S6E16: Making Connections Smarter with Mat Passy | ConnTap

In this episode of Cash Flow, I chat with Mathew Passy, co-founder of ConnTap, about next-gen NFC business cards and how they’re changing the game for creators, realtors, and entrepreneurs.

From live link updates to QR codes built into key fobs—this is networking, reimagined.

Find Matt on Socials: @mathewpassy
Learn more about ConnTap: https://conntap.com

Transcript

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Foreign. Hey, welcome back to Cash Flow Podcast. This is our dog filled set today and we have a special guest because this is an episode I've been really excited to get to. And finally, Ken, I met Matthew Passi about a year ago maybe. Sounds about right. Yeah. At Podcast Movement and his company Contap C O N N T A P has been working on the coolest gadget and I was sucked in the minute I saw it. And as they've been developing it, he's been wonderful enough with his partner to kind of share the development with me and I really want everybody to know about this. So we're going to actually have a full on conversation with you. Matthew, thanks so much for coming about what it is you're working on. It is my pleasure to be here and happy to chat about it. And yeah, it all started Joe, I think that's right, the first one, he talked to you at Podcast Movement. You had your booth there and then I came over and then we came to some of your. I was already braceleted up from you. Yes, you were, you were ready to go. Well, so that we let people know what we're talking about. Give me the elevator speech on what this is that you guys are developing. Sure. So everybody has seen nfc, you know, business cards and QR codes around and you know, it's very interesting technology. It's growing in popularity and in use cases and we have basically taken those, what we hope to be, to the next level. So a lot of these devices, they like to, you know, force you into a program, tap on someone's MTAP card. Or link or so like when I have that blink on my phone and we get our phones close and if they're the right kind of phone, if it's the same program, we can tap and share information. How is what you're doing taking this that next step further? Why was I so enchanted? Well, so the thing that we like, what was driving people crazy about those products when we started talking to folks about NFC was they had no decision, they had no control over what would happen when somebody tapped the card. All right, let me break this down. What does NFC stand for? NFC is near field communication. Okay. So that's, that's. I'm going to take this to the basics because I'm a technical idiot when I get close. The things talk to each other is what that's about. Right. So if you've ever used Apple Pay or if you've ever taken your credit card and tapped it, that thing that's NFC or rfid Got it. Okay. So with a lot of those programs, when you tap on someone's dot card or their mtap, you're forced to go through the software that they have provided. In some cases, that means, you know, providing a text number or an email and getting forced into a funnel. It might mean downloading an app so you can communicate with it. And these are great devices, and there's nothing wrong with that. But we were talking to folks about these, and originally we started calling these podcast beacons. Yep. We wanted to make it easier for podcasts. Podcast movement. Right. It's. It's the most cumbersome thing in the world. Hey, you have a podcast. How do I get to it? Well, let me. You go to my site, you go to this. Is this the right show? Right. It's like this terrible dance that everybody likes. And so we realized that there was probably a way to streamline that. And so handing these out to people, getting feedback, we realized what people want is control. And so what started was giving folks the ability to control what happens. And so originally it was you get a device, you register, we give you a profile, and then the next time somebody taps on your device, they get taken to almost like a link in bio or a link tree type. Got it? Yep. Right here are the things that are important to me. But then we had a few folks say, that's great and all, but honestly, I don't want to worry about all that. Like, I want to make it even easier for people. So how do you just get it to tap and go to my thing. Where my brain wants it to go right now? Right. You know, I'm at this event, I want people doing this, or I'm talking to this person. I want them doing this. So we worked with some developers, we adjusted the software, and so now we've built in this redirect feature, which basically says, okay, I'm going to go on my phone, I'm going to, you know, make two quick changes to the software. Literally takes as long as, you know, this interaction is going to be. And now the next time somebody taps on my device, instead of the profile page, it can go straight to whatever you want. Yeah. So on your profile page, you can have 10 links. You can have, like, a downloadable vcard. You can have all of your social, you know, profiles that we've got programmed in there. And so with the redirect, you can pick any one of those entries and say, okay, skip the profile page when you tap this. Going to go straight to my