Modern Creator
Adam Erhart · YouTube

Build This Once, Sell It to Every Local Business ($297/Month)

A one-person agency walks through the exact three-text 'Review Engine' he sells for $297 a month: check-in, compliant review ask, and a reminder that catches everyone the first two messages missed.

Posted
yesterday
Duration
Format
Tutorial
educational
Views
7.1K
401 likes
Big Idea

The argument in one line.

A single automated three-message text sequence, built once inside a CRM like HighLevel, can turn any local business's forgotten customer list into a steady stream of Google reviews and become a $297-a-month retainer service sold to every business in town.

Who This Is For

Read if. Skip if.

READ IF YOU ARE…
  • You're a solo agency owner or freelancer who wants one simple, recurring-revenue service to sell instead of a confusing menu of options.
  • You already have access to a CRM/automation tool (or are willing to get one) and want a concrete script and workflow to copy.
  • You're comfortable cold-approaching or upselling local businesses like roofers, dentists, med spas, or auto shops.
SKIP IF…
  • You're looking for a passive, hands-off income idea, this still requires client acquisition and account setup work.
  • You need enterprise or B2B strategies, this is built specifically around brick-and-mortar local businesses.
TL;DR

The full version, fast.

A one-person agency can sell a single $297-a-month service to local businesses: an automated Review Engine that fixes what looks like a quality problem but is actually a remembering problem, customers who had a good experience but were never asked to leave a Google review. The system runs three texts inside a CRM like HighLevel: a no-ask check-in, a compliant review request sent to everyone (avoiding illegal review gating), and a reminder that catches procrastinators. A one-time reactivation campaign mines the business's old customer list for fast wins, and automatic AI responses to incoming reviews build trust and search rankings. Price it at $200-300 a month, keep it to one clear offer, and don't bundle other services on day one.

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Chapters

Where the time goes.

00:0000:48

01 · Cold open / the promise

States the core promise: forget websites/ads/social, the underused lever is Google reviews, and viewers will learn the system plus what to charge.

00:4801:36

02 · Why one clear offer beats selling everything

Personal story of pitching a roofer nine services at once and losing the sale; a confused client doesn't choose, they leave.

01:3602:09

03 · The recurring revenue math

8-10 clients at $297/month is close to $3,000/month recurring while software cost stays flat.

02:0903:12

04 · The remembering problem

Reframes the review shortfall as a remembering problem, not a quality problem, introduces the Review Engine name.

03:1203:47

05 · Message #1: the check-in

First text is a plain check-in with no link, starts a real conversation and surfaces problems early.

03:4705:14

06 · Message #2: the compliant review request

Same review link goes to every customer regardless of check-in response, avoiding illegal review gating; personalization detail explained.

05:1406:48

07 · Message #3: the reminder

The most-skipped message drives the most reviews; system skips it if the link was already clicked.

06:4808:19

08 · The reactivation campaign

Mining a business's old customer list via a slow drip campaign, typical 8-15% conversion to new reviews.

08:1909:25

09 · Automatic review responses

AI-personalized responses to incoming reviews build trust and search ranking, on a 10-15 minute delay.

09:2510:48

10 · Why clients keep paying

Pricing math against one extra job's value; social-proof rivalry as a hidden retention driver.

10:4811:39

11 · Why owners outsource this

Time-value argument for outsourcing plus profile of the best long-term client.

11:3913:24

12 · Two mistakes to avoid + close

Warnings against pricing cheap and bundling services, closes with the HighLevel trial and Agency OS template pitch.

Atomic Insights

Lines worth screenshotting.

