Money, pricing & model

Your business model, what to charge, and whether the numbers work.

What founders use for money, pricing & model, ranked by how many answers lean on it.

  1. Where the a16z essay defines the metrics, this one reads like an audit checklist for the model you just built. It names eight... Capidel Article Unit Economics and CAC/LTV: The Metrics Every Startup Financial Model Needs Capidel
  2. This is a clean, plain-language walk through the numbers that decide whether your pricing actually works: contribution margin,... Mercury Article · ~12 min read What is unit economics, and does it matter for your startup? Dan Kang
  3. This is the rare piece that treats Indian and dollar pricing as two different economic games, not one price converted at the... Product Growth Article SaaS Pricing in India: The Rupee vs Dollar Dilemma Product Growth (productgrowth.in)
  4. This is SaaSBOOMi's canonical case for why building from India is a structural edge, written by Manav Garg, who founded Eka... SaaSBOOMi Essay The India Advantage Manav Garg
  5. This piece answers the sequencing question head on: it places unit economics right at the handoff between reaching... Stage 2 Capital Article · About 8 minute read Understanding Unit Economics: The Bridge Between Product-Market Fit and Go-to-Market Fit Brent Holloway
  6. This is the canonical a16z reference that defines the marketplace vocabulary you actually need before you build a model: GMV vs... Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) Essay 13 Metrics Every Marketplace Company Should Track Jeff Jordan, Li Jin, D'Arcy Coolican, Andrew Chen (a16z)
  7. Most CAC math quietly assumes one funnel, and that breaks the moment you have to pay to acquire both sellers and buyers. This... Natalie Luu, Lightspeed Venture Partners (Medium) Article How to Measure CAC in a Two-Sided Marketplace Natalie Luu (Lightspeed Venture Partners)
  8. Before you tune CAC and take rate, this book gives you the structural picture of why marketplace economics compound: network... W. W. Norton & Company Book Platform Revolution: How Networked Markets Are Transforming the Economy and How to Make Them Work for You Geoffrey G. Parker, Marshall W. Van Alstyne, Sangeet Paul Choudary
  9. This is the cleanest plain, formula-first explainer of the magic number: it gives you the exact calculation... Wall Street Prep Article · ~10 min read SaaS Magic Number: Formula + Calculator Wall Street Prep
  10. Bessemer built this from years of their own portfolio data, and it is the piece that answers the real question hiding inside... Bessemer Venture Partners (Atlas) Essay · long read plus benchmark charts Scaling to $100 Million Mary D'Onofrio, Bessemer Venture Partners
  11. This is the clearest walk-through of the exact trap you are in: your spreadsheet shows a healthy per-unit margin because unit... Toptal Article · About a 15 minute read Don't Scale an Unprofitable Business: Why Unit Economics (Still) Matter Toby Clarence-Smith
  12. Patrick Campbell built ProfitWell on more pricing data than almost anyone in SaaS, and this piece distills his core idea: find... LTSE (Long-Term Stock Exchange) Essay · ~10 min read Patrick Campbell's ProfitWell Playbook: Boost startup revenue with value metric pricing Patrick Campbell
  13. If you started cheap to win early deals, this covers the follow-up problem: how to raise prices on existing accounts without... OpenView Article · ~12 min read SaaS Pricing Guide: When & How to Raise Prices Without Losing Customers Kyle Poyar
  14. This is the clearest honest look at why a services arm quietly starves your product: Jason Cohen (who bootstrapped WP Engine)... A Smart Bear (Jason Cohen) Essay The unfortunate math behind consulting companies Jason Cohen
  15. This is the most concrete piece on turning repeatable service work into a scalable offer, built around finding the 20 percent... Consulting Success Article The Consultant's Guide to Productization Michael Zipursky
  16. This is the essay that gave the industry a clean way to answer your question: divide net burn by net new ARR, and you know how... Craft Ventures (Medium) Essay · About a 12 minute read The Burn Multiple David Sacks
  17. Before you spend down your cushion on growth, you need to know how long it takes to earn that money back, and this is the... The SaaS CFO Article · About a 10 minute read How I Calculate the CAC Payback Period Ben Murray
  18. Walling built and sold bootstrapped companies (including Drip) and has backed hundreds more through TinySeed, so this is... SaaS Playbook (Rob Walling) Book · About 200 pages The SaaS Playbook: Build a Multimillion-Dollar Startup Without Venture Capital Rob Walling
  19. This is a founder writing honestly after quitting too early, burning 18 months and his savings, then going back to a job and... Indie Hackers Essay · ~10 min read Startup lesson learned: Don't quit your job before there is interest in your product Eddie Forson
  20. This is the most concrete, no-fluff answer we found to the actual mechanics question: how much do I give up to get a customer... SaaStr Article · Short read, about 6 to 8 minutes Dear SaaStr: What's a Reasonable Discount for an Annual Contract? How About a 3-Year Contract? Jason Lemkin
  21. This is the definitive book on funding growth from customer cash instead of your savings or an investor, and it names the five... Wiley Book · Full-length book, about 320 pages The Customer-Funded Business: Start, Finance, or Grow Your Company with Your Customers' Cash John Mullins
  22. This is the practical companion to the staying-small question: it replaces gut feel with concrete triggers for when a hire is... Startup Rally Article · about a 10 minute read First Hires in a Bootstrapped Startup: A Cashflow Guide Startup Rally
  23. This is the clearest proof case that a serious software company can be built away from the big startup hubs: a 150-person team... Inc42 Article · ~8 min read How Zoho Aims To Put Tenkasi On The Map With Zoho Desk, A Product Built In The Downtown Of Nowhere Shweta Modgil, Inc42
  24. This is the clearest read on why a rupee of Indian revenue and a dollar of US revenue are not the same size, pulling together... Monetizely Article Regional vs Global SaaS Pricing: A Strategic Approach to Pricing Optimization Monetizely

