What advice would you give to someone working full-time with only 3-4 hours per night to start a profitable business, and is it effective to target leads in an earlier time zone (Pacific) while being on Eastern time?
What a great question. Regarding your Pacific Standard Time question, if you work 6 – 9 PM Eastern, that’s 3 – 6 PM Pacific, so you can book meetings then; it’s not a problem. Now, for your main question about working full‑time with only 3-4 hours a day: Yes, it’s feasible. In fact, everything needed to start this business can be done in 2-3 hours a day, so your 3-4 hour window is more than enough. Having limited time is actually an advantage because it forces you to focus on revenue‑generating activities and constantly ask whether each task moves the needle. To compete with people who have 8-12 hours, you must make each hour two to three times more effective by always checking if your work is generating revenue. Think of it like being dropped into a mid‑to‑high difficulty area in a game right away—you level up much faster than if you stayed in the beginner zone. Most of the core activities I discuss take only an hour or two a day, leaving you extra time to build the rest of your business.
Yeah, I do think you could absolutely spend three to four hours per day. But if you're only doing it on weekdays, you must understand that you're only spending 15 to 20 hours per week on this thing, which is presumably one of the most important things to you. I understand a lot of people here are limited in time. In a way, being limited in time could be positive because it forces you to be very efficient and effective with your time. But you will have to put in some time regardless if you want to achieve your goals. If you're unwilling to put more than just three to four hours per weekday—which is really what you're doing—keep in mind weekdays are only five-sevenths of the week. The probability of growth and the rate at which you grow will of course be slower. So I guess it's just about how quickly you want to hit your goals. If you want to hit your goals fast, you want to escape the permanent underclass. Is three to four hours a day going to do it for you? I don't know. Anyway, hopefully that makes sense.
Well, you ended up joining anyway—just kidding. For anyone else here, I'd recommend a couple of hours, maybe two to three hours per day. The first couple of days might be a bit heavier: day one could be three to four hours, day two two to three hours, then from day three onward it settles to about two hours a day, maybe a little more. Some people take longer at the start, but that's okay. The reason this works quickly is that lead generation and outreach strategies become fast with practice because I make you do a lot of them. Regardless of initial timing, you'll eventually gravitate to a two‑to‑three‑hour daily workload, which most people can fit in. A core part of the program is daily accountability and habit tracking—not just learning a specific lead gen tactic or setting up automations. It's like going to the gym but for money: you show up daily, track your habits, and build consistency. Regarding money, it's hard to give a fixed number because it scales with how much outreach you do. My suggestion is about ten Upwork applications a day and roughly two thousand cold emails in the first month. In practice, most people end up spending an extra $100‑$150 per month on things like Upwork fees or cold‑email tools, due to limiting beliefs that hold them back. The beauty of Maker School is that the capital outlay is low: you spread the cost over three months, and the time to see results is short compared to typical businesses that require a big upfront spike with uncertain payoff. You also get discounts via coupon aggregators and my affiliate links, so give it a try.
Treat the extra hours like a gym session. You won’t get 12× the results by working 12 hours straight; you’ll see diminishing returns after a point. Focus on the high‑impact, money‑making activities—outreach, lead‑generation, and sales—that deliver roughly 80 % of your results. Fill your calendar with those tasks, execute them efficiently, and you’ll accomplish the vast majority of what you need to move the business forward.
I don’t follow a strict hour‑by‑hour schedule, but my day mirrors a typical agency pipeline. I start with lead generation—cold email, Upwork, LinkedIn, communities, trade shows—whatever brings in prospects. After generating leads, I move them to sales calls, then kickoff calls, fulfillment, and finally retention/follow‑up. I recommend structuring your day the same way: begin with lead gen for one or two hours, then handle sales calls (especially early if you’re just starting), followed by onboarding/kickoff calls, then fulfillment (one to two hours), and finish with retention/follow‑up tasks. I use this framework daily; it’s essentially the same whether I’m scaling or just starting. To maximize reputation (my lead‑gen proxy), I focus on community management and inbox zero, then create content (which also generates leads), then fulfillment, and finish with light admin. I always front‑load the highest‑ROI activity—lead gen—when my mind is fresh and energy is high, then work down the stack.