Episode 91 Transcript
Heather (00:01.637)
Matt Rad, welcome to the show and what a cool name you have, by the way, welcome.
Matt Raad (00:07.99)
Thank you very much, Heather. It's Norwegian. You know what it means. It means good advice, which is kind of bizarre considering where I ended up in life. So there you go.
Heather (00:16.277)
Oh, I can't wait. You guys are going to love this journey. Before I crack into some tips from you, we were just having a really great conversation without the record button on around the themes that you're noticing, because you do a lot of group coaching and coaching. And I wanted to start with that. What themes are you noticing in our world these days with how people are feeling?
Matt Raad (00:30.12)
Yep.
Matt Raad (00:36.566)
It's really, really noticeable, particularly I think from since COVID, overwhelm or anxiety, sorry, and actually burnout. So we deal a lot with, so we coach a lot of...
Heather (00:46.549)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (00:51.894)
So Heather, we don't tend to coach younger people, but they are in our community. So we teach people how to buy and sell websites. And basically what that means is that when they're a bit older, that means they're trying to transition out of a career. So most of our clients are in that position where they're a bit older. A lot of them have kids and they're typically in white collar professions. They're well paid. And we are just blown away over these last few years by how much burnout there is now.
particularly too for me as a male, like, you know, men don't notice a lot of stuff, right? But females, female high achievers, I think there's a lot more pressure on women these days, particularly if they're moms, plus also holding down senior management roles. So that's a really interesting subset of who we help as well. But it's almost gone exponential. I think something happened out there in the world with COVID, it must have unleashed.
Heather (01:33.141)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (01:48.296)
underlying subconscious anxiety or something, but the burnout thing is huge now. So one of the main things that we try to help people through our course is, it's funny, we think we're teaching them how to make money online, but really we end up helping them make life changes for the better to deal with burnout, career change and overwhelm.
Heather (02:04.245)
There you go.
Heather (02:09.461)
Yeah, so yeah, it is. It's crazy. That's why I started this show a year ago because I it's it's everywhere the hustle rebellion like everyone's like hustle hustle hustle and defining success and old old methods of designing defining and designing success for themselves. So thank you for yeah.
Matt Raad (02:14.07)
Yeah, well.
Matt Raad (02:25.014)
Yeah, that is awesome. And I think you're really onto something there. It's a really good thing. And I think, you know, if someone's listening to this, listening to podcasts like Heather's is so important. It's one of the things you need to be doing. Get that different perspective and realize, yeah, there's a lot of this going on and what are some ways you can do with it.
Heather (02:46.197)
Oh, thank you for that. Now we are going to find out about Matt and he's just mentioned some interesting things about his coaching and that he helps people buy and sell websites. If you don't even know what that means, you'll know what it means soon. But in the meantime, before we get into some of your backstory and what you do, I'd like to start with you and your business because I know that you have created quite a unique business, a lifestyle business as well for yourself. But I know you'd have moments of growth and overwhelm as well. So how do you...
Matt Raad (02:55.734)
You're welcome.
Matt Raad (03:13.396)
Yep.
Heather (03:14.645)
Let's do three tips. So what are three tips or ways that you do or deal with moments of high growth or stress in your business if you have it.
Matt Raad (03:23.126)
I think, yeah, it's a really, really good question. I need to think this one through. I'm gonna go to my go -to answer to solve everything in your life, right? You ready, Heather? And anyone listening to this? It's a really simple set of vision. Everything comes back to when you've got a life vision.
Heather (03:35.093)
I'm in. Let's do it. Let's go.
Matt Raad (03:44.47)
And it's not so much goals, but it's a vision for your life and who you want to be and how you want to be in, you know, five years, 10 years, 20 years and so forth. Because the vision becomes like a lighthouse, then it guides you. So you're going to go through challenges no matter what you decide to do. Even if you think you've got an easy job or an easy pathway, there's still challenges. If you've got a vision, it makes life so much easier when you hit overwhelm because...
tied in closely, my wife Liz teaches this side of the vision. So I'm very blokey, like Arnold Schwarzenegger was a huge influence for me. And I was telling you earlier, Tony Robbins and stuff. So I'm like, right, vision and I achieve it. Bam, do it. But we need to listen to our wives. They're always right. And they're smarter tied in with the vision. What Liz teaches on that side is also having your why. So then you understand.
why you're doing it. And again, that helps you in those times of overwhelm or burnout. I mean, it can be tricky when you suddenly get hit with a burnout situation in life, which can be quite serious, particularly once you get to my age, I'm in my 50s now, and we've helped clients through and friends and all sorts of things through, unfortunately, the big C, cancer and stuff like that, and all sorts of things, divorces, all that sort of a thing.
