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. The Ken's Two by Two takes the pioneers (Capital Float, ZestMoney, Lendingkart) and asks why so many of India's first lending... Two by Two, The Ken Podcast · ~60 min listen What killed India's first fintech lenders? Rohin Dharmakumar and Arundhati Ramanathan
  2. Before you can model revenue, you have to understand the rules that decide what revenue is even allowed, and this guide lays... IncorpX Article · ~15 min read Digital Lending Business in India: RBI Guidelines and Compliance IncorpX
  3. Chan's piece is the honest version of the ads question: advertising is a real model, but it degrades the product once you are... Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) Essay · About a 12 minute read Outgrowing Advertising: Multimodal Business Models as a Product Strategy Connie Chan
  4. This lays out Meta's actual advertising revenue per user, and the regional split is the reality check most founders skip: even... FourWeekMBA Article · About a 7 minute read The Facebook ARPU Explained Gennaro Cuofano
  5. Video · About 5 minutes This Video Is Worth $13,568.99 (How Ads Work on YouTube) CGP Grey
  6. This is the classic counterweight to the first-timer instinct to price low out of nervousness. McKenzie's core argument is that... Kalzumeus Software Essay · About a 10 minute read You Can Probably Stand To Charge More Patrick McKenzie (patio11)
  7. This is the India-specific angle most business model advice skips: if you are based in India and selling software, who you sell... Efficient Capital Labs Article · Roughly a 10 minute read Unlocking the US Market: A Guide for Indian SaaS Founders Efficient Capital Labs
  8. When a founder assumes bigger deals automatically mean longer cycles, this data study is a useful reality check. HockeyStack... HockeyStack Article How ACV, Sales Cycles, and Sales Reps Relate (HockeyStack Labs) HockeyStack Labs
  9. A business built on a few big enterprise deals quietly builds a trap: if one account walks, your revenue caves. This piece... Lighter Capital Essay How SaaS Startups Can Minimize Customer Concentration Risk Lighter Capital
  10. Bill Gurley, a Benchmark partner who watched a decade of overfunded startups up close, wrote the definitive takedown of the... Above the Crowd Essay On the Road to Recap Bill Gurley
  11. Video · ~15 min The 5 things that kill startups after their seed rounds Michael Seibel
  12. This is the India-specific companion to the theory: a plain accounting of 25 Indian startups that folded in 2025, with the... Inc42 Article From Burn To Breakdown: 25 Startups That Shut Down In 2025 Palak Sharma
  13. If your real question is "can I use services to fund the product without getting stuck there," this is the practical playbook.... SKMurphy, Inc. Article · about 10 min read Bootstrapping Your Way from Services to Scalable Products Sean Murphy
  14. For the practitioner gut-check on how much services revenue is actually healthy, SaaStr is the reference voice, and Jason... SaaStr Podcast · episodes roughly 25 to 40 min The Official SaaStr Podcast: SaaS, Founders, Investors Jason Lemkin
  15. This is the reference definition founders actually cite when they argue about take rate, and it gives you the honest benchmark... Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) Essay · Short reference entry, a few minutes The Marketplace Glossary: Take Rate Li Jin
  16. Set your take rate too high and you do not lose users to a competitor, you lose the transaction itself: buyer and seller meet... Sharetribe Academy Article · Long read, roughly 15 to 20 minutes How to prevent marketplace leakage (disintermediation) Juho Makkonen
  17. Video · Short explainer Take Rate Explained Mostly Growth (CJ Gustafson)
  18. Video · short How to Use the Ledge Technique for Sales Objection Handling | Ask Jeb Jeb Blount
  19. Enterprise sales theory assumes a deal team and a discovery process, but an early founder is often talking to someone they... Tortoise Labs Essay How to Talk to Potential Customers About Pricing Nick Rimsa
  20. This is the cleanest breakdown of the real decision: it maps public pricing versus a contact sales gate onto your deal size... Monetizely Article Should I Display Our SaaS Pricing on the Homepage? A Strategic Breakdown Monetizely
  21. A first-person founder account from Buffer's CEO on choosing to put their pricing (and the costs behind it) fully in the open,... Buffer Essay Introducing Transparent Pricing: What Your Money is Used for When You Purchase a Buffer Subscription Joel Gascoigne
  22. Dan Balcauski is a full-time pricing operator, and this episode gets concrete about the machinery behind serving different... Better Done Than Perfect podcast Podcast · Podcast episode, around 30 to 40 minutes Pricing and Packaging for SaaS with Dan Balcauski Better Done Than Perfect (Userlist), with Dan Balcauski
  23. This is the canonical piece on packaging one product into three tiers so it stretches across price-sensitive and premium buyers... Harvard Business Review Article · Article, around 10 to 12 minute read The Good-Better-Best Approach to Pricing Rafi Mohammed
  24. When your product is half built, the temptation is to give it away and hope revenue comes later. Ash Rust argues the opposite:... Medium Essay · ~8 min read Startup Sales: How to Charge your First 5 Customers Ash Rust

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 →
eChai Partner Brands The partnership →