I’m a credit card rewards consultant for high-spending business owners (yes, that’s a thing!) Basically, I help people earn more points and use them for more value.
I have the privilege of speaking with business owners spending $20,000+/month on credit cards daily. After hundreds of conversations, I know the mistakes that basically every founder is making. I’m sharing the top 3 with you today - some of you will earn an extra 1 million+ points just from what I say in the next paragraph.
Mistake 1: Not maximizing ad spend
Everyone knows the Amex Business Gold card earns 4x points on online advertising. Less people know about the $150,000 cap (you only earn 4x points up to $150k, then it’s 1x). Even less know that Amex is cracking down on the ability to get 10 Gold cards to evade the $150k cap (I know a guy with 12).
So few of the people I speak with know there’s a better solution… The Chase Sapphire Reserve for Business lets you earn unlimited/uncapped 3x points on advertising.
That’s right - if you spent $100k/mo on ads, you’d earn 3.6 million Chase points/year. You should not be earning less than 3x points on your ad spend.
Mistake 2: Locking yourself into airline/hotel credit cards
Last week, I talked to a CPG founder in Wisconsin spending $120,000/mo on his Southwest Airlines credit card. That’s insane to me. Yes, he’ll get A-List Preferred, a companion pass + more Southwest points than any human could ever need, but he’s missing out on SO much.
“But I like to keep things simple,” he told me. Great. Here’s a simple plan for him:
Put all spend on a Capital One Venture X Business card and earn 2x points on every purchase.
Immediately DOUBLE the amount of points he’s earning.
Use those points for literally any travel purchase (Airbnb, Turo, Cruise, Flights, Hotels, etc…) using their points eraser feature.
That’s about $29,000/yr of (tax-free) free travel. And that's the worst case scenario. If he learns how to find great deals transferring his points to airline & hotel partners, - he could easily get $50k of travel from his points (more on that soon).
When you put all of your spending on an airline or hotel credit card, you get a lot of points, but you also get pigeon-holed with one brand.
You have very few options of how to use your points. I highly recommend focusing on flexible card/currencies like Capital One, Amex, Chase, etc…
Your points are more flexible and can be used for so many more things.
You’ll likely earn more points per dollar spent - the flexible cards are generally better for earning.
Don’t lock yourself into an airline/hotel card. Get a flexible card, earn as many points as possible, then redeem them for as much value as possible.
Mistake 3: Redeeming points for terrible value
Credit card points are generally worth about 1 cent per point. Most people have no idea there are opportunities to get 5 cents per point.
Last year, I booked a stay at the Hyatt Regency Coconut Point in Florida for 21,000 Hyatt points. The cash rate was $1,210. That’s 5.76 cents per point.
That’s the difference between your 100,000 points being worth $1,000 or $5,760.
So how do you get that kind of value? How do you avoid redeeming your points for just 1 cent per point?
You have to learn how to find the deals.
All of the major banks allow you to transfer points to airline and hotel programs. Amex transfers 1:1 to Flying Blue, the loyalty program of Air France/KLM, for example. 100k Amex points could become 100k Flying Blue Miles.
I found a deal on Flying Blue’s site yesterday to fly from Dallas to Paris for just 60,000 points + ~$300 one-way. The cash price of that flight? ~$4,000. Incredible value. These deals don’t happen every day, but if you know what you’re doing, it’s not that hard to find them.
When I’m explaining this stuff, I usually get a response like this about now:
“Ok cool Colin. I get how valuable this can be. But are you telling me I have to become an expert on all the airline/hotel partners my bank transfers to and scan each site individually to find great deals?! I don’t have time for that!”
No, it’s not 2014 anymore. I’m going to share with you the single most powerful tool on the internet (in my opinion) for someone who knows nothing about points & miles to find the best deals.
Seats.aero is a company that pulls flight deals from all of the major airline websites for you. You can search across 25+ different airline programs at once. I use them daily for my business. They just released an AI Assistant that is effectively Chat GPT with access to all of seats.aero’s data. You can ask it something like this:
And you’ll get a response like this:
If this is all too overwhelming and you want someone to hold your hand through the whole process and find you the best deal - that’s my business. Check me out here.
Recap:
Make sure you’re earning at least 3x points on every dollar of ad spend. Be aware of the limitations/caps of the cards your friends told you were the best.
Don’t put all of your business spending on an airline or hotel card. 99% of people are better off with a flexible card. Capital One Venture X Business is probably my favorite card for people who want to keep things simple.
You can do a lot better than 1 cent per point redeeming your points. I’ve gotten myself/clients more than 5 cents per point. You don’t have to get a PhD in points & miles to figure this out. Seats.aero does the heavy lifting for you.
Here’s my challenge to you: That “trip of a lifetime” you’ve been talking about? If you’re a high spending business owner that learns the points game, I don’t see why you can’t take that trip, every year.
Happy Travels.
About our featured guest:
Colin Stroud is a credit card rewards consultant who focuses on helping small business owners build optimized credit card rewards strategies and take luxurious trips with their points. Since starting Go Somewhere in 2023, he's worked with hundreds of clients and helped people take incredible trips all over the world. He's become the most followed travel-focused account on LinkedIn and has been featured in the Washington Post, the Koerner Office Podcast, and many other notable publications. Colin lives in Ohio with his wife and two daughters and is always dreaming of his next trip (booked with points, of course).
