Financial Plan & Acquisition Model

How many clients do I need, and what does it take to get them?

This document answers the operating questions behind the 12-month cash flow: how many clients, at what rate, and how much weekly activity is required to find them.

1. The revenue model

Model Ortho offers three ways for a practice to engage. All prices are set at the founding rate while the founding-client program is open.

For planning, founding clients are modeled at a blended $2,400/mo (the midpoint of Strengthen and Rebuild).

The 6-month founding contract is the bridge. It gets Model Ortho to break-even while the practice experiences the work, then the client either renews at the regular rate ($4,500/mo) or completes the engagement. The financial model below assumes the founding cohort converts to regular-rate clients or is replaced over the back half of year one.

2. Monthly break-even

Fixed monthly cost is $7,010, made up of:

• Owner draw: $5,000
• Healthcare, tooling, hosting, marketing: $1,675
• Contingency (20%): $335

Everything above $7,010 in a month is margin.

3. How many founding clients do I need to get started?

Three founding clients.

• 3 × $2,400 blended = $7,200/mo, which clears the $7,010 break-even.
• At the Strengthen rate it is 4 clients ($9,000); at the Rebuild rate it is 3 ($8,250).

Three founding clients is the number that makes Model Ortho self-supporting. The plan targets reaching three paying founding clients by month 6–7 of year one, with the first signed in month 3.

4. How many clients at the regular rate to hit monthly expenses?

Two clients at $4,500/mo = $9,000/mo, roughly $2,000 above break-even.

One regular-rate client ($4,500) is not enough on its own; the second one is what turns break-even into a cushion. This is the durable end-state: a small number of high-trust, high-value relationships rather than a large client count.

5. The conversion funnel (what rate am I shooting for?)

Two conversion rates matter. These are the targets:

These are targets, not guarantees. They assume a warm-network-first approach: starting from existing relationships, the SE orthodontist prospect list, and referrals before leaning on cold outreach. Pure cold outreach typically books at 2–5%, so the 10% target is only realistic if warm introductions lead the way. The 25% call-to-client rate is realistic for a strong, qualified conversation in a niche this specific.

6. How much activity to land one client

At a 25% close rate, one paying client takes four discovery/demo calls.

At a 10% book rate, four calls take forty outreaches.

So the unit economics of one client are:

• 4 discovery/demo calls
• 40 outreaches
• 1 signed client

7. Weekly activity targets

Steady state: one new client per month:

• ~1 discovery/demo call per week
• ~10 outreaches per week

That cadence lands roughly one client a month once the engine is running.

The ramp: reach 3 founding clients (break-even) over ~6 months:

• 12 discovery/demo calls total
• 120 outreaches total
• ~2 calls per month, ~20 outreaches per month, ~5 outreaches per week

The ramp is lighter than steady state because the first three clients come disproportionately from the existing network and referrals, where the booking rate runs well above 10%.

8. Sensitivity: if conversion runs conservative

If the call-to-client rate lands at 20% instead of 25%:

• One client takes 5 calls instead of 4
• 50 outreaches instead of 40
• Steady state becomes ~1.25 calls and ~12–13 outreaches per week

The model holds. It simply shifts the activity up one notch. The plan budgets conservatively so that even at the lower rate, three founding clients are reachable within the first six months.

9. The year-one shape

• Months 1–2: setup, the Wall engagement, and the first discovery calls. No paying clients yet.
• Month 3: first founding client signs.
• Months 4–6: two more founding clients (reaching three, break-even).
• Months 7–9: founding clients begin renewing at regular rate or rolling off; new clients fill the gap.
• Months 10–12: two-to-three regular-rate clients steady, with the model self-supporting.

By month 12 the practice has between two and four active clients, owner income clears the $50,000 bar in year one, and the business is at break-even on a recurring basis rather than a one-off one.

This plan accompanies model-ortho-cash-flow.xlsx, which carries the monthly detail, the funnel tab, and the three-year summary.