He couldn't close a single client for eight months. Then he built a $2.1M agency. How Adam McChesney relaunched Builders of Authority on HighLevel and turned an enforced pause into a $2.1M year

Note: This case study reflects one user's experience. Results vary and are not typical.

Adam McChesney woke up on March 1, 2024, completely out of the company he'd spent three years building. A legal battle tied to a non-compete had ended his partnership at a digital marketing agency and the same dispute meant he couldn't sell marketing services to anyone.

Not a website. Not an SEO retainer. Not a single client call.

He'd been here before, in a smaller way. In 2018, while selling CPAP equipment for ResMed, he'd typed "how to make money online" into Google after a retargeted apartment complex ad stopped him mid-scroll.

That curiosity turned into a $7,000 course, and over the next two years he built roughly 200 lead-generation websites on the side, giving leads away for free while he kept his day job.

By the time he went full-time in July 2020, he had 200 live case studies and no revenue to show for most of them.

This time was different. He wasn't starting from a hotel room with a side hustle. He had a legal document telling him he couldn't use any of it.

The challenge: The eight months he couldn’t sell anything

For most of 2024, Adam ran Builders of Authority, a personal branding mastermind he'd started in late 2023, as the only outlet available to him. He coached agency owners, ran group calls and kept posting content daily. What he didn't do was stop.

"When we relaunched, there was already a strong pipeline of business owners who were ready to work with us," Adam says. That pipeline didn't build itself in the days after the lawsuit settled. It built over eight months of a founder with nothing to sell, showing up anyway.

The frustration wasn't just financial. Adam had already built and exited an auto glass company from a rank-and-rent website, coached more than ten agency owners and grown a previous agency location to $1.7M in a single year. He knew what scale looked like. He just couldn't touch it.

The solution: Rebuilding with HighLevel as the foundation

When the lawsuit settled in October 2024, Adam relaunched Builders of Authority as a full-service agency for contractors and home service businesses, the niche he already understood from his own auto glass, roofing and landscaping client history. This time, HighLevel wasn't a tool he'd bolt on later. It was the foundation from the first client.

"HighLevel wasn't just another tool. It was an operating system for running and scaling a digital marketing business," Adam says of the platform he'd first been introduced to back in 2020, before spending several years away from it while working inside a franchise that ran on Salesforce instead.

The rebuilt offer structure locked HighLevel into every recurring package:

• Presence: $1,750/month + $500 setup

• Demand: $2,750/month + $1,000 setup (SEO, Google Ads, Facebook Ads)

• Authority: $3,750/month + $1,500 setup (SEO, Google PPC, Facebook Ads, HighLevel)

Every subscription tier requires SEO and HighLevel as the base layer, whether the agency runs it or the client does elsewhere.

Inside HighLevel, the team builds landing pages, automations, follow-up sequences, calendar bookings and listings, reviews and reputation management.

Then it integrates with whatever field or project management system a client already runs, tools like JobTread for contractors managing their own job pipelines.

The relaunch started with two people: Adam and one executive assistant.

The result: From zero client revenue to a $2.1M year

The rebuild generated roughly $500,000 in the first four months after relaunch, October through December 2024.

That momentum carried straight into 2025, the first full calendar year of the relaunched agency, which closed at $2,167,902 in gross income and $567,187 in net income.

Team headcount tells the same story from a different angle: two people at relaunch, seven by the start of 2025, more than 30 by year-end and 35 today.

The agency now serves 85 active paying clients and worked with over 100 businesses across the year, with current monthly recurring revenue sitting around $200,000.

What happens when you refuse to sell a client without HighLevel already built in?

Adam didn't rebuild Builders of Authority by working longer hours or chasing a hotter niche. He rebuilt it by refusing to sell a single package that didn't require HighLevel from day one.

Today, that rule supports an agency that closed its first full year back at $2,167,902 in gross income, run by a team that grew from two people to 35.

That same rule extended past the client roster: every one of Builders of Authority's three subscription tiers, from the $1,750-a-month Presence package to the $3,750-a-month Authority package, still requires SEO and HighLevel as the base layer, whether the agency runs it or the client does.

"You have to be doing SEO and HighLevel, either through us or on your own. We won't do it otherwise."

Read the full case study to see the exact pricing behind Builders of Authority's three subscription tiers, how a two-person restart scaled to a 35-person team and the five lessons Adam says any agency owner can apply today.

Disclaimer: The results shared in this case study reflect the experience of one HighLevel user and are not typical or representative of what other users may achieve. Builders for Authority's growth and revenue outcomes are specific to their unique business model, market and execution. Revenue figures represent gross revenue during the stated period and do not reflect expenses or net profit. HighLevel makes no representations, warranties or guarantees regarding potential earnings, client growth or business success. This content is for illustrative and informational purposes only and does not constitute a business opportunity, franchise offering or earnings guarantee. Past performance does not predict future results and individual results will vary significantly.