Courtlin had been through five marketing agencies. Every one of them got him low-budget leads for $10-20K projects. Within his first season with us, he closed a project over $100K from a Facebook ad.
In Courtlin's words: "Before then we used maybe five agencies, and I felt like I was just throwing money in the fire because we would get a bunch of leads, but the leads weren't high quality so they really didn't mean anything."
Before working with us, Evanston Landscaping was selling $10,000 to $20,000 projects. The agencies he'd tried generated leads, but they were price-conscious homeowners looking for small jobs. Not the affluent North Shore buyers he needed.
Evanston Landscaping serves Wilmette, Winnetka, Kenilworth, Glencoe, and the surrounding North Shore suburbs of Chicago. These are neighborhoods with $800K+ homes and homeowners who want premium outdoor living spaces. None of the five agencies had figured out how to reach that buyer.
The problem wasn't lead volume. It was lead quality. Courtlin's minimum project is $10,000 and his sweet spot is $20-50K+. But the leads from previous agencies were homeowners shopping for the cheapest bid on small jobs.
He'd never closed a large project from paid advertising. The big jobs always came from referrals. Five agencies had tried to change that and failed. Paid ads were supposed to open up a new pipeline of high-ticket work, and all they'd delivered was low-budget inquiries that didn't justify the sales time.
As Courtlin put it: "If you want to step up your game and stop dealing with leads who don't have the money to afford the project that they're looking for" — that was exactly the gap he needed filled.
We started in June 2025. Built ads showcasing Courtlin's best work — outdoor kitchens, patios, full backyard transformations — targeted specifically to affluent homeowners in his North Shore service area.
The landing page had a qualification flow. Homeowners answered questions about their project scope, budget range, and timeline before they could book. If someone was looking for a small job below his minimum, they never made it to his calendar.
We set up automated follow-up and a booking system so every qualified lead landed on his calendar with confirmation messages. And we built out his CRM so he could track every lead from first click to closed project.
The shift was immediate. Within the first season, Courtlin went from closing $10-20K projects to quoting and closing jobs worth $70,000, $80,000, and over $100,000 — all from Facebook and Instagram ads. That had never happened with any of the five previous agencies.
In August 2025 alone — just his third month — he did $115,000 in total revenue with $90,000 of it coming directly from ads. Three projects, all at significantly higher ticket sizes than anything he'd closed from paid marketing before.
In November, he closed a single project worth $87,000 — 100% from ads. The kind of project that used to only come from referrals was now coming through his ad pipeline.
For the full year of 2025, Courtlin generated $310,000 in revenue directly from ads on just $8,900 in ad spend. That's a 34.8x return. 117 leads, 50 estimates booked, 16 projects closed.
Courtlin is still a client. In March 2026, he hit $115,000 in total revenue in a single month with 12 projects closed. His 2025 total revenue reached $700,000, with nearly half coming from ads.
His focus is on outdoor kitchens — the highest-margin projects his team builds. He told us: "I want to focus on selling outdoor kitchens because they are very profitable and my team enjoys building them." The ads are dialed into that market now.
He's targeting $1M this year. His satisfaction rating has been 5 out of 5 every single month he's reported. He's offered to write a review multiple times.
The biggest change is the kind of work coming through the door. Courtlin isn't chasing small jobs anymore. He's building premium outdoor living spaces for affluent homeowners on the North Shore — the work he wanted all along.
"Before then we used maybe five agencies, and I felt like I was just throwing money in the fire because we would get a bunch of leads, but the leads weren't high quality so they really didn't mean anything. If you want high quality leads, if you want someone that communicates with you, sends you text messages, calls you, Zoom calls, and creates high quality content and ads, I definitely recommend digital contractors."
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