Heather (05:03.253)
Right.
Matt Raad (05:06.646)
Those things can really blindside people, but I still think having a vision is probably the number one thing for them to do with it. And tied in is understanding your why, why you want to be doing the things that you're doing. And that then can throw up ideas of, well, am I not doing the right thing here? Especially if you're a corporate, you're in a role you're not enjoying. I'm very lucky that I've created, I've achieved my vision and I get to live my dream. So any work I do, I absolutely love.
Heather (05:12.917)
So good.
Heather (05:18.195)
Mm -hmm.
Matt Raad (05:36.758)
So I'm aware that for someone listening to this, it's easier said than done when they hear of someone like me, I just do what you love. It's not quite that simple. It doesn't, life doesn't work out that way all the time because I'm coaching people to get to that point. So I'm very unique in that I do genuinely, you know, I would be happy to work 12, 16 hour days. It's effortless if I need to do those because I love it. It's literally not work. I get, I'm a full -time investor. It's unreal. It's effortless.
Heather (06:00.405)
You love it.
Yeah. Yeah.
Matt Raad (06:05.878)
So talking to me about overwhelm, I personally don't very often get overwhelmed these days. And I think in the past, so having a vision, if I had to break it down and say, come back to your question, top three, but you've really put me on the spot here, this is not normally a question I actually get asked. I'm just thinking, you know what my second one is? Is having someone to talk to. Good old fashion chatted out.
Heather (06:27.381)
Ha ha.
Heather (06:32.085)
Oh, I like that. Yeah.
Matt Raad (06:34.102)
Like when you're in overwhelm, so our kids, they're high achievers, they get into overwhelm and they're lucky they've got mom and dad to talk to and particularly mom. Liz is really good at helping people through overwhelm because she's been through it. So I think my number two as a male would be to say, have someone trusted that you can talk it through. That's so important.
And then my other one, I'm purely going off gut feel here and for me, and this is more my way of getting through things is I meditate on things. So I will either journal it and write it down and actually Liz does the same and we taught that to our kids and we teach that to our clients. If you are feeling overwhelmed, you get a blank bit of paper or your success diary. If you're listening to this, I'm presuming you have one, you should have. Get a good old fashioned pencil and just write it out.
Heather (07:10.261)
Okay.
Matt Raad (07:29.782)
things that worry you. Actually Liz, my wife taught me that one. You kind of, we call it a brain dump. And then you sleep on it. And then the next morning you get up real early and for me I'll meditate on it. And then I feel better afterwards or solutions come or whatever.
Heather (07:34.453)
Yep.
Heather (07:41.333)
That's good.
Heather (07:45.525)
Something good about a brain dump, I'd use that word as well because you just get it all out of your head and somehow when it's out of your head and on a piece of paper, it's not as daunting.
Matt Raad (07:49.686)
Yeah, yeah, that's right. And I think that's why it's kind of, you know, it's a next level down from being able to speak to someone trusted about it. I think that's, yeah, that would be my three things.
Heather (08:01.405)
Yeah.
Heather (08:05.397)
Great tips, thank you. And now I wanna talk more about what you're doing these days, but we wanna start before what you said, buying and selling websites and being a full -time investor. Where did you come from, Matt? Where did it all start? What did you used to do? Have you always loved what you do? There's a lot of questions, pick one.
Matt Raad (08:17.686)
Well.
Matt Raad (08:22.934)
Yeah, well, I was very lucky in that talk about following my heart and loving what I do. I did a trade when I first started out in life and got retrenched at the end of it, which was a good thing. And so my mom said to me, she grew up very poor and said, follow your heart, do what you really want to do. And she said, you've always want to go to union study, you know, like zoology or something like that. Just do it. You don't have kids, you don't have anything. So that's what I did.
went to uni and studied zoology and that's where I met Liz. So we both started out zoologists and so that was awesome, just mind blowing, but we never used zoology. We've never became zoologists because the minute we finished uni, we bought our first business and we were hooked within 24 hours. Like it was literally that addictive to us. We loved it. We realized we bought a small manufacturing business.
Heather (08:54.229)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (09:19.286)
So I'd always, I should explain, it sounds really weird that people, there's obviously more to it than that, but I grew up very poor as well. My mom was a single mom and she remarried when I was older, which is great. And dad, my stepfather is, I'm really close to him. He was a farm manager, but what's important here, and maybe if you're listening to this, I grew up very poor, single mom, nothing at all in the Western suburbs of Sydney.
