Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute

Earned Revenue: How CPI Funded Its Mission on Its Own Terms

The Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute had world-class clinicians and a treatment center that changed lives.

March 2026

— CPI had served the Chicago community for over 90 years with world-class psychoanalytic training and treatment. But a decades-old funding model — reliant on a shrinking donor base — was creating chronic deficits and leaving significant earned revenue potential untapped. They needed a partner willing to go beyond marketing and help them build a real business engine around their treatment center.
— CPI had served the Chicago community for over 90 years with world-class psychoanalytic training and treatment. But a decades-old funding model — reliant on a shrinking donor base — was creating chronic deficits and leaving significant earned revenue potential untapped. They needed a partner willing to go beyond marketing and help them build a real business engine around their treatment center.
— CPI had served the Chicago community for over 90 years with world-class psychoanalytic training and treatment. But a decades-old funding model — reliant on a shrinking donor base — was creating chronic deficits and leaving significant earned revenue potential untapped. They needed a partner willing to go beyond marketing and help them build a real business engine around their treatment center.

SERVICES

Earned income strategy, Google Ads, SEO, landing page design, conversion rate optimization

The Challenges

Donor Dependence: CPI’s funding model relied heavily on a small group of major donors. If even one walked away, the organization would slip into deficit — a precarious position for an institution with a 90+ year legacy.

Untapped Revenue Potential: Their treatment center served hundreds of patients, but it had never been positioned as a revenue engine. The clinical work was exceptional — the marketing around it was nonexistent.

New Territory: This wasn’t a marketing problem with a known playbook. CPI needed to build an earned income strategy from scratch — something their in-house team had never attempted and no previous partner had been asked to do.

Our Approach

We started by listening. Before touching a single ad account or writing a line of copy, we sat with CPI’s executive director to understand the mission — not just the marketing goals, but the deeper reason the treatment center existed.

What we really did was partner. The channels were the tools. The insight was treating their treatment center like the business it needed to be — without losing the clinical integrity that made it worth funding in the first place.

Our Solutions

We designed a full earned-revenue strategy built around four core pillars: custom landing pages built to convert visitors into patients, Google Ads campaigns targeting people actively seeking psychoanalytic therapy and psychotherapy in the Chicago area, conversion rate optimization to improve the patient inquiry-to-appointment pipeline, and an SEO strategy that positioned CPI as the definitive authority in psychoanalytic treatment.

Custom landing pages were designed around the specific services CPI offered — not generic therapy language. Google Ads targeted people actively seeking psychoanalytic and psychotherapy services in Chicago. CRO continuously improved the patient inquiry-to appointment pipeline. SEO drove organic traffic that compounds month over month.

The channels were the tools. The insight was treating their treatment center like the business it needed to be — without losing the clinical integrity that made it worth funding in the first place.

The Results

10x revenue increase in under 2 years

77,500 organic search clicks and growing

9.23M Google Search impressions in 16 months

Average position 7.7 in Google Search — Nov 2024 to Feb 2026

Within three months, the strategy was generating measurable revenue. Within two years, CPI had eliminated chronic deficits, paid off all outstanding liabilities, and built a sustainable funding model that didn’t depend on any single donor.

From 535 clicks per week in November 2024 to 2,966 clicks per week by February 2026 — a growth curve that tells the full story. CPI no longer worries about chronic deficits. For the first time in a decade, they are investing in growth.

"They didn’t just provide a service, they became true partners in advancing our mission." — David M. Brooks, PhD — President, CPI

Client Impact

"Damon and his team took the time to really understand our mission and helped us execute an earned income strategy around it. With Earned Impact’s help, we’ve consistently achieved or exceeded our revenue goals and reduced our dependence on traditional funding sources. The increased revenue and unrestricted funds have allowed us to shift our focus away from worrying about chronic deficits and toward investing in growth for the first time in ten years. They didn’t just provide a service—they became true partners in advancing our mission."

— David M. Brooks, PhD — President, Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute

CPI’s transformation from donor-dependent to self-sustaining is reflected across every metric. Organic search traffic grew from near zero to 77,500 total clicks — and continues to climb week over week.

Revenue increased 10x in under two years. Chronic deficits eliminated. All outstanding liabilities paid off. For the first time in a decade, CPI is focused on growth — not survival.

REVENUE INCREASE IN UNDER 2 YEARS

10
%

GOOGLE SEARCH IMPRESSIONS (MILLIONS)

95
%