  • Most local businesses aren't sitting on a quality problem, they're sitting on a remembering problem: nobody asks for reviews consistently.
  • 10 clients paying $297 a month is just under $3,000 in monthly recurring revenue, while the software running it stays flat at $297 a month no matter how many clients you add.
  • Sending every customer the same review-request link regardless of their check-in response is what keeps a review campaign compliant, routing only happy customers to Google is 'review gating' and against Google's rules.
  • The first message in a review sequence should be a plain check-in with no link and no ask, it starts a real conversation instead of begging for a favor.
  • The third follow-up message is the one most agencies skip, yet it generates the largest share of total reviews because people mean to leave one and then get busy.
  • A past-customer list is a hidden asset: dripping review requests to old customers at 2-3 every 20 minutes typically converts 8-15% into new reviews.
  • A business sitting on 500 old customers can generate 40-75 new reviews in a few weeks just by mining a list it already owns.
  • Personalizing a review request with both the customer's and the business owner's first names makes it read as a real person reaching out instead of a mass text.
  • Charging under $100 a month for a service like this is a race to the bottom, price it at $200-300 a month minimum instead of competing on cheapness.
  • Bundling five services on day one overwhelms a new client; selling one problem, one solution, one price is what actually gets a yes in the room.
Takeaway

One text sequence turns forgotten customers into steady Google reviews.

WHAT TO LEARN

Most local businesses don't have a quality problem, they have a remembering problem, and a three-message automated sequence plus one list-mining campaign fixes it without any new marketing spend.

01Cold open / the promise
  • The video frames Google reviews as the single highest-leverage, most overlooked service almost any local business already needs.
02Why one clear offer beats selling everything
  • A client who's handed a nine-item service menu tends to get overwhelmed and disappear instead of choosing anything.
  • One offer for one price removes the decision paralysis that kills local-business sales conversations.
03The recurring revenue math
  • Ten clients at $297 a month is nearly $3,000 in monthly recurring revenue while the underlying software cost stays fixed regardless of client count.
  • Because the system is built once and resold, each additional client is close to pure margin.
04The remembering problem
  • Businesses don't lack quality, they lack a system that reliably asks happy customers for a review.
  • Reframing a review shortfall as a visibility problem rather than a quality problem changes how a business owner hears the pitch.
05Message #1: the check-in
  • The first message after a job is a plain check-in with no link and no request, which starts a real reply instead of triggering a sales-pitch reflex.
  • Any problem a customer raises in the check-in gives the business a chance to fix it before it ever reaches a public review.
06Message #2: the review request
  • The compliant version of a review request goes out to every customer with the same link regardless of how they responded to the check-in.
  • Only sending the review link to customers who signaled they were happy is review gating, which breaks Google's policies.
  • Using both the customer's and the business owner's first names makes an automated text read as personal rather than mass-sent.
07Message #3: the follow-up
  • The system checks whether a customer already clicked the review link and skips the reminder if they did, avoiding double-asks.
  • The follow-up reminder is the message most people skip, yet it captures the reviews from people who meant to respond but got busy, often the largest share of the total.
08The reactivation campaign
  • A business's old invoice and booking list is an unused asset, every past customer who was never asked for a review is a review the business should already have.
  • Dripping requests to old customers at 2-3 every 20 minutes, not a single mass blast, keeps the campaign looking natural and preserves response rates.
  • Typical response rates on a reactivation campaign run 8-15%, meaning a business with 500 past customers can expect 40-75 new reviews within a few weeks.
09Automatic responses
  • Turning on automatic AI-personalized responses to incoming reviews (10-15 minute delay) removes the last manual task from the business owner.
  • Google's algorithm favors businesses that actively respond to reviews, and prospective customers trust listings where every review gets a reply.
10Why clients keep paying
  • The pricing pitch reframes cost against value: if the system brings in just one extra $5,000 job a month, a $297 fee is an easy yes.
  • Business owners also want visible social proof over competitors, which is a retention driver even if it's never said out loud.
11Why owners outsource this
  • Business owners could technically run this themselves, but their time is worth more spent on their core work than manually texting past clients.
  • The best long-term clients are often ones who already tried DIY tactics (table cards, verbal asks) and watched them fail to stick.
12Two mistakes to avoid + close
  • Never price this service cheap to win a client, competing on price invites a race to the bottom against people willing to do worse work for less.
  • Don't bundle five services on day one; selling one clear problem and one clear fix is what makes the initial close easy, with upsells coming later once trust is built.
Glossary

Terms worth knowing.