Show the next 24

The questions

Business models explained 18

How the money actually flows.

What business model should I choose for my startup? 3 → What's the difference between SaaS, marketplace, and transactional business models? 3 → How do I make money from a free product or freemium model? 3 → How does a marketplace actually make money and solve the chicken-and-egg problem? 3 → Should I sell to businesses (B2B) or consumers (B2C)? 2 → All 18 questions in Business models explained →
Pricing & packaging 18

Charge money. Charge more. Here's how.

How do I decide how much to charge for my product? 3 → What is a value metric and why does it matter for pricing? 2 → How many pricing tiers should I have and how should I package them? 3 → Am I charging too little for my product? 3 → How do I raise prices without losing my existing customers? 3 → All 18 questions in Pricing & packaging →
Unit economics & modeling 18

Know what a customer costs and earns.

What are unit economics and why do they matter? 3 → How do I calculate CAC (customer acquisition cost) and LTV? 3 → What is a good LTV to CAC ratio? 3 → What metrics should I actually track as an early-stage SaaS founder? 3 → How do I build a simple financial model or revenue projection? 3 → All 18 questions in Unit economics & modeling →
Bootstrapping & profitability 18

Grow on customer money, keep control.

Can I really build a successful startup without raising money? 3 → How do I bootstrap a startup with little or no money? 3 → How did Zoho and Zerodha bootstrap to billion-dollar companies? 3 → How do I reach profitability (or ramen profitability) as fast as possible? 3 → Bootstrapping vs raising VC, how do I decide? 3 → All 18 questions in Bootstrapping & profitability →
Startup finance & accounting 18

Keep the books, watch the runway.

What financial basics does every founder need to understand? 2 → What is burn rate and runway, and how do I calculate them? 2 → How should I manage cash flow so my startup doesn't run out of money? 3 → Do I need an accountant and proper bookkeeping from day one? 2 → What taxes and compliance do I need to handle as an Indian startup? 1 → All 18 questions in Startup finance & accounting →
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