The Core Four Advertising Framework
The only four ways to let people know about your stuff
The Core Four is Hormozi's foundational framework for understanding all advertising. He argues there are only four ways any person can let other people know about anything they sell. These four methods come from combining two audience types (warm and cold) with two communication styles (one-to-one and one-to-many).
The four methods are: (1) Warm Outreach — one-to-one contact with people who know you, (2) Post Free Content — one-to-many communication with your warm audience, (3) Cold Outreach — one-to-one contact with strangers, and (4) Paid Ads — one-to-many communication with cold audiences. Hormozi emphasizes that these are the ONLY four things you can do, and if you're not getting enough leads, you're not doing them with enough skill or volume.
The methods compound together — a business doing warm outreach AND content gets more from both than a business doing only one. Hormozi built different businesses using different combinations: his first business off content and warm outreach, his gyms off content and paid ads, Gym Launch off paid ads and cold outreach, and Acquisition.com off posting content.
- There are only four ways to let people know about your stuff — warm outreach, post content, cold outreach, and paid ads.
- If you aren't getting enough leads, you're not doing the core four with enough skill or enough volume.
- Every combination of core four activities boosts each other — they compound together.
- You only need to master one method to feed yourself for the rest of your life.
- If you have more time than money, post content; if you have more money than time, do cold outreach or paid ads.
- Start with Warm OutreachBegin by reaching out one-to-one to people who already know you — contacts, friends, family, social media followers. This is the cheapest and most reliable method. It works whether you have 100 contacts or 1,000,000.Pro tipEven if you think you have no leads, add up contacts from your phone, all email accounts, and all social media profiles. Most people have their first 1,000 leads already.
- Add Content CreationStart posting free content publicly to your warm audience. This is the best second step if you have more time than money. Spend 100 minutes per day creating content and release at least one piece per day on a platform.Pro tipYour best free content can make the best paid ads later — if a piece of content generates sales organically, it will likely perform well as a paid ad too.
- Layer in Cold Outreach or Paid AdsOnce warm outreach and content are generating leads consistently, add cold outreach (if you have time) or paid ads (if you have money). Cold outreach targets strangers one-to-one; paid ads target strangers one-to-many.Pro tipSkills from warm outreach transfer directly to cold outreach. Skills from content creation transfer directly to paid ads. The learning curve shortens with each new method.WarningExpect lower response rates with cold audiences. Use automation for cold outreach to maintain volume.
- Maximize with More, Better, NewFor each method, first do MORE of it (increase volume), then make it BETTER (test and optimize), then try NEW placements, platforms, or methods. Exhaust more and better before adding new.Pro tipThe biggest increases often come from simply doing more, not from clever optimization. Double your inputs and you'll roughly double your outputs.WarningDon't try to add a new method until you've maximized the current one. Most entrepreneurs spread too thin too early.
- Stack All Four MethodsThe ultimate goal is to have all four core methods running simultaneously, with teams managing each one. Every method boosts the others. A business doing all four will dramatically outperform one doing only one or two.Pro tipBuild each method profitably before moving to the next. Use profits from earlier methods to fund later ones.
Starting with $51K in savings and no advertising knowledge, Hormozi reached out to everyone he knew via calls, texts, and Facebook messages offering free 12-week training. Only six people said yes. After getting them results, he asked for referrals and got five or six more clients, building to $4,000/month.
An entrepreneur making $2M/year spending $30K/month on Facebook in the chiropractor niche claimed he'd saturated the market. He did no content, no outreach, and advertised on only one platform. A second entrepreneur in the same niche spent $30K per week across four platforms.
Hormozi scaled from $400K to $780K in one month by tripling his ad budget after a mindset shift at a private event. He then tested new audiences, added text follow-ups, improved ad production, and launched an affiliate program, stacking methods over time.
Hormozi developed this framework after years of building multiple businesses and realizing that despite the seemingly infinite complexity of marketing, everything boils down to four fundamental actions. He noticed entrepreneurs constantly overcomplicating advertising, when in reality they just needed to do more of these four things with greater skill. The framework became his 'get out of jail free card' — a simple mental model he could apply to any business to diagnose and fix lead generation problems.