HighLevel
A CRM and marketing-automation platform used to build and run the review workflows, texts, and auto-responses described in this video.
Review gating
Screening customers before asking for a review, e.g. only pushing happy customers toward a public review link, which violates Google's review policies.
Drip campaign
Sending outreach messages in small, spaced-out batches over time instead of all at once, so the activity looks natural rather than automated.
Reactivation campaign
Reaching back out to a business's past customers, from old invoices or bookings, to request reviews they were never asked for the first time.
Resources

Things they pointed at.

03:47toolHighLevel
12:50productAgency OS
Quotables

Lines you could clip.

00:27
These businesses are sitting on maybe 20 reviews when they should have 300.
clean stat-driven hook lineTikTok hook↗ Tweet quote
01:00
Nine options are confusing and overwhelming to a client, and a confused client doesn't choose, they leave.
sharp one-liner on offer simplicityIG reel cold open↗ Tweet quote
02:30
That is not a quality problem. That is a visibility problem pretending to be a quality problem.
the core reframe of the whole pitchnewsletter pull-quote↗ Tweet quote
05:55
People don't remember perfection. They remember how you handled that bump in the road.
quotable on customer-service recoverynewsletter pull-quote↗ Tweet quote
06:50
Most local businesses are sitting on an absolute gold mine that they forgot they even owned.
reframes the reactivation-list opportunityTikTok hook↗ Tweet quote
11:20
The best long-term clients... already tried to fix this themselves but failed.
insight on ideal-client selectionIG reel cold open↗ Tweet quote
11:45
You never want to be the cheap option. That is a lose-lose race to the bottom.
pricing-discipline warningTikTok hook↗ Tweet quote
The Script

Word for word.

