# Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending September 10, 2021

Published: 10 September 2021
Canonical: https://www.top10in.tech/posts/week-ending-september-10-2021

## 1. SaaS METRIC OF THE WEEK

[DAU/MAU](https://www.geckoboard.com/best-practice/kpi-examples/dau-mau-ratio/). The [DAU/MAU ratio is a popular metric for companies that need to measure user engagement](https://andrewchen.co/dau-mau-is-an-important-metric-but-heres-where-it-fails/). Rule of thumb: Apps with over [20% = good](https://twitter.com/sequoia/status/436302641992187904?_ga=2.138072432.1195518810.1630984396-1101450475.1630984396). If you have 50%+ - you’re world-class.

Link: https://www.geckoboard.com/best-practice/kpi-examples/dau-mau-ratio/

## 2. WEBSITE

Do you ever ask the question “[Is Your Website Stressing Out Visitors](https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2020/06/website-stressing-out-visitors/)?”. This line of questioning hadn't occurred to me before so how do we know if our website sucks or not? Well first up - focus on the [jobs you want the website to do](https://www.lean-labs.com/blog/the-jobs-to-be-done-framework-b2b-site-strategy). GrowthInsider has released a great and [comprehensive list of the biggest mistakes made on websites](https://growthinsider.substack.com/p/gi-007-70-websites-biggest-mistakes) also take a read here on how to conduct an [audit of your content](https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2021/08/10/content-audit).

Link: https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2020/06/website-stressing-out-visitors/

## 3. PERSONAS

SaaS B2B Marketing is a [pretty unique beast](https://neilpatel.com/blog/how-saas-marketing-is-different/) - and getting [into the minds of an idealized customer](https://www.getbeamer.com/blog/saas-personas) often requires going through the practice of creating personas - [you should try it](https://userguiding.com/blog/user-persona-examples/)- it will def make you a better SaaS marketer. For most SaaS companies [creating multiple personas](https://tomtunguz.com/marketing-to-two-different-people-at-the-same-time) is often a strategic necessity. So here is an additional differentiator (and what the difference is compared to a persona) [of an ideal customer profile](https://blog.close.com/ideal-customer-profile-vs-buyer-persona).

Link: https://neilpatel.com/blog/how-saas-marketing-is-different/

## 4. MARKETING

More for your SaaS dictionary: *Buyer Intent Data*. There is never a one-size-fits-all marketing strategy and channel for a business. So how does a business find out what are the best marketing channels for them? [This article suggests that everything needed to answer that question is already within the data a business generates](https://www.leadfeeder.com/blog/how-to-use-buyer-intent-data/) every day. (you're gonna need Personas - so don't skip the links above)

Link: https://www.leadfeeder.com/blog/how-to-use-buyer-intent-data/

## 5. CUSTOMER DATA

Looping together 3 and 4 above - Customer data management is a *practice*, not a technology. I love that simple message. Bluconic give the crib notes/5-steps [in this article about how to develop a strategy to optimize and improve customer experience](https://www.blueconic.com/blog/customer-data-management) using good data management practices.

Link: https://www.blueconic.com/blog/customer-data-management

## 6. PRODUCT MARKET FIT #1

I talk about PMF a fair bit - but never with a true VC lens, even though it's a really important metric for earlier-stage investors. So AirTree (an early-stage VC) has [just published this article taking a look at what metrics VCs like them look at for signs of Product-Market Fit](https://medium.com/airtree-venture/b2b-saas-benchmarks-what-metrics-do-vcs-look-at-for-signs-of-product-market-fit-pmf-608e3133c516) - and also what the red flags are.

Link: https://medium.com/airtree-venture/b2b-saas-benchmarks-what-metrics-do-vcs-look-at-for-signs-of-product-market-fit-pmf-608e3133c516

## 7. PRODUCT MARKET FIT #2

*Asking* the PMF question IMO is always the more noble focus (as opposed to being focused on *answering* the question). But sometimes - you just gotta know (see above) and here is a case study on [how Superhuman did it](https://firstround.com/review/how-superhuman-built-an-engine-to-find-product-market-fit/). Also, [this article](https://gopractice.io/blog/what-is-product-market-fit-and-how-to-measure-pmf) has some great PMF definitions. PMF was called “[the only thing that matters](https://pmarchive.com/guide_to_startups_part4.html)” to early-stage startups by Marc Andreessen 12 years ago. Now his team gets a little more nuanced suggesting focusing[on Product-User-Fit](https://a16z.com/2019/09/16/product-user-fit-comes-before-product-market-fit/) as an indicator towards achieving PMF. A similar nuance is also true post PMF with repeatable-scalable ***revenue*** models as a precursor to a repeatable-scalable business model (you know - the one with actual profits).

Link: https://firstround.com/review/how-superhuman-built-an-engine-to-find-product-market-fit/

## 8. FUNDRAISING

Hitting the fundraising motherlode this week with [this downloadable PDF from IVP (DataDog, Coinbase, Slack, Twitter, et al) on how to be fully prepared for your company’s next fundraising round](https://www.dropbox.com/s/fxsbg1jglemb3aq/IVP-SaaSHandbookPDF-6-2021.pdf?dl=0). This 25-page article has sections covering financials, go-to-market strategies, market sizing, valuation, and storytelling.

Link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/fxsbg1jglemb3aq/IVP-SaaSHandbookPDF-6-2021.pdf?dl=0

## 9. HYPERLINKS

Probably a read for your coffee/[Pomodoro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_Technique) break as we are breaking out the way-back time machine for this one (back to 1993). This newsletter is jam-packed with hyperlinks. So here is a question, not necessarily helpful for your business, but one I never thought to consider before: [Why are hyperlinks blue](https://blog.mozilla.org/en/internet-culture/deep-dives/why-are-hyperlinks-blue/)?

Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_Technique

## 10. CASE STUDY

I love myself a good transparent (warts and all) SaaS growth story. This one is a keeper from Tom Hunt on [how ConvertKit took a very wobbly path over 5 years to eventually unlock $1.7m MRR](https://saasmarketer.io/saas-business-growth/) - this was in 2020 - [they are now at about $2.3m MRR](https://getlatka.com/companies/convertkit)

Link: https://saasmarketer.io/saas-business-growth/

## POD OF THE WEEK

[Unpacking Product Market Fit](https://open.spotify.com/show/6rif8R6NkkVeeB7can8G9i?si=4ZZfQg2vR02GWqd6WYRo1Q&nd=1)- the podcast version - this episode references different examples and strategies to understand what kind of PMF would work for your startup.

Link: https://open.spotify.com/show/6rif8R6NkkVeeB7can8G9i?si=4ZZfQg2vR02GWqd6WYRo1Q&nd=1