Day 274: May Recap $195K in Sales & 50% Upsell Lift

Nine months into a 360-day journey to $240K in online course sales, May delivered some genuinely encouraging data — but also a honest reminder that revenue and profit don't always move in lockstep.

- Sales are $15,000 ahead of target at $195K cumulative, but profit is trailing by around $23K.

- A new upsell page using the 'Mylin Method' is showing a near 50% conversion lift over the control in early testing.

- Cost per purchase dropped from £14.43 to £10.12 in the last seven days thanks to fresh ad creative.

- Average cart value jumped from ~$44.76 across May to $53 in the most recent seven-day window.

Where We Stand After Nine Months

It's Day 274, which means we're now entering the final three months of this journey. Cumulative sales have hit $195,000 against a target that — on a perfectly even trajectory — would sit at $180,000.

Being $15K ahead feels good, but I'm keeping realistic about what's still to do.

Profit tells a different story. We're at just under $67,000 in profit to date, against a target of around $90,000. That's a meaningful gap.

Closing it completely in three months is probably a stretch, but we're going to push hard and see how close we can get.

April vs May: A Closer Look at the Numbers

One of the most useful exercises is comparing months side by side rather than just looking at raw totals. April and May were remarkably similar on leads — 367 versus 366 — which tells me the top of the funnel is stable.

Where May pulled ahead was in front-end sales, front-end profit, and average order value. AOV moved from $42.61 to $44.76, and overall profit came in at $55K versus $47K in April.

That's roughly a 10% uplift in profit month on month, which is solid forward momentum.

The Profit Margin Trend

Profit margin has been on a bumpy ride. We started strong in September, watched it drift, took a real hit in March when Meta threw up all sorts of problems and I had to essentially rebuild the campaigns from scratch.

Since then it's been a steady climb: April came in at 35% and May moved up to 38%. Still not where I want it, but the direction is right.

The 60-day customer value is currently sitting at $73, which is a useful anchor for working out how hard I can push on ad spend.

New Ad Creative: The Mylin Method

About six days ago I launched four new static image ads built around what I'm calling the Mylin Method — a framework that's now threaded through the ad copy, the main offer page, and the upsell.

The goal is message congruency: the prospect sees the same core idea from the moment they encounter the ad all the way through the funnel.

The early results are striking. Over the last seven days, cost per purchase has fallen from £14.43 to £10.12 — a drop of around 30%. Some of that is Facebook finding a better audience; some of it is the creative doing a better job.

Either way, it frees up margin.

The Upsell Page Split Test

This is the result I'm most excited about right now. I've been running a new upsell page — aligned to the Mylin Method — against my long-standing control page.

After the first six days, the new page is showing close to a 50% lift in upsell conversions.

I need to be honest about the sample size: we're working with around 10 sales at this point, so I'm treating this as very encouraging early signal rather than confirmed fact.

Upsell pages take longer to test properly because only buyers ever see them. But the direction is clear, and it reinforces the value of message alignment across the whole funnel.

Why Average Cart Value Is the Number to Watch

The jump in average cart value from $44.76 in May overall to $53 in the last seven days is largely being driven by that upsell improvement. More customers taking the upsell means more revenue per transaction without needing more leads.

If I can sustain or improve that, it changes the maths on how aggressively I can scale ad spend. A higher AOV means I can afford a higher cost per acquisition and still hit my profit targets.

Scaling the Ad Budget

I've just increased the daily ad budget by 10%, taking it to £250 per day. But realistically, to get back to the revenue levels I was hitting when I was generating around $25K a month in sales, I was spending closer to £500 per day.

We're at half that right now.

The question I'm testing through June is whether I can squeeze more profit from a smaller budget before scaling, or whether pushing spend harder is the faster route to closing that profit gap.

I'll be tracking every step and sharing the data as we go.

What's Coming in June

The priorities for the next few weeks are clear: let the upsell split test run long enough to get statistically meaningful data, keep refreshing ad creative to avoid audience fatigue, and make a calculated decision on when to step up the budget further.

Yesterday's revenue came in at $897 on roughly $300 in ad spend — $600 in profit for the day.

That's the kind of performance that makes scaling feel like the right move. The race is on for the final three months.

Nine months in, the journey is genuinely at an inflection point. The fundamentals are improving — margins are up, creative is converting better, and the funnel is more aligned than it's ever been.

The profit gap is real, but so is the momentum.

Let's see what June brings.

Resources & Next Steps

Free Top 10 Split-Tests: https://www.jonathanhowkins.com/split-testing

Join the Facebook community: https://www.facebook.com/groups/coursecreatorads

Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@jonathanhowkins-coursecreator?sub_confirmation=1