And so what that meant was ever since I was a kid, I was very unusual in that I was very, very driven from a very early age to not be poor and to be rich. And I had no idea how to do it. So when we got in going back to buying a business, I realized that was the only way I could see to become rich and to become financially free. And we struggled in that.
business and lots of other businesses for many, many years. We were not rich overnight or anything like that, but it taught us everything we needed to know. Now we ended up being very successful with it, but we went on this amazing journey of being entrepreneurs. And we, but luckily Liz was on board with me as well. And I was lucky that I married the right person. She had the same sort of dream and we just were so addicted to businesses. We got that business going so well that it was systemized and we're able to buy and sell other businesses. So we just got addicted to this idea of having a
Heather (10:32.565)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (10:41.91)
portfolio of businesses. And through that, what formed those ideas for us was because we came from a very poor background, we knew no millionaires and we grew up on farms and we only knew farmers. And so when I moved into the city, I made it a point of getting to know millionaires and millionaire business people. And through doing that, that formed our idea. The people we happened to meet were people that bought and sold businesses, you know, like they're, you know, they're really successful at it.
And so, yeah, we had a ball. And we also did it professionally in M &A, like as business brokers. And that even more opened up our network or our world to these high net worths who are buying and selling multiple businesses, are doing roll ups and stuff. And just mind blowing. It was the best way, it was the quickest way you could learn to become an entrepreneur ever. Pretty unique when you think about it. Not many people get to hang out with guys like that. The people that you'd see in the Fin Review and stuff.
Heather (11:17.235)
Yep.
Heather (11:39.157)
No, no, you wouldn't even think about that nor alone. Probably you'd think, well, who am I to do that? So I'm actually curious. How did you guys seek out and meet millionaires? How'd you do that?
Matt Raad (11:41.558)
Um, no.
Matt Raad (11:46.966)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (11:50.678)
I, um, with a vision, very, very set goals. I learned from reading books, like even with Arnold Schwarzenegger and stuff, you know, he said, you look at one of Arnie's success strategies, when whatever area he wanted to go into life, he just started hanging out with people. So when he wanted to be the top bodybuilder, he didn't hang out with your average bodybuilder. He went and hung out with the top ones. When he wanted to go into the movies, who would he invite to all these parties, all the top producers, actors, he started hanging out with them.
Heather (11:55.281)
Yeah.
Okay.
Heather (12:10.741)
Mm.
Matt Raad (12:18.646)
did the same when he went into politics. You know, we worked for free for George Bush and married into the Kennedys, which is, yeah, that's pretty, that talk about networking. So we did exactly the same thing. We just set a really clear into, well, particularly myself, set a very, very clear intention. And every opportunity I had, I went to networking things and just made sure. And that's one of the reasons why I became a business broker, because I realized it would open doors to get me in front of, so.
Heather (12:36.243)
Okay.
Okay.
Heather (12:44.189)
Right.
Matt Raad (12:45.558)
We were buying and selling businesses for high net worths in Sydney and for private equity firms. So I was like a kid in a candy shop. It was my dream come true. I was just talking to the most amazing entrepreneurs you would never ever get access to, very private individuals. Some of them were in the Fin Review and stuff, but most of them very private from the eastern suburbs of Sydney. And I'd buy manufacturing businesses for them. So that was our specialty. Up to 20 mil.
Heather (12:50.613)
Okay.
Yeah.
Heather (13:11.285)
Were you, were you in your 20s or 30s when this was happening? Just to give me a rough idea. 30s. Yeah.
Matt Raad (13:15.222)
No, I was late. That was in my 30s. So in my 20s, we bought out, we were buying and selling our own businesses. And then we kept doing that into our 30s. And then I was doing the, so we were kind of late starters in business success. It took us a long time. It took, I don't know, two decades nearly to really hit it big. What turned around for us, you know, Heather, was when we learn all this stuff. We went on this journey of learning.
Heather (13:22.517)
Okay, wow. Wow.
Matt Raad (13:44.15)
And we were buying and selling manufacturing businesses and wholesaling ports. And they're really hard cash flow wise. If you're listening to this, I do not recommend them if you're a beginner at all, because you just heard it took us 10 to 20 years. And actually, by the way, all my clients were exactly the same. Most bricks and mortar business like that take at least 10 to 15 years to really start making good money. What turned around for us was when we started applying, our kids came along and we wanted to work from home a lot more.
Heather (13:52.117)
Ha ha!
Heather (14:04.725)
Mm.
Heather (14:12.149)
Okay.
Matt Raad (14:12.214)
And so Liz said, well, she discovered this thing called the internet in early 2000s, which is like, you're one of the forerunners in that space. To us, it was all new, but we, what we suddenly realized was go Liz, we could just do exactly what we were doing with bricks and mortar businesses, but now we could do it online or we had to learn the technical stuff. That was it. And that was our biggest challenge. So to this day, that's why we're still passionate about teaching.
