Joseph Oliver (aka @oliverflips) is a guy like you and me. A person who was affected by the pandemic leaving him unemployed and had to push forward the best he could.
Table of Contents
In this interview we will understand better what was his situation and how arbitrage helped him and his family make a living.
Tired of limited Amazon Repricers?
👉 Check our Seller Snap unbiased review hereWhat did you do before selling on marketplaces?
I spent most of my adult career as a Sales Director in the Manufacturer / Wholesale Distributor Automotive Industry.
How did you get interested in flipping?
When I lost my job during lockdowns of April 2020, I applied for 130 jobs with no great prospects. With 4 kids to feed at the time, I was desperate.
I saw that arbitrage was a viable strategy for instant cash flow, and I decided to test my wholesale business knowledge and strategy with an arbitrage business.
It was a success, I love it, and I decided to continue scaling my arbitrage business.
Currently, what's the total anual revenue between all your sales channels and what is your main channel?
My main channel is Amazon.
Total 2021 numbers between all channels was 462,000.
This year I am on track to close over $1mm in revenue between all channels.
I am underperforming this month (as expected, as I’ve been working ON the business)
But zooming out, it’s clear that I’m still set to do better than almost every month last year
This is the power of systems pic.twitter.com/KIbmhBJEgv
— oliverflips (@oliverflips) January 23, 2022
What lifestyle do you have since you don't have a 9-5 job?
I love to work, and building my business is like a video game that I enjoy being challenged within.
I work mostly from home during a regular work day, but I take frequent time during the weekdays to do fun activities with my wife and 5 kids while the rest of the world is at their 9-5.
When do you think is a good time to reinvest your profits in your business?
It is crucial to reinvest as much profit as you can in your business so that you can grow fast and sustainably.
Having a 9-5 is a huge advantage because you can pay your bills while reinvesting 100% of profits back into your business. This allows you to scale at incredible speed.
I had to create an income virtually overnight, which made it stressful (but obviously not impossible) to scale quickly and effectively.
Last posts from our blog
👉 Amazon 3p: a guide to third-party selling on Amazon
👉 Amazon Backend Keywords: optimization guide & best practices
👉 What is Amazon DSP: a guide on how to use this programmatic platform
In order of priority, which is a better investment: buy inventory, hire VAs, outsource prep and fulfillment
In the beginning, you need to spend all of your time and resources finding, buying, and selling inventory.
Since prep is such a low cost/ low value activity, that would be the first thing I outsource once you get to 400-500 units per month or more.
With time freed up from prepping, you are able to source twice as much or more, which is you highest ROI activity.
When you max out your time sourcing and you still have capital to spend, the next step would be to hire a VA to train on sourcing so you double the amount of leads coming in.
Finally, as you continue to progress, your sourcing VA can train future VA hires and exponentially scale your business.
What can we find in your Gumroad
The feature product in my Gumroad is my course “Six-Figure Sourcing” which teaches all of the methods I use to source profitable items.
I also have two leads lists (capped at 15 member per month) which are currently full. I have many more courses and resources being released throughout 2022 that I am excited to announce, keep an eye out!
More posts
About the author
Jordi Ordonez
I work as an independent eCommerce and Amazon consultant.
Clients
Estrella Damm, Intersport, Bella Aurora, Lladró, Textura Interiors, Nice Things Palomas, Castañer, Due-Home and many other clients.
Lecturer & Teacher
I teach and have been a speaker at: Meet Magento, Prestashop, Prestashop Day, SEMRush, Cambra de Comerç Barcelona, ClinicSEO, Ecommbeers, Ecommbrunch, Ecommercetour.com, Ecommfest, EOI, ESIC-ICEMD, Foxize, Generalitat de Catalunya, Inesdi, Quondos and The Valley.
In addition, I have done in-company trainings for brands such as Orange and Adidas.
Writer
Finally, I collaborate writing articles for Helium 10, Carbon 6, Shopify, SEMRush, Prestashop´s official blog, Brainsins, La Vanguardia, eCommerce-news.es, Marketing4ecommerce and other blogs and media.
Social profiles
- LinkedIn
- Twitter
- Wikipedia
- Youtube
- Quora
- About Jordi Ordonez