Read-along

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metaphor
00:00There's one simple thing that you can set up one time and then sell to almost every local business in your town or any town. The dentist down the road needs it, so does the roofer, the med spa, the auto shop, the chiropractor. And it's not websites, it's not ads, it's not social media either.
00:16It's Google reviews. Specifically, helping local businesses get more and better reviews for their business.
00:22Because right now, of these businesses are sitting on maybe 20 reviews when they should have 300. They do great work, Google just doesn't show it. So here's my promise.
00:31By the end of this video, you will know how to install one system that gets a local business a steady stream of real Google reviews every week all on its own. And you'll know how to charge 200 to $300 a month to keep it running. I wanna be straight with you about why I'm showing you this one instead of something flashier.
00:47When I first started my agency, I tried to land my first clients by offering everything. I'm talking logos and websites and ads and social media, the whole menu. I remember sitting in a coffee shop at 2PM on a Tuesday with a roofer and I slid across this service list with like nine different services and watched his eyes completely glaze over.
01:05He told me he would think about it but he never called back because nine options are confusing and overwhelming to a client and a confused client doesn't choose, they leave. Since then, I've built three different 7 figure agencies, worked with over 1,500 small businesses, I've run thousands of campaigns and today, I do it all as a one person agency with zero employees.
01:25And the thing that finally worked for me was doing the opposite of that overwhelming menu approach and instead offering just one service that solves one problem for one price. And the reason that Google reviews work so well as that one service to offer is the math underneath it. So, I'm gonna put it up on screen here so you can see it for yourself.
01:4310 clients at $2.97 a month is just under $3,000 a month recurring and the software that runs all of it stays at just $297 a month whether you've got one client or 100. Which means, you get to build the system once and then you can sell the same system again and again and again.
02:02I call the whole thing the review engine and it's just three simple messages in one campaign. That's it. Now, here's the thing that most people get backwards.
02:09They think that these businesses have a review problem but they don't. What they have is a remembering problem.
02:16The business owner forgets to ask for reviews, the staff forgets to ask, the customer means to leave a review but then they forget as well. So the business does great work all week long but then Google sees pretty much none of it. That is not a quality problem.
02:30That is a visibility problem pretending to be a quality problem and the review engine fixes all of that with just three messages. Not 30 automations, not some complicated funnel, just three simple texts and the first one is the part that most people get wrong.
02:45So let me show you the exact words to use here because the wording matters more than most people realize and small changes here create surprisingly large differences in how many people actually respond. Now, the tool I use to run all of this is called HighLevel. It's the software I've used to build and run all of my entire agencies for the past six plus years and this is where we're going to build the review engine.
03:06So let me show you the first message now because it's the part that most people get wrong. The first message is not a review request, it's just a check-in and it goes out after the job is done and it says this, hey Sarah, this is Mike from ABC Roofing.
03:20Just checking in to make sure everything looks good with the work we did today. That's it. There's no request, there's no link, you or your clients in this case are just being a good business and most customers reply with something like, looks great.
03:33Thanks. What's important here though is that you've started a real conversation instead of just begging for a favor. Then after that, the second message goes out which happens either once they reply or a couple of hours later if they don't.
03:45What's important here though for compliance reasons and more on this in a second is that this message goes to everyone and this is the actual review request. Hi, Sarah. Mike here from ABC Roofing.
03:56Just wanted to say thanks again for the opportunity to work with you. If you have thirty seconds, would you mind sharing your experience in a quick Google review? It helps other customers know they can trust us.
04:05Now, there's one small detail that's doing a lot of work here which is that this message uses the customer's first name and the business owner's first name. This way, it doesn't read like a mass text sent to everybody. It looks like Mike sent it to Sarah himself and when a review request feels human, people actually respond.
04:22Shocking. I know. Now, here's something that I need you to get right because this is what's going to keep you on the compliance side of Google's new rules.
04:30Essentially, every customer gets the same second message with the same Google review link. Same link, same process no matter what they said in the check-in. You're not sending happy people to Google and unhappy people somewhere private.
04:42That's called review gating and it's not allowed. Everyone is eligible to leave a review and that's what keeps you compliant. Now, fortunately, the way that this system and strategy are designed is that something good happens naturally which is that if somebody replies to that first check-in and has some kind of issue or problem, let's say the gutter near the garage is still dripping.
05:02Well, now your client knows about it and they can fix it. This is important because the customer whose problem got handled and got handled fast, they're the ones that often leave the best reviews of all. People don't remember perfection.
05:14They remember how you handled that bump in the road. Okay. Then the third message goes out.
05:19This is the one that pretty much everybody skips which is crazy because it generates the most reviews of all three. The system we're using here is smart enough to check whether the person already clicked the review link. If they did, the system stops so nobody gets bothered twice.
05:32But if they didn't, because let's be honest, people are busy and sometimes we forget things, well then it sends one gentle reminder. Here's how it goes. Just a quick follow-up.
05:41If you haven't had a chance yet, we'd really appreciate a quick Google review. It helps others know they can trust us. That reminder is where a huge share of the reviews actually come in.
05:50I mean, saw the first request, they meant to do it, but then life happens. That nudge catches them at the right moment, so do not skip the third message. People aren't ignoring you, they're just busy.
06:00Now, if all of this talk of automation makes it sound overly complicated, here's the good news. You do not need any of it to get going. You can send the check-in messages manually, same with the review link, then just set a reminder to follow-up a few days later as well.
06:14The strategy works with or without the software. The software just makes it happen every time instead of when somebody remembers. And here's the part that makes this even easier.
06:22You don't have to build any of this from scratch. I'll give you my exact system to copy straight into your account, but more on that in just a minute. Because now, I wanna tell you about the part where business owners start to fall in love with you.
06:33Not in a creepy way, but more in a, I genuinely can't imagine running my business without you anymore. You may be the greatest thing that's ever happened to me kind of way, which now that I say it out loud, still sounds kind of creepy. Anyway, the very first campaign that I run with pretty much every new client is what I call a review reactivation campaign.