Heather (14:33.045)
Ha ha. Yeah, yep.
Matt Raad (14:41.046)
people like us back then, total beginners, how to get online. That's our thing, the technical side. And we're really good at that. We love that. And we were hugely successful with that very, very quickly. So we just started buying and selling websites instead of bricks and mortar businesses. And we could buy multiple sites, roll them up exactly like our mentors were doing. And it was so easy. It was far out. It was heaps easier than bricks and mortar businesses. So.
Heather (15:07.509)
And is that what you guys focus on now then is the buying of selling websites and you teach other people to do the same, is that right? Okay.
Matt Raad (15:12.822)
Yep. Yep. So that that's our core kind of success strategy by we also do teach people how to build sites as well and do SEO for local businesses and things because that's hugely powerful. So we've kind of expanded a bit over the years into some other strategies, but our core is still buying and selling websites. And that's what we're known for. We like just today, I ran a training class with one of the world's top website brokers.
Heather (15:31.251)
Okay.
Matt Raad (15:41.334)
you know, showing everyone these amazing websites, you know, sites that you can buy for even under $50 ,000. So, you know, in our background, Bricks and mortar world, if you're listening to this and you're in business, you'll know you're not going to get change out of six to seven figures. Whereas with websites, you can be profitable quite quickly and relatively easy once you've learned a few things with simple sites that you buy for under $50 ,000. So that's amazing.
Absolutely amazing. I have not seen that anywhere else. You can't do it with real estate. You can't do it with bricks and mortar businesses. It's pretty cool.
Heather (16:18.037)
So now we wanna know a little bit more about how this all works. So think about maybe, yeah, cause I definitely understand it. Right? I know, I know. We could do a whole educational seminar series or webinar series as you say. But I definitely know the gist of how this works, but I'd like to go back to anyone listening that really doesn't get it. And maybe let's talk about some case studies. Like I'm happy if you did choose one, two or three and walk us through the before and after.
Matt Raad (16:22.806)
We'll have to do another interview.
Heather (16:47.605)
What type of person was this person? What did you do for them? What happened as a result of working with you?
Matt Raad (16:52.726)
Yep. So really, I've got two really good examples that I think will help explain also basically what we do. So we teach people how to buy and sell websites. Now, most people instantly think e -commerce, which is physical products. This is why I just explained my background story. If you're listening to this, we do none of that. We do not, since our days of buying, selling bricks and mortar manufacturing businesses, we want nothing to do with physical inventory.
Heather (17:00.501)
Great.
Matt Raad (17:21.622)
Because as an entrepreneur, as you just heard, it holds you up. All your net worth is tied up in warehouses, you know, with widgets on shelves. And you do not want that and you don't need to. So what we teach is basically what's called information sites and they make money off advertising or affiliate offers. They're incredibly effective, very, very simple. So if we get eyeballs onto the websites,
Heather (17:27.155)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (17:47.062)
There's ads there, people click on them and see them. It's like an online billboard basically. So we're just renting space to advertisers. It's pretty much it. You're just selling electrons. You're like a little mini media company, I suppose. So to give you a really good example of what I mean by that, right now, Nathan and Alexa, a lovely young couple that, well, they're not so young now. They've been with us for quite a few years, but they were in Sydney trying to make money. You know, they went to all the...
real estate seminars, doing the real estate thing, saw us. And they'd maxed out with the bank, borrowing properties. So they started buying up small, simple sites under $5 ,000. And they renovate them just like says what we teach. We buy, renovate, and hold for the cash flow. So they own a portfolio. So this is what we teach. And to give you an example of a really good buy that they did recently, now they're not.
Heather (18:26.855)
Okay.
Matt Raad (18:40.884)
into gardening or anything, they're laptop lifestyles, currently they're living in, I think they're in Vietnam at the moment. And what they do, they live for three months until their visa runs out and they move to the next country. They bought a gardening site here in Australia that they noticed had been neglected. It hadn't been updated, they saw it online and they just contacted the guy and he's a lovely guy. It was a passion site. So this is one of our key strategies. We...
generally by what's called passion sites where people are passionate about it. So that way we know they're genuine and they're real and they've been set up in the right ways. And they said to him, no, you haven't done anything. We're really interested in that niche. Would you be open to selling? And cut a long story short, he said, yep. Makes no money, just sat there. And he said, give me 400 bucks and it's yours. They bought it for $400. It's about native Australian gardens.
Heather (19:31.093)
Really?