LinkedIn. It's going to go straight to my calendly. So my cta, if I have one, whatever my lead magnet is, here's my. Landing page that I'm promoting today or at this particular event, and I just. Want to give a practical use case of this. So this is what kind of got me. So we were at Podcast Movement at the time, and where I wanted people to go was our podcast, either Cash Flow or she Said. She Said. So boom. We program it with that. And by the way, we could logo it if we wanted to. That's true. At the time, we were doing a lot of customization and engraving. So. But then say I'm at that event, but then I'm leaving that event and going to another one where I'm going to speak. And I'm going to be speaking to an audience of entrepreneurs who were are going to need a Cash Flow Excel sheet that I've put together. On my way out the door, I can go to my phone and go, oh, no, I want you to go here. And when I get to that speaking engagement, that's what pops up. Exactly. And that, to me, is really practical because even at one event, you might want to redirect on different days. Absolutely. If you're talking about different things on day one, day two, day three, well. And with the analytics built in, you can find that, oh, people have been going to my profile. They've been most interested in this. I love it. Let's focus on. Right, let's focus on that. And the other thing we realized was at first we really thought, oh, we're an NFC company. But we started to make these products and we put. So like, this bracelet has a QR code built into it. It goes to the same place as the watch, and they're both tied to a URL. We realized this doesn't always have to be a physical thing. My contact profile that I have, I have now used it on all of my profile pages. So if you go to my Twitter, the link in bio is my contact link. Got it. So at the time of you're watching this, it might go to the profile page, or if that day I'm showing people content, it might take you there. Got it. But so it's. It's really just about dynamic marketing control and with the ability to link multiple products. So right now I've got this bracelet. I actually have one built into my smartwatch. We're developing these. Although I'll admit right now I'm a little frustrated. This one's starting to wear off quicker than I wanted to so we might have to revisit it. I've got a key fob. I've got a business card in my wallet. They all go to where I want them to go. But you can have hundreds or thousands of these products or stickers. Yep. Put them wherever you want. And now if you are running some sort of campaign, you're like, oh, Mother's Day just passed. Let's start kicking in the Father's Day ideas. Got it. A couple of taps on your phone, and now all of those devices that. Are out in the wild have changed. Have changed. You don't have to track down the URL that you need to fix the QR code that you need to relink, go in and redirect it on your website, on your. It just has to exist somewhere. That's it. Once you set it up, it can live there forever. Wow. And be dynamically controlled by you at a moment's notice. Got it. So how many, like, use cases have you come up with for this? The truth is, I can't even count them anymore. Okay. We just keep throwing things down on paper and trying to tackle each of them. 1. What's the wildest one you're trying? I don't know if I would say it's the wildest, but one of the more ambitious ones we're trying to do is for realtors. So realtors, like, we. We set up a website at Taplety, supposed to be a play on realty and tap. Not my best domain work, I'll admit, but we're basically offering is like this basic package for realtors. You get a table stand, a business card, and a fob. Okay. And so now, as a realtor, you're doing a lot of open houses. You bring your tablespan, and on that table stand, now, it can either be a direct link to the property that you're at, or it could be your profile page that says, hey, here's the 3D tour of this house, by the way. This one not doing it for you. Here's a few other homes on my listing. Here's my contact card so you can get to know me better. Here's other information. And then, of course, right, the business card and the fob do the same thing, but with realtors, I want to take it a step further. And, like, I don't know about you, but my realtor loves sending me stuff in the mail all the time. It does seem to be a carryover from the 70s. It definitely does. Mine in particular. She's lovely. Like, she will, like, just she's always going to do it. It works for her. But. So I imagine, you know, a lot of them send you a magnetic calendar to put on your refrigerator. I have gotten a few of those. Right? Now imagine you're sending that calendar to all of your clients, all the people you've ever bought and sold a home for. It has a tap. It has a QR code as a link. And at any point, it could be a resource for that home. Home buyer, home seller. So without having to pick up the phone, you just literally go tap your calendar. Now, my Realtor will tell you, I want you to pick up the phone. I want to talk to you. But I know there are plenty of realtors like, no, no, please go to my website. Leave it alone. It's like, clients like that, too. But so now imagine that tap takes you to a resource