Cynthia is a former high school counselor who helps students get into Ivy League schools. When she came to my team, she had a great reputation and a funnel that was costing her money.
A few months later she was doing six figures a month from a few thousand dollars in ad spend, and she’s on track for $1M a month.
Here’s what we changed, the numbers month by month, and the hiring framework she’s using to scale.
Where she started
Cynthia did about $600K the previous year, almost all through referrals. That’s a real business, but it depends on word of mouth.
Her paid funnel was the problem:
- It was seven steps long.
- There was no way to book a call.
- It was making $0 and costing her money.
Seven steps and no booking page means you’re asking cold traffic to do a lot of work with no clear next action. Most people just leave.
Rebuilding the offer around three pillars
Before touching the marketing, we rebuilt the offer. I like structuring offers around three pillars, because it gives the prospect three clear reasons this is different.
- An intellectual project instead of a typical passion project. Admissions are competitive, and every applicant has a passion project. An intellectual project helps a student stand out in that pool.
- A signature core essay method. This explains why her approach to the essay is different from what everyone else does.
- An overall admissions success formula, positioned as a clear path to acceptance.
Each pillar answers a question a parent already has. How does my kid stand out? How do we nail the essay? What’s the plan?
Simplifying the funnel
We replaced the seven step funnel with something much simpler:
- A video sales letter (VSL).
- A book a call page with a booking form.
- A thank you page.
That’s it. Watch the video, book the call, get confirmed.
But here’s the honest part. The offer drives the results here, not the marketing. Her market has built in urgency because high school timelines don’t wait. Parents are highly motivated. And there’s very little competition compared to something like business coaching.
Think about who’s buying. A parent watching their kid’s application deadline get closer doesn’t need to be convinced the problem is real. They already feel it. Your job is just to show them you’re the best path, and make it easy to book the call.
That’s why I always look at the offer before the ads. A great funnel can’t save a weak offer, but a strong offer in a motivated market makes even a simple funnel work.
The results, month by month
- March: about $2,600 spent, no sales.
- April: about $6,000 spent, about $85,000 in sales.
- May: about $7,000 spent, about $143,000 in sales.
- Mid June: about $110,000 in sales from about $5,000 spent, with half the month still to go.
Deals run $15K to $40K, and the close rate is about 20%.
Notice March. The first month didn’t produce a sale. A lot of founders would have quit there. Instead we kept going, and April paid for everything many times over.
The plan to scale
At this point the bottleneck isn’t leads. It’s people. To scale, Cynthia needs to hire:
- Appointment setters
- Closers
- DM staff
The recruiting process is simple. Post the job on LinkedIn, send applicants to a qualifying form, then test candidates with realistic scenarios before you ever interview them.
The test is where most bad hires get filtered out. Anyone can sound good in an interview. Give a setter candidate a realistic lead to respond to, or a closer candidate a realistic call scenario, and you find out fast who can actually do the job. Only the people who pass get your time.
The hiring framework
Screen every candidate on two things.
- Mindset. Do they work hard, want to grow, and think like you do?
- Skill. Do they have relevant experience doing this exact job?
Then in the interview, cover:
- Your company values.
- Role expectations and what a daily schedule looks like.
- Their past job duties.
- What success means to them.
- Their goals and pay expectations.
- What “work from home” means in your company.
That last one matters more than people think. Working from home should mean working, at set hours, not doing whatever they want.
My biggest hiring mistake
One of the biggest mistakes I made was letting my team hire without my oversight. Standards slipped.
The owner should always do the final interview. You’re the one who knows what good looks like, and you’re the one who pays for a bad hire.
Where this goes
Based on her numbers, I estimate roughly $100K to $200K a month in ad spend could support about $1M a month in sales. Long term, I expect her to reach about $2M a month.
That’s the power of a clear offer in an uncrowded market. When the result is obvious and the buyer is motivated, the ads don’t have to work nearly as hard.
The takeaway
- Referrals can build a solid business, but they don’t scale on their own.
- Structure your offer around three pillars that answer the buyer’s real questions.
- Cut the funnel down to a VSL, a booking page and a thank you page.
- Don’t quit after one bad month if the offer is strong.
- When leads stop being the bottleneck, hire well, and do the final interview yourself.
Want to know what’s capping your business, the offer, the funnel or the team? Take my free 90 Day Ceiling Plan. Answer 18 questions and get a written plan, built on your own numbers, that names the one thing holding you back and what to fix first.