Matt Raad (19:36.534)
It's just an info site. And they've just applied our methodology to it. They've put lots of new content on it. And they're not gardeners. So they outsource that to writers that they find off sites like Upwork or Fiverr. And that site now makes four grand a month. And just stop ads.
Heather (19:38.645)
Yeah.
Heather (19:56.917)
So, okay, wait, so when you say that, wow. So when you say renovate, do you mean that that's when you come in and you add content to it? Is that part of the renovation plan?
Matt Raad (20:06.966)
Yep. And yes, and give it a makeover. So we make it work better. He'd just put slapped down, you know, articles about his favourite native planning. So we just went through and we rebuild the homepage and then we put in appropriate content to match the audience and then build it up. And I know I might, if you listen to this, I know I make that sound really easy. There's work in that. That takes time. It's not an overnight thing. Please don't think this is a get rich quick thing. This takes time. So this is why you have a portfolio.
Heather (20:10.837)
Okay. Yeah.
Heather (20:18.965)
Okay.
Matt Raad (20:36.982)
So these guys have got a site on, Nathan's an ex -electrician, right? They've got a site on Crochet and he knows nothing about it. Same thing, they bought that site for $4 ,000. That makes, we did an interview, I think that's making 8 ,000 a month now, that particular site. So this is a multi -year strategy though. It's not like website flipping where you fix it up and you flip it straight away. This is a longer term strategy.
Heather (20:44.073)
Well.
Heather (21:03.253)
Okay. Okay.
Matt Raad (21:04.854)
In my opinion, it's more powerful because we're compounding the returns. But it's pretty cool. It's well, it's way better. And you know what? The cool thing is Nathan and Alexa write as pseudonyms on because they use outsourced writers. And now they're getting requests from big gardening shows and stuff here in Australia. Can you send your writer, you know, John Smith or whatever?
Heather (21:25.589)
You're kidding.
Matt Raad (21:30.294)
to come and speak or to, you know, can we get him to present? And Nathan has to contact him and say, John's overseas at the moment, but I'm happy to do it. And, and he's not even an expert on, on gardening. It's hilarious. So it's really cool. Um, that that's the sort of thing. And, and, well, and the other example for your listeners, it very similar one. And I think it's really relevant to your podcast, Heather. We had a, a client.
Heather (21:38.345)
Oh my.
Heather (21:42.741)
He's not even an expert, yeah.
Heather (21:52.167)
Yeah, yeah.
Matt Raad (22:00.446)
She's a real guy, get his lease and I've coached her for many years. She's awesome. She's, she's, you know, stayed home, mom wanted something different to do. So did our course and she didn't have to work or anything like that. So she did it because, you know, kids are older and she's looking for something else. And she was very successful with it, but, and she's one of our main stories that people love to hear because,
The main story is she started fixing up these sites. She bought a very simple site for $2 ,000. Now this is an outlying example and it sounds unreal, but this is for real. It's a very simple exercise site, very typical of this kind of sites that we get our beginner students to buy and fix up. And this is just one of those ones that went nuts. And I kept saying to her once on a coaching call, I've got a feeling that's a really good site. You should actually work on it. So she'd worked on another site.
Heather (22:41.493)
Okay.
Matt Raad (22:58.55)
similar price, 2000 bucks, got it to making a thousand dollars a month. That's net profit. So making 12 grand a year, right? That's pretty cool. And I said, work on this site. And it started to work and it went to a thousand dollars a month. And then it went to $5 ,000 a month. You can see the interview on our website. And publicly, we haven't told the full story because she got that site, she had months where before Christmas, because it was selling a product that sells really well.
Heather (23:05.877)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (23:28.054)
before Christmas, it's an affiliate site. All it does is recommend people buy sorts of exercise equipment. And then she gets a commission for that. And so she had months where it was making $25 ,000 a month. And at one of our workshops, one of the world's leading website brokers said to her, Lisa, if you let me sell that thing, I'll sell it for you next week for a million dollars. And that's for real. Like that's a real valuation. And it was a site that cost two grand now.
Heather (23:35.221)
Yep. Yep.
Heather (23:50.325)
No way.
Matt Raad (23:57.814)
Sounds extraordinary. You got to realize throughout that journey, talking of overwhelm, Lisa was ready to give up multiple times because it was very frustrating. It was a lot of, it looked, sounds amazing, but there's a lot that she went through ups and downs, a lot of big mental mindset game. And that's what I was able to coach her through.
