Remote closing and appointment setting

The claim

“Beginners & 9-5ers are making $5k - $10k a month with appointment setting.”

@salesmaverick__, 19 January 2023, 468,762 views¹

A “high-ticket” offer is something expensive, usually about $2,000 to $25,000, sold on a phone or video call²¹. A closer takes the call and tries to make the sale. An appointment setter books the calls, by cold calling (phoning people who did not ask to be called) or by direct message (DM). The job is real: companies advertise these roles⁷⁸. This page judges the scheme, not the people who tweeted.

The sums

In the job posts we read, the usual closer commission is about 10% of “cash collected”, the money buyers have actually paid so far⁷¹². None of the closer posts we opened offers a base salary in its text^7891012. At 10%, $5,000 a month takes $50,000 collected, $10,000 takes $100,000 and $25,000 takes $250,000 (our estimate).

We found no measured close rate (the share of held calls that end in a sale); beginners’ real rates may be lower than sellers quote. One seller’s pitch, quoted by a US regulator, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), gives 20%². At that rate, $10,000 a month on a $5,000 offer is 20 sales from 100 calls, about five every working day (our estimate). The company supplies those calls; the closer does not control the main number.

What happens to most people who try

We found no dataset, study or checked income report of what remote closers or setters earn, or of how many land a role.

In December 2023 the FTC sued the companies behind a closer-training programme called “The Sales Mentor”². The complaint says more than 55,360 people bought it and paid more than $29 million². On results it says: “Defendants have never systematically tracked the earnings results of purchasers of the Sales Mentor program.”² The case was settled, which is not a finding that the allegations were true³⁴. It does not show that buyers earned nothing; nobody counted.

We read one role in full that accepts beginners, out of about ten posts opened; others exist. It is cold calling paid by commission only, with no salary, at 200 call attempts a day¹¹. It says: “Setters who hold that standard have consistently earned $3,000 USD or more per month. Setters who do not earn less, and some earn nothing.”¹¹

Two direct-message setter posts on a Philippines job board advertise $800 to $1,800 a month and ask for at least a year’s experience¹⁶¹⁷. A staffing company’s listings advertise most setter roles at $5,000 to $8,000 a month on target, with no experience requirement shown; these are advertised figures, not pay received³³.

The upside

No case here is checked by a third party.

• An online-education company with 6 to 8 call slots a day writes “OTE starts around 30k/mo”, for people with experience closing high-ticket deals¹². OTE, on-target earnings, is advertised pay for hitting targets, not pay received. The same post lists a salary range of $150,000 to $300,000 a year ($12,500 to $25,000 a month) and does not reconcile the two¹².
• A Canadian agency writes “Top performers have historically made $ 6K- 8K / mth”, in Canadian dollars, for a role it says is not for beginners¹³.
• One reviewer of a training programme reports $4,500 and then $8,800 in the first two months on an offer. This is unverified, from a three-review page on a site that does not fact-check reviews²⁵.

The nearest measure is the US government’s May 2025 wage survey of employed sales representatives of services. The top quarter earn $100,480 a year or more, about $8,373 a month, and the top tenth $148,840 or more, about $12,403 a month, so $10,000 a month sits between them (our division)¹⁸. These are employees, most with a base salary, so this is a comparison, not a measurement of closers. A US contractor’s commission is also before self-employment tax of 15.3%, with no benefits and no minimum wage, so weeks with no sale are unpaid²³²⁴.

What it takes to compete

People in the well-paid roles have:

• A record they can prove. One post advertising on-target earnings of $30,000 to $40,000 a month asks for at least $250,000 a month already collected⁸.
• An offer with calls supplied. Four to eight calls a day with buyers already checked as able and likely to buy is what the sums need⁸¹⁰¹².

The beginner post charges nothing to start¹¹. Courses and coaching run from $97 to about $9,800 in the one documented price ladder².

Early checks (our judgement): ask who fills the calendar, and ask people already selling the offer what they were paid last month.

Who else makes money from it

Of our 11 tweets, 4 ask the reader to retweet, like, comment or follow to be sent a free guide or course, and no tweet text names an employer hiring closers¹.

Training sellers earn from buyers’ fees. In the Sales Mentor case the FTC sent refunds of more than $960,000 to 8,174 people in January 2025, about three cents for each dollar buyers had paid (our estimate)²⁴. At a 10% commission, the offer’s owner keeps the other 90% of each sale before its own costs (our sum).