I’m going to start with a mistake that probably cost me a couple hundred thousand dollars.
When I launched my ghostwriting business, I told people I could help with “websites, social media, and copywriting.” The vaguest positioning in the world. The result was predictable: I attracted a little bit of everyone, which meant I attracted no one consistently.
So I got specific. I niched down to CEOs. My LinkedIn headline became: I write posts for CEOs. Better, right? CEOs are busy. They don’t have time to post. I solve that.
Except here’s what happened: I attracted founders who didn’t have time and didn’t have budget. The niche wasn’t the problem. The altitude was.
What I Mean by Altitude
I was describing the problem I solve at ground level:
“You’re not posting on LinkedIn consistently. Let me help you with your content.”
That’s a ground-level description. It starts with absence. It implies the reader isn’t doing something they should be doing. It positions me as the solution for someone who’s behind.
Now here’s how I describe the same service today:
“I help $2–50M ARR CEOs turn 30 minutes a month into LinkedIn posts and articles that attract talent, close deals, and open doors.”
Same service. But I’m describing the problem from a completely different altitude — one where the reader is already successful, already busy doing things that matter, and the problem isn’t that they’re failing. The problem is that a specific constraint is keeping them from winning bigger.
That shift in altitude changed my entire business.
Ground-Level Descriptions Attract Ground-Level Buyers
When I described the problem at ground level, “your LinkedIn is collecting dust,” “you’re invisible online,” “you’re not posting consistently”, who raised their hand?
People who were stuck. People at the beginning. People in survival mode who needed someone to save them.
They’d book calls, love the conversation, and then say some version of: “This sounds amazing, but I just can’t swing it right now.”
I kept thinking the issue was my pricing. Or my sales skills. Or my offer structure.
It was none of those things. It was the altitude of my language.
Ground-level problem descriptions attract people who are at ground level. They’re looking for a rescue. Every dollar matters. They’re making decisions out of urgency and scarcity. You’re not just competing with other service providers — you’re competing with their rent, their payroll, their next crisis.
That’s a brutal place to sell from.
What Happens When You Climb
When I moved the description higher, when I started talking about the problem the way a successful CEO actually experiences it, everything changed.
I didn’t saying: “You have no content strategy.”
I started saying: “You’re closing deals, but you’re invisible between conversations. When investors and partners Google you before meetings, the story they find doesn’t match the business you’ve built.”
The underlying problem is identical. The CEO needs to show up online. But the altitude of the description determines who recognizes themselves in it.
A CEO running a $10M company doesn’t think of themselves as someone whose “LinkedIn is collecting dust.” They think of themselves as someone who’s busy building something real. When they read a ground-level description, they think that’s not me and scroll past.
But when they read “you’re closing deals but invisible between conversations” — that lands. That’s how they actually experience the gap. They see themselves in it.
Higher altitude descriptions don’t change what you sell. They change who sees themselves as the buyer.
The Altitude Check
Whenever I write positioning copy now, for myself or a client, I run it through three questions:
Where are they? → What’s blocking them? → What are they losing?
The first question forces you to start with the buyer’s current reality, not a deficit. The second names the specific ceiling they’ve hit. The third makes inaction expensive.
If your copy doesn’t answer all three, your altitude is too low. Some examples beyond ghostwriting:
Financial advisor:
Ground level: “Struggling to save for retirement? We can help.”
Higher altitude: “You’re earning $400K+ (where they are) but your wealth isn’t compounding because you don’t have a tax-efficient investment strategy (what’s blocking them). You’re losing six figures a decade to a problem you don’t even see” (what they’re losing).
The first attracts someone who hasn’t started. The second attracts a high earner who’s doing well but leaving serious money on the table.
CRM company:
Ground level: “Your sales process is broken.”
Higher altitude: “Your sales team is executing (where they are), but data lives across five different tools (what’s blocking them). Reps spend 15 minutes per call re-explaining context that should already exist — at 20 calls a month, that’s 5 hours of executive time wasted on something a system should handle” (what they’re losing).
Executive coach:
Ground level: “You need help with leadership.”