06:49You see, most local businesses are sitting on an absolute gold mine that they forgot they even owned. Every old invoice, every past booking, every customer they served years ago is a review that they never asked for. These are people who already paid them and already had a good experience and were just never asked to leave a review, which means you can now go back in time and turn all of that goodwill into new reviews that the business should have had years ago.
07:15And how you do it is shockingly simple. Just grab that existing customer list or you can have them get it for you from wherever their business already keeps it. Could be their booking software, their invoicing system, QuickBooks, whatever they use.
07:28Then upload that list into the system we're using and slowly drip out the review request to those past customers. The key here is to drip out those requests at a steady pace, not all at once. I'm talking two or three every twenty minutes or so during normal business hours, not blasting out 1,500 review requests all at once which looks unnatural and it's not gonna give you nearly the same results.
07:49Now typically, depending on the business, eight to 15% of them will go ahead and leave a review for your client. So picture a business with just 500 past customers. Well, that's 40 to 75 new reviews in the first few weeks alone.
08:01For a business that was sitting on just 23 reviews, in about a month, they've gone from invisible to very competitive and that right there is your case study. That is what makes that owner tell every other business owner they know about you and how great you are. Okay.
08:16Let's keep going because once these reviews start coming in, you turn on one more thing that takes your service from nice to have to can't believe how amazing this is and that thing is automatic responses. Inside HighLevel, you go to the reputation settings, switch on the AI auto responses and then select the wait time before responding.
08:34My suggestion here is to use ten to fifteen minutes. Now, every time that a review comes in, a thoughtful personalized response goes out within a few minutes without the business owner lifting a single finger. And that matters for two reasons.
08:46First, Google's algorithm favors businesses that actively respond to reviews, so it's gonna help them rank higher in the search engines. And second, when a potential customer is scrolling through the listings and they see a business responding to every single review, that builds real trust. And a business that responds is going to get the call over a business that's got reviews just sitting there, getting ignored.
09:07Now, same as before, you can do this part manually as well. I mean, you don't have an AI response tool yet, you can just set aside twenty or thirty minutes a week to write the responses yourself on behalf of your client. What matters is that the reviews get answered because responding to reviews is a service that businesses need to do but they just don't do it.
09:25The software only makes it instant and easier and make sure that it never gets forgotten. So step back and look at what you've built. The system requests reviews from new customers and it responds to every review that comes in.
09:36It also reaches out to previous customers and requests reviews that should have been captured but never were. And all of this is running in the background all month long. That is the entire service and that's why they pay you every single month, never stops working.
09:49But now, let's talk about price. Let me show you why $297 a month is an easy yes from the business owner's side because once they see the math, paying you feels obvious.
09:59Let's say that you're working with a roofer. Well, their average job is worth somewhere around $5,000. If this system helps them rank higher and brings in just one extra customer a month, that is $5,000 in revenue compared against the $2.97 that they pay you.
10:13The math here is intentionally unfair in your client's favor, which is exactly where you want to keep it if you want them to keep paying you month after month. Not to mention, once they've got 200 plus reviews and they're showing up in the search results like the map pack, they tend to get a whole lot more than just one extra customer a month.
10:29There's also something that I never say aloud to a client but it is real. Business owners wanna look better than their competitors. They wanna be the one with more five star reviews than that place down the street.
10:40Now, you don't have to mention it. You just have to know that this is part of why they stick around as well. Now, you might be thinking, okay Adam, if this is so simple, why don't they just do it themselves?
10:49Well, here's something I've learned after more than a decade of doing this and working with more than 1,500 small businesses. It's not that they couldn't do it, most of them could. It's just that their time is worth far more running their actual business and closing jobs and managing their crew than it is sending follow-up texts after every appointment.
11:05So, they'd much rather hand it off to someone for two ninety seven, $3.97, even $4.97 a month, never have to think about it again. And the best long term clients that you're ever going to get are the ones who already tried to fix this themselves but failed.
11:18They bought the little top cards, they put up a sign that says leave us a review, they told their staff to ask but none of it stuck. So when you reach out to them with a system that runs on its own, they're grateful because they finally get to stop thinking about it and people happily pay to stop thinking about things. Okay.
11:34I've got two important warnings for you before you go do this. Warning number one, when you're new you're going to be tempted to go in cheap to charge $50 or to lower your price to do them a favor just to get the client. Well, don't do that.
11:47You never want to be the cheap option. That is a lose lose race to the bottom. There's always somebody out there who's willing to do a worse job for less money.
11:55What you are is the person who installs the one system that makes a business look as good online as it actually is. So you wanna price it like that. 2 to 300 a month minimum.
12:04Warning number two, do not bundle this with five other services right on day one. The whole reason this works is that it is one clear solution to one obvious problem. When you're just starting out, the instinct is to pile on services so the offer feels more valuable.
12:18Well, fight that urge. You wanna sell the reviews, get the results, then the next service becomes an easy yes later down the road once they already trust you. I'm not joking here.
12:27If you lead with a menu of services, you're gonna end up just like I did in that coffee shop, watching client after client promise to think about it just so they could make their escape. Now, you wanna build this, the system I just walked you through runs inside HighLevel. It is the only software I run my entire agency on.
12:43I've set up an extended thirty day free trial for anyone watching and you can copy my entire agency setup called Agency OS straight into your account in about sixty seconds. The trial, all the templates, all the worksheets and scripts, everything is linked in the description. Tap that, start the trial and you can have your review engine built tonight.
13:00Then once you have that first client paying you every month, the next question is pretty much always the same. What do I add to take them from $2.97 a month to a thousand or 2,000 or more? Well, that is the whole one person agency model and I put together a free training that walks through exactly which services to stack, in what order and what to charge and I've got that linked up right here.
13:20So feel free to tap or click that now. I'll see you in there in just a second.
The Hook