And that's where I was thinking, you know, when you asked me, what do you do when you're in overwhelm? Lisa got into overwhelm a lot as she doesn't mind me saying this, which in our community, it's a big thing that we all face, particularly when you're online with online businesses and particularly when you're a beginner, there's a lot to learn. And she's a really good case study because the way she got through it was through talking to me and having a coach there to help us. Sometimes you've got to have, you know, maybe someone like me, like a mentor or, or it might be a partner or whatever.
but she was literally ready to throw in a towel. And now that's why she's happy to be one of our main kind of people that loves to get up on stage and share the story and say, well, Matt told me to keep going and it works. And she's got other sites now that have done really well. But the journey's not always easy. So be careful if you're listening to this when you're, everyone always focuses on the success side. I think what's more important is that bit before that, that journey to get to there.
Heather (24:58.997)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (25:14.23)
you know, everyone focuses on Lisa going, oh, wow, worth a million bucks. To me, the amazing part of the journey is Lisa's resilience and sticking at it. And I know what she's gone through to get there mindset wise. It's really cool. It's really cool. And that's what you can achieve. And that's through also having a clear vision. She's very driven by Lisa knew, you know, her goal, she said no to the million dollar offer. Her goal is to go for two million and then she'll sell it.
Heather (25:42.389)
There you go. I love that you were very honest too about her journey. Um, because I think so many people out there that are, you know, using testimonials and case studies to just give the best. And then it's like, Oh, it's so easy. You can do it too. So I'm grateful for you and sharing the reality. Um, just so I'm clear. So basically for buying and selling sites, you have to find the right property. So an established site that already has some activity on it. Then you renovate it with, you know, maybe new design.
Matt Raad (25:43.67)
So.
Matt Raad (25:54.806)
Yeah. Yep.
Matt Raad (26:05.494)
Yes. Yeah.
Heather (26:10.197)
ongoing content, keywords, SEO, some of the stuff you teach as well. And then to monetize can be affiliate links where you promote other people's products and you get a cut or ads. Yeah. So having ads on your site and you're making it. So it's, it's kind of, yeah, go ahead.
Matt Raad (26:13.59)
All of that. Yep. That's what we love.
Matt Raad (26:21.654)
Yep. And these days, Heather, what you might find interesting too is because you've been in this space for quite a while and you know some of the people that we know, and I've advised some of the people that you were mentioning, you know, and on this sort of topic, really interesting one now is direct advertisers. Because websites are so much more accepted now, like they're viewed as legitimate businesses, corporates.
Heather (26:37.949)
Yeah.
Heather (26:49.053)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (26:50.518)
not just big corporates, but even smaller size businesses are recognizing, hey, Nathan Alexa's site on gardening, it's got the, you think about it, that's the golden target audience for any business in the gardening niche here in Australia. So it's pretty easy or a lot easier to get direct advertisers now. We don't just need to advertise with Google. So you can get what's called sponsorship deals, all sorts of things. So it's a...
Heather (27:11.797)
Google, yeah.
Matt Raad (27:16.566)
It's a lot easier than it was when we first started online in 2000. We bought our first site in 2008, I think. So it's a lot easier than it was then, particularly in the last five years. So that's the other cool thing. So direct advertisers is a big one now too. Or better, direct affiliate offers. So you can go direct to companies, it's huge in America, and you can get much, that's one of the key secrets to what Lisa did. She just kept.
Heather (27:24.245)
Okay.
Heather (27:32.949)
Big one, okay.
Yep.
Matt Raad (27:44.532)
upping her affiliate commission rates because the site ranks so well, she could pretty much get the top, like negotiate the top affiliate payouts, which no one else would have gotten because she'd worked so hard at it. So that's, you know, success begets success, you know, that's a cool thing online. The more successful you become, the easier it gets, gets really easy, things compound.
Heather (27:48.469)
Got it.
Heather (28:08.085)
Oh, you could totally see that because you get the team going, you know, the systems, all the SOPs, everything that you need to get the portfolio kicking in. So, knowledge.
Matt Raad (28:11.094)
Yeah, that's the SOPs, yep. And your knowledge, it becomes really easy once you get over that. So our job at e -business is to get people out of that knowledge hump. That's the bit where everyone wants to give up.
Heather (28:22.005)
That's it. So how do you guys work with people? Is it just courses? What are the different options that you have?
Matt Raad (28:28.978)
For here, we have two main courses. One is the main course that we do is called the Digital Investors Program, and it's a home study program. And then part of that is what we call the web dev as well, which teaches people how to build a website through WordPress and SEO. And we just teach the base foundations, nothing too complex. And we only teach really beginners. So that's a home study course. And then later on, if people are like, enjoy that,
Heather (28:32.617)
Okay.
Heather (28:36.339)
Yep.
Heather (28:44.979)
Yep.
Heather (28:54.161)
Nice.
