I've created at least 5 offers that've done 8-figures or more. Every one I've built hit on three things:
1. A painful problem people needed fixed right now
2. A great market-timing tailwind
3. Economics that could support what acquisition actually costs
Started working with a client two weeks ago and already found one thing broken that will pay for my fees, and another that will roughly double her profit.
I GUARANTEE you have things broken in your biz right now. Find & fix 'em. It's worth the time.
So before hiring your next agency, answer these 3 questions:
1. What exactly are they delivering each week?
2. How will you measure it?
3. What happens if they don't hit it?
If you can't answer all three, you're not ready to hire.
I've wasted somewhere between $300K, $500K on agencies.
After I sold my company, I spent a long time figuring out why.
Here's what I found (and what I'd do differently):
Finally, make sure incentives are aligned. They should win when they generate more PROFIT for you, not revenue. It's easy AF to generate revenue while losing profit. This also applies to sales teams or anyone else on a performance basis.
6-month stick rate doesn't mean you collect that revenue in 6 months. Some customers might be YEARS old, which increases the average but doesn't help actual cash flow.
Make sure you're calculating this properly if you're using it for scaling decisions.
Most DTC founders are running a 6-month cash cycle that they think is 30 days because they think breaking even on acquisition means breaking even on everything. Don't forget inventory and overhead per customer!
A players want to win. That's it.
Tell them exactly what winning looks like, why it matters to the whole business, and watch what happens.
Clarity is the cheapest performance upgrade you'll ever find.
Most founders I work with are drowning in fires their team keeps starting. The fix is dead simple. Get the right people, in the right seats, working on the right things, efficiently. Do that and you can dramatically increase output without hiring a single additional person.
Your team probably has 3 hours of actual productive output per day. Stop trying to squeeze more hours out of them and start figuring out how to make those 3 hours actually count.
A 3x ROAS sounds great, but it doesn't account for contribution margin, overhead per customer, or inventory, which means your true ROAS could be more like 1.5x or less. Fix those numbers and you'll actually know what you can afford to spend.
An offer scales when three things line up:
1. Market fit, when enough people are in pain and actively looking for a solution.
2. Conversion strength, when they believe your offer can fix their problem.
3. Scale potential, so the economics hold as volume grows
A 30% increase in LTV can produce a 90%+ increase in profit, with zero new customers and zero additional ad spend.
If you've been neglecting it... take this as your sign to get back on it.
Or hit me up and I'll do it for you on a performance-only basis.
Most people focus on maximizing customer volume. The problem is, that's the LEAST profitable sale you'll ever make. Profit typically comes from everything AFTER that first sale. Focus there and you'll find it much easier to grow your margins.
Do you know what a customer is worth to you at 90 days, by channel, by product?
If not, you're making six-figure ad decisions from a dashboard that can't show you what you actually keep.
What does your 90-day CM per customer look like right now?
Your agency is paid on ad spend.
You're paid on profit.
Those incentives don't align. And that misalignment is costing you more than your agency fees ever will.