Mike Cardona

Helping busy solo entrepreneurs save 30+ hours per month | Automate the tasks you hate, so you can spend more time doing what you love | Automation Alchemist 🧪

Are you working around the clock to keep your business afloat? From marketing to writing, accounting to customer service, you're juggling it all. It's exhausting.

You're not alone. This is a common struggle for solo-entrepreneurs and digital creators. The demands of your business often sideline the need for strategic focus and direction, leading to a vicious cycle of low-value tasks.

Don't blame yourself. When you're in the thick of running a business, finding time for growth planning can feel like a luxury. But what if it didn't have to be?

Imagine having:

• Simple but powerful automations.
• Streamlined workflows and systems.
• Time dedicated to strategic growth planning.

This is the promise of Hidden Levers. As a fellow solopreneur, I've walked in your shoes. Nine years ago, I was where you are now.

Today, I'm on a mission to help creative solopreneurs like you:

• Grow a profitable business without burning out.
• Do the work you love and enjoy.
• Achieve time-freedom.

Every Tuesday, I share actionable frameworks, resources, and tips that leverage AI/Tech tools so you can reclaim your time and do the work you enjoy—all in five minutes or less.

Ready to redefine your solopreneur journey? Click here: https://bit.ly/3PhJ8Vi

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Follow me as well for content on:

• AI
• Zapier
• Airtable
• Systems
• No-Code
• Automation
• Solopreneurship

Operations | Automation Alchemist | Writer

Empowering creative solopreneurs to save time and money by optimizing and streamlining their operations for maximum efficiency.

Hobbzi

Digital Strategy Director

Plentē Agency

Telling client stories that forge relationships and solve problems.

Director of Digital Strategy

Light & Line Creative

Whether it's a product, a service, or a piece of software, everything comes down to the story you tell...How does YOUR offering make THEIR life better?

I help you answer that question...over and over and over again in the simplest, most compelling way possible.

The result? Sales, conversations, conversions, relationships, and brand ambassadors that LOVE how you've made their life better!

Owner

𝗛𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗵𝗮𝗱 𝗮 𝗯𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗸𝗱𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗼𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗼𝗺?

I have, more times than I can count. 

I remember taking breaks from my cubicle, running to the nearest bathroom stall, locking myself in, and silently screaming into my hands because I felt like I couldn't take ONE MORE SECOND.

𝗜 𝗳𝗲𝗹𝘁 𝗦𝗧𝗨𝗖𝗞 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗿𝘂𝗲 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗿 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗮 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗼𝗻.

I hated my life and hated the exciting dreams I somehow kept dreaming for myself.

They felt almost like God mocking me...even though I know He wasn't. 

I was a dark place!

But, my pops "didn't raise no quitter" and 𝙄 𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙘𝙖𝙢𝙚 𝙢𝙮 𝙙𝙚𝙨𝙞𝙧𝙚𝙨 𝙩𝙤 𝙧𝙪𝙣 𝘼𝙒𝘼𝙔.

I fought through the dark seasons, leaned into the pain, and learned to 𝙙𝙞𝙨𝙘𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙧 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙋𝙐𝙍𝙋𝙊𝙎𝙀 behind these things.

I learned to rip away the messy junk and find the beauty and powerful motivation, the story, inside me that kept feeding me dreams and that helped me survive my darkest seasons.

In short, I learned how to get unstuck. From a dead-end career, from my lack of confidence, from burnout...and to create a truly incredible life and living that's EXACTLY what I dreamt of.

Now, I live my dream life and get to help others become UNSTUCK. 

𝐈𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮'𝐫𝐞 𝐟𝐞𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐭𝐮𝐜𝐤, 𝐚𝐝𝐫𝐢𝐟𝐭, 𝐨𝐫 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐢𝐧 "𝐈 𝐇𝐀𝐅𝐓𝐀 𝐆𝐄𝐓 𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐁𝐔𝐓 𝐃𝐎𝐍'𝐓 𝐊𝐍𝐎𝐖 𝐇𝐎𝐖," 𝐈 𝐜𝐚𝐧 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩 𝐲𝐨𝐮!

𝗦𝗵𝗼𝗼𝘁 𝗺𝗲 𝗮 𝗺𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗹𝗲𝘁'𝘀 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗲𝗱!

Michael Henson 🏔️

A wise man once said, "Agencies are going to agency..."

