8. If I Were You: The Next 90 Days
The single most important thing
Find out by day 45 whether RCICs will switch for compliance. If they won't, stop.
- Segment: Canadian RCIC firms with 1–8 licensees, Ontario and British Columbia first.
- Job: "Keep every file College-ready: agreements, client money, updates and closure, done by the rules."
- How: sign an RCIC partner, run 20 calls, then sell a hands-on compliance setup (templates, a ledger sheet, checklists) for CA$99/month before writing product code. Automate only what you've done by hand for at least 5 firms.
The plan below works at ~15 hrs/week. Full-time targets are in brackets.
Week-by-week
| Weeks | Goal | Exit criteria |
|---|---|---|
| 1–2 | Partner and list. Sign an RCIC as advisor or co-founder. Pull 60 firms from the College's register (Ontario and BC). Draft a one-page call script. | Partner signed. 15 calls booked. |
| 3–4 | Discovery, and sell on the call. Ask each consultant: what software they use and pay, how they track client money and the 30-day rule, what their last complaint or near-complaint was, how they build the service agreement, and what would make them switch. Record answers word for word. At the end of each call, offer the hands-on compliance setup: a section-24 agreement template reviewed by your partner, a client-account ledger sheet with a 30-day flag, and a spousal-sponsorship checklist, at CA$99/month. | Day 30: 3 firms paying (5 full-time). Top 3 pains written in consultants' own words. |
| 5–6 | Finish the calls and run the kill test on day 45. Deliver the hands-on service to the paying firms and note every question they ask. | Kill test: ≥5 of 12 calls (≥8 of 20 full-time) rank agreements, client accounts or file records top 3, and ≥2 (≥3) say they'd switch. If it fails: stop. Plain No. |
| 7–10 | Build the thin v1 (web only, Canadian hosting): agreement builder with e-signature, client-account ledger with the 30-day flag, status-update log, 3 program checklists, client portal, file export. | Pilot firms move from the hands-on kit to the app. Every new file opened in it. |
| 11–12 | Free hook and first content. Launch the free service-agreement checker and 5 search pages on the rules. Migrate each pilot's open files for them. | 6 firms on the app (12 full-time). ≥60% of pilots active weekly. |
| 13 | Measure and decide. | 6 paying firms (12 full-time), all new files in the app, ≥1 measurable outcome per firm (hours saved per file, ledger items flagged, file export used). Hit it: go to Phase 2 of the roadmap. Miss it: cut to agreements and ledger only, and try once more. |
Kill criteria (write these down now)
- Day 30: no RCIC partner signed → stop and get one, or stop.
- Day 45: kill test failed → stop NicheCRM. Don't fall back to photographers or recruiters. Those niches score lower (02).
- Day 90: fewer than 3 paying firms (6 full-time), or pilots keep files outside the app → the wedge is wrong. Don't add features. Change firm size or program focus once, or stop.
The one thing to stop doing
Stop keeping six professions open.
A template engine that serves insurance agents, mortgage brokers, recruiters, photographers, planners and consultants is GoHighLevel with fewer features. Every week spent keeping options open is a week not spent learning whether one profession will pay. Choose RCICs, or choose none.
A close second: stop thinking of it as a CRM. Consultants don't buy "a CRM". They buy files that survive a complaint, and a way to stop chasing clients for documents.
What stays on the long-term roadmap (only after proof)
- Invoice builder with section-33 rules, and QuickBooks export.
- Staff-supervision log and roles reporting for Practice and Firm plans.
- More program checklists, and multilingual intake.
- French and Quebec (Law 25).
- IMM form help, only if pilots rank it top 3.
- A second country (Australian registered migration agents), only after $10k MRR in Canada.