Your offer builds your audience

Hey there!

Quick announcement before we dig into today’s topic:

Last week I announced my first Profit Accelerator Masterclass. By this Thursday, it was at capacity. Whew!

I’m stoked (and honored) to be in a position to help a room-full of business owners develop wedge offers that scale their business.

If you’re part of this group, I can’t wait to roll up our sleeves together!

If you hoped to join but missed out, no sweat! I’ve already announced the next one.

This session will fill up, too.

.. now onto today’s topic …

Ever hear this advice?

Sounds logical. But they don’t understand the real reason business owners like you and I launch courses and other introductory wedge offers.

Spoiler: It’s not to kick back and watch online sales roll in from your yacht. Well, OK, that may actually happen… but there are other, more immediate benefits.

But if you follow their shitty advice, you’ll wait to launch once you have enough followers. Meanwhile, you’ve missed out on months and years of the best audience building asset available.

Disagree? You’ll want to read till the end.

Where does this bad advice come from?

1. Marketers with bad intent, who want you to spend all of your money on branding, positioning, social, websites, SEO, PR, and ads — the best marketers merge these assets/channels with wedge offers

2. Fortune cookies that were hijacked by malicious AI bots that just want to see the world burn (wait, what?)

3. People who’ve never built a low-ticket offer and insist their expertise can’t be packaged and productized — gotta love this group…

They believe their expertise could never be packaged into any format that doesn’t involve them being in the room with their clients, bestowing their genius.

And so you’ll hear them say things like, “Online courses are spammy snake oil!”

Don’t get me wrong, there are many throw-up-in-your-mouth-a-little courses.

50% are from side-hustlers throwing shit together while managing their day job. The other 50% from 20-somethings picking up a skill on Monday and selling a masterclass on Friday.

But that’s not you. And that’s not what you’re gonna create.

You’re also not a side-hustler…

Business owners vs side-hustlers

We’re business owners. We’re not a side-hustlers. And for the love of God, we’re not creators.

FYI, I’m saying this out loud for myself to hear, because for my first year building Profit Ladder, I thought I was a creator.

[Jersey accent] I ain’t. [/Jersey accent]

And neither are you.

Side-hustlers and creators are playing a different game based on volume. They’re chasing passive revenue streams.

Their goal is to build a business that’s powered by low-ticket offers, sponsorships, and affiliate deals. And so they need a massive audience to win.

There’s nothing wrong with this kind of business. It’s just not who you are, and not the metrics you need to win.

You need a handful of clients per month. Not 100,000 TikTok followers.

And so the primary function of your wedge offer is to attract ideal clients, faster and easier. They buy your $200 toolkit to validate that your signature offer is the thing they need.

In the same time they would have wasted in your competitor’s pitch meeting, they’re using your toolkit to get their own wins, with minimal time-to-value.

Who would you buy from… the consultant/coach who talks about how great they are, or the one who proves it?

When and why to build your wedge offer

When you initially launch your business, audience building (marketing) and wedge offers are the last thing you should be worried about. They’re fast-tracks to burning through cash and stalling out.

Your first and only priority is to bring in enough cash to say afloat.

Your best bet? Deliver active services where you do a thing and get paid for it. In parallel, you hone the same expertise that you’ll productize next.

Once cashflow is stable enough, carve out 20% of your energy to develop your wedge offer — even especially if your audience is tiny.

Your offer builds your audience

I’m finally ready to make my point!

Here’s why your wedge offer helps you grow your audience:

• It forces you to package your knowledge into something clear and actionable

• It generates endless content ideas from the frameworks, examples, and tools you create

• It sharpens your niche, messaging, and positioning while boosting your expertise

Suddenly, audience building feels less like a struggle and more like a strategy.

You’re not just chasing likes or going viral — you’re sharing clear, proven stories and strategies for a well-known problem for an audience that will come to you. Once they do, you’ll have an offer that’s easy to understand and easy to buy.

And since it organically leads to your higher-ticket services, the customers who get fast results from your $200 course are now far more likely to invest in your premium offer.

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🪜 Caitlin offers 2-day design intensives for women coaches & consultants who want a brand and website that position them as a go-to expert.

🪜 Everyone always asks me about the video conferencing tool I use. It’s Butter and it’s WAY better than Zoom.

🪜 Orbit writes professional, revenue-driving newsletters for you.

See ya next Sunday 🤘🏼

P.S. Want to speed up sales of your consulting or coaching services?