page of your favorite contractors in the area, your favorite landscaping companies in the area, Right? Like, all those resources that we tend to get from our Realtor because they know the area we're typically moving into. A new area that can be right there on that magnet. And wow. And if they want to, they could create paid ad links for this stuff. And listen, oh, that contractor went out of business. Gone. New ones up there ready to go. And from one place, the thousand devices could be out there, but you make one change, right? I can do it on my phone. I can do my computer. Very easy. But it doesn't just have to be that. It could be, you know, here are my new listings. Here's if you need to reach me, right? Like, whatever information you want your clients to have is in their home and can be dynamically changed without having you send out a new magnet every three, six, nine, whatever months it is. Yeah. And it's interesting because when we first talked about this, I was thinking about it as. I have a podcast. So I'll wear it on my wrist and just have people. The cool thing about this technology is that my phone can be off and I. And I can tap at the. Tap the thing, and boom, It'll come up, right? If your phone is closed, it'll still kind of like, lock in that tab, save it in your notification. Boom. And all I have to do is. It's just there. I don't have to do anything like, open up, find an app, turn my camera on. None of that. But I was thinking, oh, this is just a thing I wear around on my wrist. And if somebody says, hi, why are you here? I say, oh, take this, but you're suggesting. And I Love this because it opens up a huge opportunity that this becomes something you put in your swag. 100%. We, you know, how is it different. Than a QR code? It's not. I mean, QR code. A QR code can work the same way. Most QR codes are static. Or you subscribe to a company that gives you dynamic QR codes and you can update those. But no, I mean, we're implementing the QR code into our platform because. Right. Some people don't understand nfc. Right. But they've seen the QR codes enough. Yep. Some people don't understand the QR codes, but they. So if we have the link, it still does what you want to do. Right. And it lets you do a swag thing. Absolutely. So, like, you know, when we first started doing it, we are podcasters. What? I've been in podcasting for 20 years. You know, we were thinking, oh, this is great for podcasters. But, like, right away, we're like, oh, this is good for any content creator. So I have this thought of, what if you are a band and you made up guitar picks with the tap in there with the QR code on the back, and you gave that out at shows. Right. You just kind of tossed them to the audience and, you know, now that person can put it on their keychain, hang on to it, make it a momentum display them, whatever. And if somebody says, oh, you know, you went to that band the other night, What'd you think? They were great. You should check them out here. Tap my pick and go check out their SoundCloud or whatever they're promoting at the time. Really cool. For musicians, YouTubers, influencers, any content, really. It's meant to bridge the gap of you meet someone in person. Yep. And you want to get them connected to you digitally. Yep. And, you know, mostly what you say is, are you following me on such and such. All right, we're back to that dance. Let me open up Instagram. Oh, no, I spelled it wrong. Let me try. Is this you? Instead of just tap, now it's just boop. Oh, so literally, I could do that. I could have it just point to my Instagram directly and they hit follow or whatever and Instagram, and we're all. Set right to your page. That's very cool. Yeah. And that's. And I think that's the thing with this is there's so many uses. You have to realize and think about which ones are novel and which, you know, what you can integrate it with to make it really kind of stand out and And I love it. So you have bracelets, you have key fobs, you can make stickers, you can make guitar picks. The nice thing is these stickers are so small, we can pretty much form fit them into anything. A couple of material limitations here and there, but we're really taking a cue from our audience and from our clients. What's going to work best for you? And to your point, right, you can use this in multiple ways. I'll admit I am, I'll say, crazily creative. Not that I'm the most creative person, but like, things just spill out of my head constantly. And so my partner Joe and I, we've been running through all these crazy ideas, but I don't have them all. Got it. Somebody is listening to this and saying, there you go. Wait, what if I did it with this to that person? I would say drop it in the comments quick. Right. One job in the comments. But to like, tell us. We can help you basically develop your own version of the same platform and you can sell our product under your brand name. Bingo. And we will be almost like a franchise, but. Right. We will kind of be your support system while you just go out and, you know, market and brand what you think is the most effective use of this kind of dynamic, what we're calling microcasting. Oh, I like that. So this is actually interesting to me as your CFO is exactly what you're