The Referral Ceiling
Growing on referrals alone eventually stops working, because your network can only send you so much business.

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The mechanism
The chart tracks two lines across three stages: Early, Growing, and Saturated. A dotted line labeled Ambition keeps climbing the whole way. A solid line labeled Referral revenue rises with it at first, then flattens once the network is tapped out. A gold dot marks the point where they split, and the shaded wedge between them is the growth referrals can't reach. The people who send you work are a fixed group, so once you have used them up, wanting to grow more doesn't make more of them appear.
Part of Partnerships. Durable compounding pipeline beyond yourself.