A Restart in South Dakota
Before he was running multiple seven-figure companies, Nate Tilley was starting over in South Dakota with little more than a phone and a decision to change his life.
At 19, after battling addiction and spending time in jail, Tilley reached what he calls a non-negotiable moment.
“I knew I was either going to keep going the way I was going and end up dead or locked up,” he says. “Or I was going to cut everything off and rebuild.”
He left behind friends, moved towns, and took a job detailing cars on a gravel lot for $12 an hour. Around that time, he bought a $27 Facebook ads course.
“I didn’t have money, but I had time. So I went all in.”
The First Campaign That Changed Everything
Tilley’s first campaign was not for a client. It was for the car dealership where he was working.
He put $100 into Facebook ads and generated 12 leads. Three of those leads turned into car sales. His commission totaled $3,900.
“That was it for me,” he says. “I saw that I could put money in, create attention, and directly make money back. It clicked.”
That single campaign shifted how he saw work, income, and leverage. It was no longer about trading hours for pay. It was about controlling outcomes.
From Employee to First Client
After that initial success, Tilley applied the same principles to the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu gym where he trained. This time, it was his first real client.
He created a simple offer for a free month of kids training and ran ads on a small budget. Leads came in quickly. Classes filled. The gym increased revenue and eventually expanded into a larger space.
“I remember recognizing parents from conversations I had online,” he says. “That’s when I understood this could work anywhere if you did it right.”
Two Companies, Two Markets
Today, Tilley operates two separate companies built for entirely different audiences.
ROAS, which he co-founded with Dylan Vanas, focuses on performance marketing for coaches, consultants, and course creators. The company builds done-for-you webinar funnels designed to convert cold audiences into high-ticket clients.
The Shift Social serves local businesses and car dealerships. Its S.C.A.L.E. system is designed to generate leads and booked appointments through Meta advertising.
Tilley keeps the businesses separate for a reason.
“The avatar, the economics, the funnel structure, it’s all different,” he explains. “If you mix it, you dilute it.”
Scaling Through Clients and Campaigns
Through his companies, Tilley now runs marketing for clients including Andy Elliott, Chris Voss, Krista Mashore, and Neel Dhingra.
Through these clients, he has also been involved in collaboration campaigns with Russell Brunson.
Across more than 1,000 campaigns, his work has generated over $100 million in client revenue, with more than $50 million coming from webinar funnels alone. One recent campaign produced a 62X return on ad spend.
He also serves as Fractional CMO for Elliott Group, overseeing marketing strategy and execution at scale.
By 27, Tilley had built multiple seven-figure businesses.
“I’m not the smartest guy in the room,” he says. “I just model what works and execute.”
Still a Brown Belt
Outside of business, Tilley is a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu brown belt who has ranked in the top five internationally for three consecutive years. The discipline is not separate from how he operates. It shapes how he approaches pressure, patience, and decision-making.
“On the mat, you can’t fake it. You either did the reps or you didn’t,” he says. “Business is the same.”
That mindset carries into how he builds teams and systems. Repetition, accountability, and consistent execution matter more than short bursts of effort.
For someone who once lacked direction, that structure became the foundation for everything that followed.