describing. So how do you get these things distributed as far and wide as we need them distributed? So let me. Let's do an example of what you just said. So say I decide I'm going to resell these. Who would I resell them to? Like, what would I go do? I'm a cfo. So is there, is there an audience for me to resell these two as a cfo or would it be more content creators? Well, it depends if your CFOs are maybe looking for a way to help some of their companies or their brands. Right. Maybe the CFO is working for a media network, that CFO concerned to the network and be like, oh, I saw these products, we should really have them. Got it. And the person could say, okay, how do I buy them? And that CFO can either say, well, here's a link to concept and it's got my affiliate code, so I'll get a little piece of the action. Everything you buy. Or we'll help that CFO basically launch their own store. They'll have their own storefront. The devices can be branded with their stuff or they're Highly customizable, especially in small prints. And they would sell their own subscriptions. We would basically do all the support. Got it right. We would help them get the orders, they would get the products for super cheap and sell it for, you know, what they think is appropriate. And basically they would be their own contact distributor of sort. That's what I'm hearing. It's really a tiny thing but just like we used to distribute large equipment in the field. You have a distribution network. Right. There are, there are plenty of middle men and women. Yep. Who can take this product and say, oh, you guys are in New Jersey, right. You, you know the New Jersey. Like I'm not going to try, but I'm out in Oklahoma. Nobody's touching this. I'm going to go sold over there and I'm going to say please and thank you. Yeah. And make it as easy as possible for them to do it and for them to, you know, be profitable doing. So. It's. I love it. I don't know why this just came to mind. And maybe I'm just. Because I like the gadget. I'm coming up with something that could be done another way. But one of the things I'm thinking of when I had a little, little kid who in daycare to have something on my wrist that I could tap and just check in to a video feed, something like that. So I mean with your profile you can put whatever you want on there. So if your daycare, early childhood center, whatever. Yeah. Says here's a link to, you know, watch your class, you can put it on your profile and you could tap it. Now the only problem I would say with that is right now don't want to lose it. Well, not only that, but if, if, you know, if somebody else happens to tap your device, they're looking at your CFO stuff and you forgot to change it. Like what is the little sheep daycare video? Yeah, good point, good point. Cute. But yeah, but not what I, not, not my, my hard ass CFO that I'm looking for, right? No, probably. Probably. Yeah. I love it. So how do people get involved if this is of interest to them? So to me there's like a couple things. One is they might have ideas. Two is they might. Are you guys looking for financing? Are you Bootstrapp? How do people, what do people need to know to get in touch with you? I mean, I think we would certainly entertain financing and investing from the right partners. We're not looking for someone whose only interest is buying into the equity, but. More so we're not doing an A round. We want founders. Right, Exactly. We want people to buy into it because they believe in it, because they will see the fruits of the labor. But right now the main ways is, look, if you're just an individual, you want to buy a couple of these, we have them where you can customize. GoContab.com Go contact. Or just contact. We'll take you to the store down in the, in the show notes. So don't worry, it'll be there. If you want to be a reseller, right now we have a form you fill out, you chat with us, but basically we are going to figure out where you want to sell these. And right now we're not sitting here saying, oh, sorry, that's someone's territory, not. Exclusive territories or anything. Nothing like that yet. But we're going to figure out, you know, what, what is the right level of commitment. Do you want to just be an affiliate? Right. No investment, just I'm going to tell people about this. I'm going to, you know, promote customer. I don't want to deal with it. Right. But I'm just going to get credit for the hardware and the software subscriptions that come with. Yep. But you're going to manage them. But we're going to manage them. No problem. We have what we're calling like a brand ambassador. So kind of like a middle tier where we will, you will buy like a small supply of product with your brand on it. Okay. And we're still kind of selling it for you, but your affiliate rates go up. Right. You're, you're dedicated to the cause, so. Right. You're getting a little bit more of the hardware sales, you're getting a little bit more of the recurring software sales. But then we also have this reseller program, folks who are saying, no, no, no, I want to open my own store, I want to sell these. In which case we will help you to replicate our platform with your branding. So when they go to, you know, look at their stuff, it's not