When speaking of a prospective client on a call, how do you gauge which size account or team setup is appropriate for them?
That's a philosophical thing. You're terrified of something, and so you're running away from it. Does that really seem like a sustainable way to live your life? You're probably going to run into issues and things that you are terrified of in the future. And if you make a decision now to set the precedent of running away from them, how is that going to benefit you moving forward? If you are terrified of doing something, almost by definition, you should try doing it. Is this the straightest line path to making money? No. I don't do the cold calls these days, as I've mentioned a number of times, but the obstacle is the way. If you have an issue, you should tackle that issue head‑on. You should at least try to do that at least once, maybe at least 10 times. That's my recommendation. So, it is not better to create an automated product and sell it using ads and content. I would make sure you know how to do this first before you try doing anything else.
Happy to share. This is my sales script. I won't give the whole script here, but if you want more, head over to Maker School for a month subscription—you'll get assets, including this in month one, and more assets if you stay for months two and three. I also guarantee you'll get your first client in 90 days if you follow the program. I'm pretty lax about the requirements; for example, I once refunded a girl who only did 30 Upwork applications in three months due to financial difficulties. The point is, as long as you're reasonable, there's very little risk. I'll give you the first two sections: I start by building rapport, then I always set the schedule. Setting the schedule is important—I'll say something like, 'You get a ton of cold outreach every day; you probably got 10 emails in the last 5 minutes. What made you want to click on mine? What was the reason we're talking right now? Was it the positioning, messaging, or just right place, right time?' From there, they'll usually tell you how to sell them. You take that insight and use it to proceed with the rest of the process and actually sell them. Definitely check out Maker School if you want more of that. Hopefully that helps.
The number one way to acquire clients in the current year is not through posting vague things on social media. It’s by finding people who suffer from problems you can actually solve, quantifying how big those problems are in terms of revenue or savings, and then proactively solving those problems for them. After a few days, reach out and say, "Hey, I’ve been solving a problem that’s costing you $10‑20k a month. Do you want me to keep doing it? Here’s proof." That’s the most effective method today. It’s hard, which is why most people don’t do it. It’s easier to sit behind a laptop, blast LinkedIn or YouTube with generic content, but that won’t make money. To scale, you eventually build a personal brand, but to start you just have to reach out to people individually.
The fastest way to make money is to sell more to people who are already buying from you—either upselling existing customers or offering complementary products to past buyers. If you have a list of past clients, start there and try to extract as much revenue as possible. If you lack even that, go completely cold but back your offer with a very strong guarantee, such as promising $20 k a month in revenue for the next 60 days and charging $3 k (about a 7× ROI) with a full money‑back guarantee. This approach works even if you’re not a natural salesperson, assuming you grasp a few fundamentals. For delivery, use highly scalable outbound platforms like Upwork initially, then add cold email and cold DMs.
Outsourcing sales is a mistake; the sales skill is the only lever that will matter over the next five years, and agents can quickly learn the technical side, so you’d give away leverage and end up with roughly 30 % of the profit instead of 70 %. Sales is far more valuable than the technology itself—consider Netflix versus an AI‑generated clone: the clone lacks Netflix’s customer list, marketing, vendor relationships, and licensing, which are all distribution assets. Therefore, your focus should be on acquiring clients through cold outreach, not content creation or paid ads. Paid ads exchange money for time, which you don’t have; content creation also trades time for a delayed, uncertain payoff that could leave you without income for months. Instead, become excellent at cold outreach. Think of it as skipping the beginner zone in a game and fighting a level‑99 dragon: defeating one grants you twenty levels and lets you crush the beginners. Alternatively, cold outreach lets you sell your skills directly (one step) versus the longer path of building a skill, then a brand, then products, then sales. You’ll earn less in the long run but far more in the short term, which fits your one‑year goal to reach €3 k/month.