Higher altitude: “You’re great at running the business (where they are), but you’re not visible to the people who decide the next opportunity (what’s blocking them). Your competitor just landed the board seat you wanted because they’re known and you’re not” (what they’re losing).
Notice the pattern: you’re not inventing a problem. You’re describing a real constraint at a higher altitude — one that an established buyer immediately recognizes as their own.
Why Higher Altitude Works
This isn’t a trick. It’s just how self-selection works. People read your marketing and ask themselves one unconscious question: Is this for me?
Ground-level descriptions answer that question for struggling buyers. Higher-altitude descriptions answer it for established ones. Both are honest. Both describe real problems. But they invite different people into the conversation.
And the established buyers? They’ve already invested in themselves. They’ve hired coaches and consultants before. They have discretionary income. They’re not asking “Can I afford this?” They’re asking “Is this the right solution for where I’m trying to go?”
That’s a fundamentally different sales conversation.
What Changed When I Made This Shift
Three things I didn’t expect.
The quality of inbound changed overnight. I stopped getting inquiries from founders who wanted to “post a few times on LinkedIn.” I started hearing from CEOs who said things like: “Our market presence is the bottleneck, and I need infrastructure to fix it.” Budgets went up because I changed who I was talking to.
Sales cycles collapsed. Discovery calls went from 45 minutes of convincing to 15 minutes of logistics. When you describe the problem at the right altitude, the right buyers recognize themselves immediately. They don’t need to be sold. They need to know you understand their situation better than anyone else.
Close rates roughly doubled. I wasn’t manufacturing demand. I was capturing demand that already existed. The people booking calls already had the budget, already felt the constraint, already knew they needed help. My job was just to prove I understood the problem.
How to Raise Your Altitude
Step 1: Audit where you are now.
Pull up your homepage, LinkedIn bio, and your last few sales emails. Read every sentence where you describe the problem you solve.
One question: Am I describing what’s missing, or what’s being constrained? Here’s the test. If a buyer with real budget reads your copy, do they think:
A) “I don’t have that problem” — because you’re describing ground level and they’re past it.
B) “That’s exactly my situation” — because you’re describing a constraint they feel right now.
If it’s A, your altitude is too low for the buyer you want.
Step 2: Study your best clients.
Think about the three clients you’ve loved working with most. The ones with budget, patience, and good outcomes. What were they already doing well before they hired you? Don’t think about what they needed fixed. Think about what was already working.
For my best clients: they’re speaking at conferences, building teams, closing deals, scaling revenue. They’re not struggling. They’re succeeding — with one specific constraint.
Step 3: Name one constraint.
For my clients: they’re invisible to their market between live conversations. Everything they’ve built lives in the room. Nothing exists between rooms. That’s it.
For a CRM company: their sales team is executing, but data is scattered across five tools and it’s costing them hours every week.
For an executive coach: they’re running the business well, but not visible to the people who decide the next opportunity.
Be specific. Vague constraints don’t create urgency.
Step 4: Make the stakes real.
This is where most people stop too early. They name the constraint but don’t put a price tag on it.
Don’t say “you’ll attract better talent.” Say: “Your competitor just hired the VP of Sales you wanted because their CEO has 40,000 LinkedIn followers and you have 900. Talent follows momentum.”
Don’t say “you’ll be more visible.” Say: “When investors Google you before meetings, that’s the story they find — or don’t find. You’re losing leverage before the conversation starts.”
Make the cost of the constraint specific, tangible, and hard to ignore.
Step 5: Rewrite one thing.
Don’t overhaul everything at once. Pick your homepage headline, your LinkedIn bio, or your most recent outbound email. Rewrite it by answering the three questions:
Where are they? → What’s blocking them? → What are they losing?
Test it. See what happens to the quality of conversations that come back. One change, one week.
The Bottom Line
The reason most service businesses struggle to attract premium clients isn’t that they’re not good enough at what they do. It’s that they’re describing the problem at an altitude where the right buyer doesn’t recognize themselves.
Ground-level descriptions attract ground-level buyers. Higher-altitude descriptions attract buyers who are already in motion and have the budget to invest in solving the constraint that’s holding them back.
Good luck climbing.