And I couldn't agree more.

Brand owners, agencies abound.

Their claims of legendary results abound even more.

Are they all crap? Nope. Some are though...

Here are three things I'd recommend any brand owner/builder focus on when it comes to marketing.

1. Avoid chasing "shiny."
2. Align expectations.
3. Define success.

If you find an agency that "feels" right when you meet, they can prove solid results, and you know they're in it for YOU and not their own bottom line, book'em!

Then follow the checklist above.

You'll be closer to success than most of your competitors.

Anything I missed?

Chasing what works, not what’s popular. Oh yeah, and making my clients money! 😎

There’s a phase almost every company hits where what used to work… stops working.

Not because the team got worse, but because the business outgrew its original growth engine.

What got you to $1M rarely gets you to $5M.
What got you to $5M won’t get you to $10M.

The uncomfortable part is recognizing when it’s time to evolve…before the plateau becomes a purgatory.

Growth favors those willing to reassess early and intelligently pivot into their next season.

The best ad campaign might be the one you're ignoring.

It's not about the size, it's about how effective it is. 🤓

For one of our SaaS clients, their most efficient acquisition channel wasn't their biggest campaign.

It was a small retargeting campaign most people would dismiss.

CPA: $13.78 
LTV:CAC: 8.85x

Their average customer lifetime value is $122.

That means every customer from this one "little" campaign returns nearly 9x what it cost to get them.

Everyone's hunting for the next big swing...

Don't be fooled or foolish.

Frequently, the data points somewhere smaller.

Imma hold your hand while I tell you this...

Patience is a marketing strategy.

Most brands spend 80% of their budget trying to find new people...

And they ignore the most profitable segment they have.

The result? Their warmest audience is sitting there unconverted.

Real numbers from a real-life brand:
➡️ Prospecting ROAS: 16.38x 
➡️ Retargeting ROAS: 24.51x

We see this gap in nearly every account.

People who already know your brand buy more often, cost less to reach, and return better margins.

Aggressively chasing cold audiences may seem sexy, but it's not a growth strategy.

It's avoidance.

Compound Growth comes from a funnel that's integrated and intentional throughout.

You probably don't have a traffic problem, you have a focus problem.

Check out this insanity right here.👇

One of our clients generated $504,076 in revenue from a single campaign.

12.29x return on ad spend.

Not from a new channel. Not from a creative overhaul.

From finding the product category that was already working and building a focused strategy around it.

Most brands scatter...it's human nature after all. 

If one thing works, multiple things will work "more better." 

Here's a truth gleaned from managing millions in ad spend:

Complexity is sexy...but simplicity scales.

$2,344,279 in revenue from $117,909 in ad spend.

19.88x average return. 11,364 purchases over 13 months.

Nobody wants to hear that results like this are boring to build.

No viral moment. No lucky campaign. No hot new platform.

Consistent optimization. Following the Compound Growth Protocol. Not switching strategies every time something else looked interesting.

Truthfully, most brands have the ingredients these days.

They just keep changing the recipe.

Spray & pray marketing…how’s that treating your bottom line? 😬

We’ve managed hundreds of thousands in ad spend, and most brands trip on the same first mistake:

They trust their own opinions more than the data.

Your customers already tell you what works with their wallets. That’s the signal.

Ignore it if you want. Just know it’s your revenue on the line.

Thoughts?

It's not rocket surgery. 

Profitable growth = customers worth more than what you paid to get them.

Just looking at metrics like ROAS doesn't tell you if they're coming back.

For one of our app clients, we track LTV:CAC (lifetime value vs. customer acquisition cost). 

Theirs is 4.3x. 

That means every customer acquired has a lifetime worth over 4x what we spent to acquire them.

It's super tempting to optimize for the first purchase rather than the relationship, but compounding growth is the goal. 

Anything else just feels like "rented revenue."

What numbers do you actually look at to know if your ads are working?

Spending more to acquire more customers is often the wrong move.

One of our e-commerce clients:

Average order value: $243.57 
Total purchases: 3,120 
Revenue: $759,931 
Ad spend: $79,267 
ROAS: 9.6x

This wasn't built by acquiring more people.

It was built by targeting the right ones and leveraging existing customer audiences.

One foundational truth from our Compound Growth Protocol is that the quality of an audience beats size of audience more often than most people want to believe.

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