Overview
Commons Clinic is a physician-led, value-based specialty healthcare group focused on orthopedics and musculoskeletal care across Southern California. During the engagement the company was mid-way through its Series B and preparing to launch WholeBody, a new preventive-health and longevity assessment line. Winston Francois was brought in to build the patient marketing foundation the company did not yet have, then to help take a brand-new product to market.
The mandate:
- Build lifecycle marketing and attribution from the ground up in HubSpot
- Launch the WholeBody Assessment with full-funnel paid acquisition across Meta and Google
- Acquire patients efficiently while protecting runway during an active fundraise
The challenge
- No lifecycle foundation: no nurture sequences, no attribution, and a HubSpot instance that needed serious work.
- A mid-engagement product launch forced a near-overnight pivot from lifecycle to paid acquisition.
- The new WholeBody line had no creative library, no proven messaging, and unsettled conversion tracking across GA4 and GTM.
- Capital constraints from the Series B raise demanded efficient spend and honest counsel on when to pull back.
The approach
1. Lifecycle marketing, built from scratch
- Stood up the HubSpot infrastructure and nurture journeys within weeks of kickoff.
- Prioritized a 10-email lifecycle roadmap (what-to-expect, physician-led, and patient-testimonial flows), each tied to send timing and a strategic rationale.
- Rebuilt to the client's own Figma email templates for brand consistency and faster approvals.
- Began attribution and GA4 groundwork so engagement could actually be measured.
2. An overnight pivot to full-funnel paid
- Reorganized the delivery team in days, adding paid-media specialists and creative producers.
- Launched WholeBody across Meta and Google, starting with a 10-day Meta test, then scaling to a $500/day (roughly $15K/month) media budget.
- Structured Meta creative into four thematic categories spanning human-touch and data-driven messaging.
- Built Google brand and non-brand search campaigns and a Performance Max plan for the new line.
3. A creative and measurement engine
- Produced two photoshoots (April and July) and a video content library, plus refreshed four-static and four-video creative sets for the WholeBody launch.
- Cleaned up conversion events and GTM/GA4 tagging to sharpen measurement.
- Delivered weekly pacing and performance reporting with clear, prioritized budget recommendations.
- Advised on competitive positioning and, when runway required it, on pulling back spend.
The results
February – November 2025
| Metric | Change | Impact |
|---|---|---|
| Lifecycle infrastructure | Built in weeks | Live nurture, physician-led, and testimonial email flows in HubSpot |
| Team pivot to paid | Days | New WholeBody line launched without a delivery gap |
| Meta cost per landing-page view | $0.41 | Highly efficient top-of-funnel traffic (CPM ~$2.84) |
| Meta 10-day launch test | 1.76M impr. | $5,015.61 spend, 240K reach, 12.2K landing-page views |
| Google brand-search cost per conversion | $16.95 | Efficient capture of high-intent WholeBody demand |
| Creative and content | 2 shoots + video | Reusable asset library for the WholeBody line |
The paid program was young by design: WholeBody launched in September, and the client paused media in November to preserve cash for its Series B raise. The figures that existed were efficient, with Meta delivering traffic at $0.41 per landing-page view on a roughly $2.84 CPM, and a $5,015.61 ten-day test reaching 240K people and driving 12.2K landing-page views.
More important than any single number, Winston Francois showed it could re-shape its own team overnight to follow where the business needed to go, standing up a full growth function from a lifecycle-only starting point.
“When we brought Winston Francois in, we needed lifecycle marketing built from scratch: no nurture sequences, no attribution, a HubSpot instance that needed serious work. Their team had the entire infrastructure up and running within weeks. What set them apart was what happened next. We launched our Wholebody Assessment product and needed to pivot the entire strategy from lifecycle to paid acquisition, practically overnight. Winston Francois reorganized their team in days, brought in paid media specialists, creative producers, and stood up full-funnel campaigns across Meta and Google while producing two photoshoots and a video content library for the new product line. They got our Google campaigns to a $61 cost per conversion in a category where most healthcare companies spend multiples of that. Jason and his team operated like a department of my company, not a vendor. They understood our capital constraints, helped us think through competitive positioning, and gave honest strategic advice, even when it meant recommending we pull back spend to preserve runway. That's not how agencies think. That's how partners think.”Nick AubinCo-Founder & CEO, Commons Clinic
What we learned
- A signed scope is a starting point, not a cage: the ability to re-staff a team in days was worth more than perfect adherence to the original lifecycle SOW.
- Build measurement before you scale spend: unsettled conversion events and GA4 gaps capped how confidently paid could scale.
- Efficient reach is the easy part; mid-funnel nurture and clean conversion tracking are where new-product paid programs are won or lost.
- Operating like an embedded, runway-aware department builds relationships that outlast the engagement: the CEO later joined Winston Francois as an advisor.