saying, oh, right, it's, it's whatever brand you set up. Huh. So true white label. Kind of like high level is, right? Yeah, true white label. And then we'll also help you order the product at obviously very, very steep discount from what retail prices are going to be. Yeah. You know, we'll set rules as far as there's a minimum. Right. We don't want you selling our $20 key fob for a dollar. Minimum prices. Sure. But at the same time, if you are, listen, if you're the person who could sell a $999 app on an iPhone that does nothing but be there. Right. If you could sell$1,000 key fob to someone because you happen to put a one little gold dot on there, God bless you. Right. We're not going to take extra of what you did with. We're just going to sell it to you at the. Exactly. So, right. Just get started. And we're, you know, we're talking to folks right now who are interested and. So they would literally give a, you know, a spiel like, hey, if you use these at your next event, you can do such and such and, and like that. So let's say that I were a reseller, I'm going to an event next week. Okay. What would I do? I just take mine and talk about it or I'm not going to sell it the events, I don't do that. But I do want to just like curious so that people know what they would do as a reseller. I mean, the thing that we've noticed is especially with like the bracelets or something, somebody just looks like, what is that? Got it. It is an attention getter. But so the nice thing is that when you use our profile page, right, if you're not using the redirect, we have a feature built in where you sign up for the affiliate program, you enter in your affiliate link and. And then at the bottom of the profile page, instead of a link that just says go contact.com, it would be your affiliate code. Got it. So, yeah, show people, hey, check out my contact. Look what this does. Check it out. And then they've got that profile on their phone. You can say, oh, if you're interested, there's a link right there to go buy it. Got it. And they can get started right away. Or if you want to do a bigger order where you have someone who says, I love these, I need 50 of them, contact us, you know, put us in touch with that person for the order and we'll take care of you. See, and this is the thing about this. You don't have to advertise it because people do ask about it. Or if you, if somebody says, oh, how can I get in touch with you? And I hold this thing and I go, just tap your phone. They're going to ask about what that is and then you can explain it to them and like, oh, wow, really? Yeah, I think you're right. It doesn't have to be advertised, but we're still in a world where it has to be. You have to advertise. Oh, yeah. I'm just saying as an affiliate, I don't have to. Like, if I were going to be an affiliate, which I am very likely going to do, I don't have to advertise. It just it sells itself. It really, it, it should because it's. A good, useful, easy, fun, different tool right there. There are certainly going to be people who are going to find a reason not to want it, because that's something. Yeah. But there are plenty of people in the world who. Would you like a concept as well? Apparently I need one. Yeah. But there are plenty of people who see the ease, see the possibilities and want to get in early and, you know, we're going to encourage that. Oh, my God. Dogs. I guess this is what the chip is, though, that they already put in dogs, but they wouldn't have to put it in the dog. That's true. But they could lose their collar. I guess so. Yeah. And a lot of people have kind of gone to the air tags because again, this isn't gps. Right. Like you can't track where your FOB is gone. No, but it's, it's definitely the, the possibilities of what you can do with nfc, I think are just being scratched. Yeah. Right. We're in like the 2008, 2009 years. Of your creative brain. Right. So it would make my brain crazy. But I mean, if you are anybody who sells or shares or, you know, requires somebody to do something that is online, you can make this product work. You can make it work. Yep. I love that. Well, wow. Thank you so much. So the way that people are going to find out more about this is to go to c-n n t a b.com p tap contact. Okay, so c o n n t a P. That makes sense. So, so the name contact comes from. It was a combination of tap, which I see. But then we wanted connect, control. Got it. So it's on tap. Con untap, con contact. There we go. So, but we'll drop the link here since I've just flubbed it up. So that's really good. But thank you, Matthew, and tell Joe I'm cheering you guys on all the way. This is the coolest thing and I promise I'm going to be one of the people that is going to make fun use of this. I'm going to not tell Joe that he's going to have to watch this himself. There you go. No free downloads for you, Joe. I like that. And like. And subscribe, all of you. We'll keep you posted on this wonderful business. You know that one of the things I like to do is follow businesses that are starting out with really creative ideas and kind of talk about how they evolve and develop. So hopefully we'll have you back year down the road and we'll see what's going on. Love it. Thank you for having me. You bet. Take care.