Matt Raad (28:58.614)
and they want more one -on -one with us, we do the usual thing. We have a high -level coaching program called the Champions Program, which I'm very, very passionate about. That's kind of my baby. And we've been doing that for, again, more than a decade now. And we get some amazing results out of that. But the main course we do is the Digital Investor Program, where we're teaching people how to do website due diligence and how to buy really good websites. That's the main thing we do.
Heather (29:24.277)
And you and Liz still have your own portfolio as well, don't you? So you're not, you're practicing what you preach to.
Matt Raad (29:26.614)
Yeah, yeah. So, oh yeah, that's what I was saying. I could work 12 or 16 hours. When we're on holidays, I love SEOing websites. That's my geeky kind of, it's, as I say to all our clients, look, that's my geeky hobby, but obviously it's how I make my money too. But seriously, I love SEOing websites and it's what I do every lunch break. I probably look at 50 odd websites a day and I do...
Heather (29:32.999)
Yeah.
There you go.
Matt Raad (29:54.74)
I look at Google Analytics, everything, like I can't help myself. And so right now in the market, we're very actively looking to for this year, we want to be buying up a bunch more sites because I think they're really good. Not giving financial advice is my personal opinion, but I think they're really good recessionary protectors. They're a better way for us to store our money than in other traditional assets. I think there's a reasonable chance there's a recession or a bit of...
Heather (29:57.685)
You love it. You love it.
Matt Raad (30:23.606)
volatility coming somewhere in the next couple of years. So I love owning websites for that because we saw during the GFC websites went really well.
Heather (30:32.533)
Yeah, interesting point, actually. And I read that you and Liz are a bit of futurists as well. So you can kind of look at these trends and see things happening. So yeah.
Matt Raad (30:40.438)
Yeah. Yep. And we get to speak to, because of the position I'm in now, what I love, Heather, is like what you're doing is I get the network a lot through podcasting and through all the people I know in buying and selling websites. So that, and I do get to get a feel for what's happening out there with website sales and who are the, who's investing and what are the deals like. And it's pretty exciting what some of these brokers are seeing. Oh my goodness.
If you're listening to this, the one thing my mentors always told me is follow, if you want to get rich, follow the big money and big money's flowing into websites now. So, and content sites, really interesting there. Genuine passion content sites, the real ones, because of AI and stuff, the real ones are going to be, you know, they're rarer. They're worth a lot of money, like fine red wine. So, you get the right ones. The trick is you got to learn how to do it.
Heather (31:16.915)
Okay.
Heather (31:25.353)
Yep.
Heather (31:33.755)
Interesting. How to do it. Yeah, because my mind goes in a gazillion directions. Yeah, there's AI and why can't you start one, but I know you have to age your domain and there's so many, there's so much in it. Like just the SEO tactics. There's so much that you would have to have exactly the plan that you guys put together. Do you, could somebody that has a business do this on the side? Like where does it fit in? So who'd be the right person to come over to you and learn more about your course?
Matt Raad (31:40.118)
Yes, see there is. Yep.
Matt Raad (31:52.884)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (32:01.558)
Well, most of our clients are in that boat where they're either own their own business or they're corporates working not nine to five, five to nine these days, sadly. So our course is designed to study at part time. And that's the beautiful thing with websites. If you're listening to this and you want to get into a business, seriously, don't do bricks and mortar businesses. You can't do them part time. You can't park them.
Heather (32:11.765)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Matt Raad (32:29.27)
Whereas with websites, the beautiful thing is you can definitely do it part -time because it's SEO. You can just park them for a month or two. You don't have to work on them all the time. You can just work on them a couple of hours a week or a couple of hours a month, whatever. So it's perfect. That's the other reason why we love teaching. It's the absolute perfect way to get into a side hustle, you know, part -time. So, but you do need it. Ideally, if you're into it.
Heather (32:50.965)
There you go.
Matt Raad (32:53.974)
I mean, I'm biased, I spend 12 hours a day, but you know, if you're into it, you should be spending a couple of hours a week at least on it.
Heather (33:00.501)
Okay. So you could definitely start if you have a business, maybe if you're at a crossroads and you're wondering if you want to stay in the same business, like it's a good, it's a great potential place to start because like you said, it compounds, you can build it over time and yeah. Yeah.
Matt Raad (33:12.534)
And it gives you alternatives for business owners. You know, at some point, if you're listening to this in your business, are you going to sell your business? Well, you probably already got 80 % of the skills that you need to do this. You just need the technical, like the mindset skills I'm saying. And so it gives you a really good alternative, like way to make money. You can have multiple websites in all these weird and wonderful niches. And we've got a website in Pigeon Racing, like nothing about Pigeon Racing.
