Across industries and offers, the revenue figure stated in an ad comes back at roughly half in the submissions it produces: advertise to business owners doing $50,000 a month and the average applicant does about $25,000. So the number in the creative has to be double the merchant you actually want. To fill a funnel with $30K-a-month merchants, the ad says $60K.
This one is odd, and it has held across every industry and every offer we have run. Whatever monthly revenue the ad names, the people who submit average about half of it.
| The ad says | Submissions average | Who you were after |
|---|---|---|
| $30K a month | About $15K | Not the merchant you wanted |
| $50K a month | About $25K | Borderline |
| $60K a month | About $30K | The floor most funders want |
| $100K a month | About $50K | Larger files, thinner volume |
Nobody has a proof of why. The most likely reading is that a revenue figure in an ad is read as a ceiling rather than a floor — a merchant doing $28K sees “$50K a month” and reasonably decides they are in range — and that self-reported revenue on a form rounds up at the small end and down at the large end. Whatever the mechanism, it is stable enough to plan on.
It also means a creative that names the small merchant on purpose — “doing $20K a month?” — is not a targeting choice. It is a decision to fill the funnel with $10K merchants, most of whom nobody can fund.
About double the revenue you actually want to see on the application. Submissions average roughly half the number in the creative, so an ad aimed at $30K-a-month merchants should say $60K.
Nobody has proved it. The likeliest reading is that a stated revenue is read as a ceiling rather than a floor, and that self-reported revenue rounds up at the small end. The pattern has held across every industry and offer we have run.
We have measured it on revenue, which is the figure that decides whether a file can be placed. Treat other stated numbers with the same suspicion until your own data says otherwise.
No. The band on the form is the floor a funder will accept, and it stays there. The rule is about what to put in the ad so that enough of the people who arrive clear it.
Not in practice. A merchant doing $30K reads “$60K” as being in range, which is precisely the behaviour the rule describes. The ones scared off are the $8K merchants, and that is the point.
We will tell you straight up if we cannot help you. No commission deals, no free trials, no chasing you for three weeks.