THE FLYWHEEL
THIS WEEK IN THE ROOM
The referral that keeps firing after you stop promoting
Dina Colada on making a business impossible to ignore. Plus the Checklist Handoff, a two-minute Platform Tip, and this week’s picks From the Deck.
THE ISSUE
Most cross-promotion is a moment. You post, your partner posts, a few people click, and by Thursday it’s gone.
The problem isn’t the size of anyone’s audience. It’s that the promo has an expiry date built in.
This week’s play fixes that by putting your partner somewhere permanent — the page people land on right after they’ve already said yes to you. It keeps working while you’re asleep, and it takes a few minutes to set up.
Also inside: Dina Colada, who has spent her career finding the money businesses are leaving on the table, and a two-minute fix to your card most members haven’t made yet.
Short read. Real founders. Let’s go.
From LA To Morgantown. How Dina Colada Is Turning Real-World Business Wins Into a Creative Growth Strategy
Dina Colada didn't start her career as a creative growth strategist by reading marketing textbooks or attending business seminars. She built multiple six-figure food and beverage brands, wrestled with real bottlenecks, tested ideas that flopped, and celebrated wins that changed everything. It was in those trenches that she discovered what actually makes businesses grow, and that hands-on experience is now the foundation of her work helping companies get noticed, get customers, and make more sales.
"I've been in the trenches figuring out how to get people to stop, pay attention, and actually buy," Dina says from her office in Morgantown, West Virginia. "I'm not just teaching marketing theory. I built my own business, I've made mistakes, I've had big wins. That's what I bring to the table."
Seeing What Others Can't
What inspired Dina to launch her creative growth strategy business at dinacolada.com was a pattern she couldn't ignore. As she worked with clients across e-commerce, coaching, dating and relationships, and brick-and-mortar stores, she kept seeing the same thing: talented business owners sitting right on top of problems they couldn't see.
"There might be a problem that's sitting right in front of them, and they don't even realize it," she explains. "I had my own bottlenecks, and I've worked with many different clients. I see all of the gaps that people have."
Her approach combines a history of Ecomm sales, dating psychology, branding, marketing, custom bot building, copywriting, offer development, design, and AI tools to identify what's working, what's not. She finds the gaps where businesses are leaving money on the table. The results speak for themselves. She recently helped an e-commerce company increase their conversions by 77%, translating to about five million dollars in additional revenue that year.
Stop, Want, Sell
Dina's entire philosophy boils down to three words: stop, want, sell. "Make them stop, make them want it, make it sell," she says. "I love taking a business with a great product or service and finding creative ways to make it impossible to ignore."
But making something impossible to ignore isn't about flash for the sake of flash. "I don't believe in making things pretty just for the sake of it," Dina clarifies. "I want the creative aspects to make money, so people can get their products or mission out into the world."
What clients discover when they start working with her often surprises them. "People discover that they're not doing marketing wrong," she says. "There are just things that are out of sight for them because they don't know what they don't know."
Still Learning, Still Growing
Even someone who teaches tech tutorials on YouTube faces technical hurdles. Dina is refreshingly honest about her own challenges. One of her biggest obstacles has been finding the right software to build her marketing funnels.
"I had web software for more than two decades, that I didn't really like to build on, and I finally found my ideal funnel builder, that works for my meticulous creative brain, so I'm moving everything over to that," she shares. "That's the thing with marketing. There's always more that you can do to make things more streamlined."
She's still in the process of making that transition, which will make it easier to update funnels and do split testing with headlines, offers, and packaging. It's a reminder that growth is a constant process, even for the experts.
Ready to Take Action
Dina is looking for a specific type of client: ambitious business owners who are open to fresh ideas, willing to try something different, let go of the reins, and ready to take action. If that sounds like you, she wants you to know you don't need to have everything figured out first.
"That's what I help with," she says. "Bring your ideas, bring your marketing headaches, or the business problem you can't solve. My goal is simple: make your business impossible to ignore."
Speaking on stages and podcasts is another of Dina’s passions. Whether she’s teaching AI tools to six-figure startups, CEOs LA, or at-risk girls in Morgantown, WV, she brings warmth, playfulness and education, to tech-savvy entrepreneurs or beginners.
Whether you're struggling with conversions, confused about your messaging,need a roadmap for some easy-to-impement AI tools, or just know something isn't clicking but can't put your finger on what, Dina Colada brings the perspective of someone who has built, tested, failed, and succeeded. She has a checklist on her site to help you find 15 places where you could be losing money. You can learn more about how she can help you at dinacolada.com. Connect with her on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, or YouTube to see her creative growth strategies in action.
Dina Colada — Dina Colada Creative
MAKE THEM STOP. MAKE THEM WANT IT. MAKE IT SELL.
Their audience: E-Commerce Sellers | Small Businesses | Local Service Businesses |
What they're looking for: YouTube Collabs | Stage/Speaker | Affiliate Partners |
Dina Coladas' take:
"Bring your ideas, bring your marketing headaches, or the business problem you can't solve. My goal is simple: make your business impossible to ignore."
Think your audiences line up? Open their Founder Pass and tap the heart. If they heart you back, you're matched and chatting.
Want to be featured in The Flywheel?
Dina’s spotlight started as a conversation with Frank, our AI interviewer. He asks, you talk, and we turn it into a story like this one.
Five or six minutes. No prep, no video, nothing to schedule.
The Checklist Handoff
The hook:
Every promo you’ve ever run had the same flaw. It ended.
The swap:
You and your partner each add one line to the page people see right after they’ve downloaded your free thing — the thank-you page, the welcome email, the last slide of the checklist itself. The line points at your partner’s free resource as the obvious next step. They do the same for you.
That’s it. One line each, on a page that’s already live.
Why it works:
A newsletter mention runs once. This runs every time someone new says yes to you — next week, next quarter, next year, without either of you touching it again.
It also catches people at their most agreeable moment. They just handed over an email address. The hardest yes already happened; you’re borrowing the momentum for the second one.
And it’s honest by construction. You’re not interrupting anyone — you’re answering the question they’re already asking, which is “okay, now what?”
The pitch. Steal it.
Hey [name] — I’ve got a free [checklist/guide] that people download, and right after they do they land on a thank-you page that currently says nothing useful. I’d like to put your [resource] there as the recommended next step, if you’ll do the same for me. One line each, nothing to build, and it keeps running after we both forget about it. Want to trade links?
One rule
Only point people at something you’d send a paying client to. The handoff borrows your credibility — if their resource is thin, you’re the one who looks careless, and you won’t be around to explain yourself.
PLATFORM TIP: The founders you starred and never told
Favorites are private. That’s the point — you can shortlist someone without them knowing, no awkwardness either way. But it also means starring someone does nothing on its own. If you favorited a founder and never swiped right on their card, there’s no match, no chat, and no way for them to know you were interested. They’re sitting in a list only you can see. Two minutes: Open Favorites and read the list with this week’s play in mind. For anyone you’d actually trade thank-you page links with, go to their card and swipe right. If they’ve already swiped right on you, you’ll match on the spot and the chat opens. |
From the Discover deck this week:
Andrea Rogers — Mixologist Master A free weekly cocktail newsletter with recipes you can make at home.
Debbie Mauro — Agent Impact Network 394,000+ real estate pros connected through a national referral and investor network.
Every card you see comes with a Flywheel Score — a 0–100 read on how well your audiences, products, and goals line up. High score? That's a partnership waiting to happen.
Promotion ends when you stop.
A recommendation doesn’t.
One is work you repeat, the other is work you did once.
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