Heather (33:24.501)
There you go.
Heather (33:35.797)
Yeah.
Matt Raad (33:39.958)
I still to this day think that's weird. That thing makes a thousand bucks a month. Who would have like, we don't touch it. I don't even know the lot. It's just crazy. So it, there's lots of alternatives for business owners. You'll see some amazing business models out there. Our one's really simple. It's just ads, but there's heaps of other ways you can make money online too. So you can just buy them. I wouldn't, you know, if you know what you're doing, it's awesome buying good websites for really good fun.
Heather (33:44.373)
That's even weirder.
Heather (34:05.429)
So where do people go to learn more about you and your course?
Matt Raad (34:08.918)
You can Google my name, Matt Raad, and you'll find me presumably on the internet somewhere. I know you will. But ebusinessinstitute .com .au. And we've got a free masterclass on there if you're interested in this and you want to hear our actual strategy. There's lots of buttons on there that say sign up for the free masterclass. It's a 90 -minute webinar where we go through exactly the sorts of sites we buy, where we're buying them, how we value them, and a quick look at the due diligence we do.
It's really cool if you want to get a if you're interested and you want to get more of an overview, go and do the free masterclass.
Heather (34:43.669)
Perfect, you guys check that out. We have a link for our show notes as well. And by the way, I know it's Matt Rod, as you said, but I call you Matt Rad. So just so you know. It's so much more catchy. No.
Matt Raad (34:47.094)
Thank you.
Matt Raad (34:51.154)
Yeah, everyone calls it Matt Rad. Yeah, that's right. And especially amongst all my American friends, they love it. Yeah, yeah. They say, we're going to use Radge. They love it. Thank you.
Heather (35:00.637)
Matt Rad.
Heather (35:07.349)
So as we start to wrap up, do you have any last ideas or things that you want to share with the listeners?
Matt Raad (35:13.878)
I think it's funny, Heather, I'm really passionate about this. I'm gonna come back to it. I'm at a point in my life, like, you know, I'm in my mid fifties. I'm in a very fortunate position now where I've achieved and both Liz and I, we've achieved our goals that we wrote down 30 years ago. And I think it comes and it's amazing. We live, we pinch ourselves. And I've got another friend that I was at a party on the weekend, same thing. He's at the same age as me.
And, you know, he's hugely successful in his field. And I say, what's it like? Do you pinch yourself? Because I am. And he goes, yeah, it just seems surreal. Where we grew up, like I grew up in poverty to now living like this is mind blowing. And how I achieved it was setting a vision, setting goals. It's so important. I think Arnold Schwarzenegger had it right. I just read his book many, many years ago and I read, you know, all the classics like
magic of thinking big and rich, well, I was gonna say rich dad, poor dad, but the think and grow rich and all those sorts of stuff. I've got to say all that stuff works. Luckily I did read all that stuff and did Tony Robbins and did a lot of goal setting there and everything came true. It's just, but it took a lot longer than what I expected. But my thing is, I think having a vision, particularly in this day and age is super, super important. And it's something we're really proud of that we've taught our kids and they've...
they're achieving their goals as well. So it's a methodology that works. You can't beat it and write down your goals. I learned that one with Brian Tracy, the sales trainer from years ago, tends to come true. 95 % of stuff I wrote down has come to being pretty amazing. Yeah, so you can't lose. If someone said to you, hey, you can get whatever you want in life, you just gotta do one thing and you go, what's that? You gotta spend a couple of hours.
Heather (36:58.997)
Yeah, I find that too. It's cool. I love it. Clarity.
Matt Raad (37:12.022)
and plan out your life and write it down on a bit of paper, I reckon it's worth it. And basically that's what we did and we spent a lot more time than that. And then we focus on it. We review it every year and every 90 days and all that sort of a thing. So for us, that's worked. And I hope for anyone listening to this, you think about that carefully. Write down your vision for yourself and then you tweak it each year. That's basically what we've done over the last 30 years. Every single year, we just tweak it a bit and...
Re -adjust, kids come along, that changes your life. So you gotta read readjust your vision a bit there, but you will hit your vision.
Heather (37:46.389)
Excellent. Oh, thank you. Thanks for that reminder and the importance of it. And thanks for being very humble and talking about your journey very openly and reminding people that there really is no such thing as overnight success. It takes a lot of hard work and mindset work as well as part of that process. So thank you for being here. Very grateful.
Matt Raad (38:00.566)
No. Yep.
Matt Raad (38:05.236)
huge one.
Thank you so much for having me on, Heather. Definitely a pleasure to be here today.
