Two years into building an automation agency alongside my consulting job I have three clients generating $20K revenue—one from Upwork, one from cold email, and one referred from that cold email client. The cold email ROI is great but relying on a single client per month isn’t repeatable. I’ve built several AI tools (SEO generator, social post generator, meeting summary tool, product copywriter) and have healthy inboxes but almost no meetings. I’m considering a productized, done‑for‑you service helping CFOs get invoices paid faster. Should I scrap the current model and go all‑in on one narrow offer, or does having only three clients in two years indicate something else is broken? Also, am I not doing enough outreach?
I think the core problem isn’t the offer itself but the amount of outreach you’re doing. Based on the numbers you shared you’re probably doing far fewer outreach actions than a typical agency—maybe 24 × less than you think. If you tally every email, DM, call, or LinkedIn message you sent in the first month you’ll see you could have done many more. The growth equation is simple: more outreach equals more leads, which equals more clients. So before you scrap the model, double‑down on consistent, high‑volume outreach (cold email, LinkedIn, etc.) and track those metrics. Once you have a reliable pipeline you can decide whether to specialize, but the immediate fix is to increase outreach dramatically.
Great question. I should make it abundantly clear that when you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. My hammer is cold email, so I try to solve every problem with it. Cold email isn’t always the most effective marketing method, but it’s like a video game where you keep playing the main character because you’re best at it. I would definitely use cold email. I’d start by pitching these SMA agencies. I’d go to Apollo and filter for 1‑11 staff, looking for digital marketing, digital agency, or creative agency. I’d use the OR operator to pull as many as possible—probably a list of 30 k to 50 k in the United States alone. Then I’d blast out my offer with the software, giving a free demo. I’d position it as if I’d read the person’s whole life story and built the software just for them. I’d mention that I’ve been following what they’re doing at [their company] and that I used to run a digital marketing agency (maybe I still do). I’d share that I’m suffering from XYZ problem and that this software is the solution I came up with. I’d want to put it in front of them to see if it has value. I’m 100 % confident that running their clients through my system will generate outsized returns, so much that I’m willing to guarantee it and give it away for free just to hear their thoughts. If they’re open to a quick call, we could jump on it. I’d approach this at the higher‑agency level, positioning myself as an agency owner talking to agency owners, not as a SaaS person trying to sell something. I’d get on as many calls as possible and frame them almost as partnerships: give them a trial of the software, let them solve their current problems with it, then use that feedback to improve the software faster and better. Once I have a ready‑to‑go version, I’d charge premium prices. And yes, I’d go straight cold email, starting with agencies because they tend to have more money than SMBs.
The ceiling is virtually unlimited. The reason why is because cold email is quite productizable — there are only a couple of steps that really require a lot of human intellect and muscle. A quick example of how you could productize a cold email agency so you get almost unlimited output for the same fixed input: you could automate the process of buying domains, which is achievable via API endpoints. You can automate setting up mailboxes, also achievable via API endpoints or browser automation. You can automate finding offers that have worked really well for clients in similar verticals — presumably if you wanted to productize a cold email agency you'd just work with people in the same vertical, then copy and paste those offers, make minor context-dependent modifications, and run them. You can automate the process of replying, and you can automate iterating and managing that. Now you shouldn't automate everything, but when it comes to productization and scaling to 70K a month or more, you typically just need the same inputs done very similarly over and over again with minor modifications. Cold email agencies are probably one of the simplest and easiest ways to do so — that's a major chunk of the revenue that got me to over $70,000 in a month. So just productize the hell out of things across the stack. But note that when you start an automation agency you typically do custom work across a big swath of different client verticals and niches, and that's pretty difficult to scale to 70K a month. So typically what you have to do is close it down to a subset of those niches, sell a subset of the products you're currently selling to that subset of niches, and in that way make everything really similar over and over and over again.
I think we should start by clarifying terminology: I wouldn’t consider someone a client until they’ve paid money—or at least committed to paying for something, like a software subscription. Until money changes hands or an agreement is signed, it’s not a real client. Many people think a deal is closed when the prospect says yes, but it’s not truly closed until they sign or, better yet, pay the invoice. Saying yes is different from actually paying you. You said you started automation in November, learned it in two months, and since January you’ve only got two clients in the process of closing. Over roughly 60–70 days, if you’d done a daily outreach minimum—say 10 personalized Loom videos a day via Upwork, DMs, Instagram, X, etc.—you’d have contacted about 700 people. Yet only two showed interest, which is about 0.3% (2 out of 700), or roughly 1 in 350. That’s extremely low; to get one ‘yes’ you’d need to hear roughly 349 ‘nos’. If you’d done consistent, reliable outreach using the mechanisms I show in Maker School and on my channel (daily Loom videos, etc.), even if you were terrible at it, it would be statistically unlikely to get so few results. Typical response rates are around 2%, which would be about eight times better than what you’re seeing. So you likely reached out to far fewer people—maybe around 80 total, or about one per day. To improve, first be very clear about what ‘closed’ means—wait for payment or a signed agreement. Second, set a clear daily outreach minimum, like sending 10 customized Loom videos a day on platforms such as Upwork, Instagram, X, or via DM. Third, standardize your sales process: use a repeatable roadmap (like my ‘Roadmap to $25k a Month with Automation’) that funnels prospects into a meeting, then a sales call, then a detailed proposal or scope of work, and follow the same steps each time. Doing this builds infrastructure you can iterate on—run it for 10 clients, tweak, run another 10, and you’ll see conversion rates improve. That’s what I’d do if I were in your shoes.
I would invest it entirely in lead generation. If you're not investing your money in lead generation, what else are you investing it in? Sure, marginal expenditures will happen for things like client fulfillment and growing your team, but if you're a beginner, the only thing that really matters is how many people see your brand, book meetings with you, and decide to close. So your priority is maximizing the top of the funnel. Three simple ways to do that: First, spend some money on Upwork applications—it's a vetted marketplace where people have raised their hands saying they want to pay for someone good at this. It's easy to stand out; you don't need to compete with thousands. Just ask yourself what makes you different and how you can show that differentiation makes you better suited than the other 50‑ish people they'll scroll through. Reply rates are around 10–20% in Maker School, which is high. Second, run a cold email campaign sending high‑quality, templated but AI‑customized outreach to people in your target market who have a higher‑than‑usual probability of needing what you offer. Think of it as a soft version of putting your hand up: these folks aren't raising hands yet, but they might soon, and you'll catch them as they do. Third, use an inbound approach like joining communities, becoming an authority in your niche (home services, HVAC, digital, PPC, etc.), which helps fill gaps your outreach methods might miss.
lead generationupworkcold emailinbound communities