What I Built
American Recipes Association started as a direct-response content play in the food and recipe niche. I built the full acquisition stack from the ground up — Facebook ad creative, audience targeting, funnel architecture, offer sequencing, and backend monetization — and operated it for three-plus years as a self-funded business.
The core loop was cold Facebook traffic → ClickFunnels landing page → front-end offer → order bump → upsell sequence → Shopify subscription or membership product. I tested hundreds of creative variations, audience segments, and offer structures to find what actually converted. The winning combinations scaled to sustained positive ROAS across the account. Ad spend peaked above $220K managed, generating over $738K in tracked revenue.
I also built the full content and email backend: recipe content production pipeline, subscriber email sequences, membership retention flows, and Shopify product catalog management. Every funnel was built to a specific job — front-end acquisition, upsell capture, or member retention — and measured against clear conversion benchmarks before scaling spend.
This was not an agency engagement. I owned the ad account, controlled the Stripe billing, managed the Shopify store, and made every creative and budget decision directly. The business ran lean with no paid team — systems and automation handled what would otherwise have required headcount.
Facebook Ad Account — Campaign Performance
Full ad account campaign view from Meta Ads Manager. Shows active and historical campaigns, spend distribution, and performance across the account lifetime. $220K+ in managed spend across recipe content acquisition campaigns.
Winning Ad Creative
The best-performing ad creative from the account. Direct-response copy and recipe-native imagery drove cold traffic at scale. This creative format was identified through structured split testing and became the primary scaling vehicle for the account.
Shopify Store — Revenue Analytics
Backend Shopify analytics covering the store's revenue history from 2023 through 2026. Products included recipe cookbooks, digital downloads, and subscription membership plans. Shopify handled fulfillment and billing; ClickFunnels drove the acquisition side.
Funnel Architecture — 500+ Funnels Built
ClickFunnels was the primary conversion layer between ad click and Shopify purchase. Over 500 funnel variants were built and tested — front-end offers, order bumps, OTO upsells, downsells, and member areas. The structure below describes the core acquisition loop that scaled.
// Core acquisition funnel — the primary converting structure at scale Step 1 Facebook Ad // Cold traffic, recipe-native creative, interest/LAL targeting Step 2 Landing Page (CF) // Recipe opt-in or low-ticket front-end offer ($7–$27) Step 3 Order Form + Bump // Order bump adds 20–35% to average order value Step 4 OTO Upsell #1 // Recipe collection bundle or digital cookbook ($37–$97) Step 5 OTO Upsell #2 / Downsell // Membership offer or discounted variation Step 6 Confirmation + Shopify // Order routed to Shopify; email sequence triggered Step 7 Email Retention Flow // Membership upsell, re-engagement, and LTV extension // Variants tested: 500+ funnel builds across offer price points, copy angles, sequences // Traffic sources: Facebook (primary), organic (secondary) // Billing: Stripe via ClickFunnels + Shopify Payments
Business Outcomes
Operated as a fully self-funded, solo-run direct-response business. No outside capital, no agency partners, no paid team. Every metric reflects real spend and real revenue from a business I owned end to end.