The bait, then the rug-pull.

The video opens with a blunt promise: forget logos, websites, ads, and social media, the one service every dentist, roofer, med spa, and auto shop already needs is more Google reviews, and there's a three-message system that gets them automatically.

Frameworks

Named ideas worth stealing.

03:12list

The Review Engine

  1. Message 1: check-in
  2. Message 2: compliant review request
  3. Message 3: reminder follow-up

A three-message automated text sequence that requests and captures Google reviews from new customers without ever violating Google's review-gating rules.

Steal forany local-service or agency onboarding sequence that needs automated review generation
06:48concept

Review Reactivation Campaign

Dripping review requests out to a business's existing past-customer list at a slow, natural pace instead of a single blast.

Steal forany list-mining campaign where you want organic-looking outreach at scale
CTA Breakdown

How they asked for the click.

VERBAL ASK
12:50product
I've set up an extended thirty day free trial for anyone watching and you can copy my entire agency setup called Agency OS straight into your account in about sixty seconds.

Soft CTA woven into the final chapter after all the value is delivered; positions the free trial plus template copy as a shortcut rather than a hard sell.

Storyboard

Visual structure at a glance.

cold open
hookcold open00:00
one clear offer
valueone clear offer00:52
revenue math
valuerevenue math01:31
message 1 workflow
valuemessage 1 workflow03:10
reactivation setup
valuereactivation setup06:53
auto responses
valueauto responses08:13
pricing warning
valuepricing warning11:33
close / CTA
ctaclose / CTA13:19
Frame Gallery

Visual moments.

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