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Sean Murray: I think the whole
game of leads is changing. A lot

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of that is because of
technology. It's kind of a

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blanket statement. But I think a
lot of tech that business owners

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use, now, they have a funding
option built in. This doesn't

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really fit in with the term
embedded finance, but it kind of

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perfectly describes it, because
what you use for your, to your

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point of sale, or whatever, you
might use it just to, you know,

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track inventory, record your
revenue, whatever, you know, do

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your p&l, etc. But a lot of
these technologies now have like

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a funding button in that, like,
get funded. Yeah. So you could

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just be a store owner, and
you're like, I really need to

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get some money. And 5-10 years
ago, we will be sitting here and

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you will be saying, well,
business owners, they go on

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Google, and they search, yeah,
but they don't need to do that

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anymore, they can literally just
go into the software, and click

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the Get funding button, right.
And they can either get pre

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approved, or they can actually
just get approved right there on

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the spot, and get the money in
their account is as early as the

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next day. And so I think the
whole kind of game of leads is

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changing from that standpoint.
Because if you're an independent

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broker, and you're like, I need
to buy leads, and I need to call

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people email, people who might
need money, you're not competing

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against other brokers anymore,
you're competing against

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technology that is, you know,
putting it right in front of

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somebody's face. Yeah. And half
the battle in convincing a

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stranger to apply with you is
trust. Yeah. And if you're using

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a software that you're already
that you already trust, they do

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your accounting, or you know,
whatever it is, then that is a

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strong advantage, because they
already trust it. And so you're

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competing against that. But the
other side of that is, if you're

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a broker, like Well, I'm never
going to be able to create my

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own point of sale software, you
know what I mean? The other side

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to that is, it goes back to
whether or not merchants or

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borrowers or whatever, are going
to use a single source of

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capital, there was a theory that
was floated around like, five,

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six years ago, and the small
business finance industry, that

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if you offered the cheapest
financing, you would win. And

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the thought process was,
customers only take the

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cheapest, the end. And so you
could come in undercut the whole

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market. And all the other
competitors offering higher cost

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products, were just going to die
out, and it was just a waiting

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game until, until that happened.
So you, you could you could lend

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at a loss for you know,
theoretically, the thought the

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thought was, you can lend at a
loss for a long time and that

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all the high cost companies die.
And then you could do what you

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need to do to make money, right.
But what they didn't expect is

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that customers didn't just
choose the lowest cost product,

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they used the lowest cost
product. But then they also went

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and they chose another product,
there was a tendency for

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customers to use multiple
products. And so what the what

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the lower cost companies didn't
get is that if customers are

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using both, then does it really
make sense? Wouldn't it mean

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that you weren't going to win
anything. Because you weren't,

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you weren't replacing your
competitor, those borrowers,

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those merchants were using both
products. And so if you're a

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broker out there, and you're
wondering, I'm never going to be

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the next, you know, QuickBooks
capital, I'm never going to be

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the next square capital, I get
it. And so these are, you know,

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you have to worry and you have
to compete against the buttons,

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but at the same time, you can
offer something that these

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customers can, can use,
hopefully, in addition to what

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the button is already giving
them and perhaps that's a way to

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think about how to even improve
your, your pitch, right? If

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these customers are used to
something with the, with the

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button and the software, how do
you with a stranger using more

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old fashioned methods, like cold
calling, or direct mail and

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stuff? How are you going to
build that trust? Is there a way

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that you can piggyback off of
these new, these new ways that

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customers interact with lenders?
That's something, that's

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something that everybody should
be thinking about. Yeah.