Because the masses, the mob mentality with their
pitchforks and their torches, they can be wrong
too. A whole group of them can be wrong. Or they
can be right, and then they will impale you.
Ha ha, told you so, stab. Ha ha ha. The other
thing on this is... You need to do your research
before you run off on your cockamamie idea. You
really do. Run it through Excel. Run it by a
few people you trust. Make sure they think it
will work based off your research or whatever.
Before you just start screaming, this is the
best thing since sliced bread or the wheel. A,
you don't want to embarrass yourself because
you will do it. You will embarrass yourself doing
it that way in particular. B, All this fact -checking,
your due diligence, yeah, it's homework. And
it can be boring. And it's not fun and exciting.
But it is a necessity in your business. And then
rolling back to what you said, I think was very
important. You yourself saying, I think, or somebody
else saying, I think, is not, I know. That's
a huge fundamental difference. I've known because
I've done this. I've known because I've done
that. There's something else. Oh. mentioning
back to the discord group i used to get really
annoyed by people just posting their orange bars
ha ha ha look at me but it's not really like
that that that flash like you see on instagram
or tiktok or whatever it's more of a motivator
like hey i've been with you guys since i was
making no bars my bar was white white background
and now here's where i am it's more of a motivational
thing that i take it than anything else i i used
to take it the other way like it's look at me
look at me but it's not really that way in our
discord now it's more of hey i was you six months
ago you can be rocky too you just got to put
in the work yeah i'm gonna wrap it up here you
know when we talk about who gets a vote it's
you your significant other Not me, not Johnny,
not the biggest reseller in the universe, not
the number one reseller in the universe. Good
for them. I'm happy for them. But that doesn't
mean what they do is going to work for me, work
for you. And I'm going to wrap it up with a famous
quote. A wise founder of the universe once said,
everybody can run their business as they see
fit. And that is the truth. And we will talk
to you all in next week's episode. Thanks for
listening to another episode of the Reseller's
Mindset Podcast. Today's full episode and all
previous episodes are available to all YouTube
members, along with the weekly Zoom call and
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