The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started
Back to feedPost
A small HVAC business owner called me.
Revenue was up 40%.
His bank account had more money than ever.
Everyone told him:
"You're crushing it."
But he wasn't sleeping.
Something felt wrong.
So I started reviewing the books.
Then I noticed something strange.
Revenue went up every year.
Profit went up every year.
But cash flow never improved.
Why?
His customers were paying slower every year.
Year 1: Invoices paid in 18 days.
Year 2: Invoices paid in 31 days.
Year 3: Invoices paid in 52 days.
On paper, the business was growing.
In reality, he was financing his customers.
The lesson?
Many business owners think growth creates cash.
Sometimes growth destroys cash.
A business can die while looking successful.
That's why I don't just look at revenue.
I look at how fast cash comes home.
The network for creativity
Join 1.25M professional creatives like you
Connect with clients, get discovered, and run your business 100% commission-free
Creatives on Contra have earned over $150M and we are just getting started
Related posts
In the mountains, not seeing the road ahead is dangerous, and business works much the same way. This concept deck for an AI consulting firm shows clarity arriving step by step, from black fog to a sharp peak. What does clarity look like in your work?
Very nice 👍🏻
Most founders don’t need a better brand deck.
They need to stop losing weeks to back-and-forth.
I run brand and positioning sprints,
so this might sound odd coming from me.
But hear me out.
Good strategy still dies inside a messy process:
↳ Feedback buried in email threads
↳ A logo “approved” on a call, reopened three weeks later
↳ Nobody sure which file is final
Most delays I see aren’t creative problems.
They’re process problems.
So every client gets a private portal:
→ One page per phase, with its own comments
→ Contract and brief that lock once you tick approval
→ Invoices visible only to you and one or two people you choose
→ A Loom walkthrough on day one
If you’re hiring a brand partner, ask:
1 → Where will my feedback live?
2 → What happens after I approve?
3 → Who can see my invoices?
If the answers are “email,” “we’ll see,” and “everyone,” expect delays.
Strategy gets the credit.
Process protects your timeline.
Take a look at the process demo here.
P.S. What slows you down most when working with an agency or freelancer: feedback, approvals, or handoff?
founder delays kill more brand projects than bad design does honestly
A client messaged me with a launch date 9 days away and a Kajabi sales page that wasn’t finished. The developer before me had left in the middle of the project.
I opened the page and found the sections didn’t match each other. There were three different fonts, the pricing block was half built, and the checkout button went to a page that didn’t exist yet. Nothing was wrong enough to need a restart, but nothing could go live either.
I spent the first day writing a list instead of building. What already worked, what was broken, and what would stop a buyer from paying. The layout stayed. The pricing section I rebuilt from scratch, the fonts I fixed across the page, and I connected the checkout and the emails that go out after someone buys.
Before it went live I bought my own course through every path to make sure the access email arrived. It did, and the client launched on the date she wanted.
This isn’t the first unfinished Kajabi project I’ve picked up, and it won’t be the last. After 5 years on the platform I know where these builds usually break: checkouts, automations, and access emails. If you’re stuck with a half-built page and a launch date, send me a message. Most of them are closer to done than they look.
