Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending February 26, 2021

1. SaaS METRIC OF THE WEEK: CPA - cost per acquisition - vs CAC. CPA is often conflated with the Cost of acquisition, but they are different. Andrew Chen dives into the details as to why (and also how to calculate CAC accurately).
2. DESIGN: Bringing good design into different elements of a business is nothing new to modern businesses. But there are specialized branches of design constantly emerging. Growth Design is my new all-time favorite - merging typical HCD/Empathy Design but adding in the pragmatism of designing the jobs that need to be done.
3. SALES OPS: For those of us lucky enough to be in Scale-Up mode. Scaling creates real teething problems. Especially when it comes to revenue teams and moving beyond the founder being the primary (or only) salesperson. Eventually, a dedicated team will be needed (that doesn't involve the founder) and, in more modern times, Sales Operations operators are needed to help coordinate cross-departmental activities to help a revenue organization hum. Take a read of this Sales Ops primer article from Point Nine Capital on how to get started.
4. DEATH: Of the SaaS kind. Sorry to make it morbid - but Y-Combinator (via the SaaStr Blog) lists 5 things that kill startups (and what to do about it). It's a way deeper article than it sounds (and it ain't just 5 things) - then there is also this Twitter Zinger.
5. CYBERSECURITY: This is actually an expansion of the Pod of the Week below (listen to it!). Cybercrime has become big business and selling your product to larger corporates and the enterprise in a post-SolarWinds breach world has made operational and cyber Due Diligence a lot trickier to navigate (there is a growing need for chief compliance officers for example). What to start focusing on? Start with more detailed Log Management (listen to the Podcast to understand why in the Solar Winds case)
6. SEGMENTATION: Not all customers are created equal and audience segmentation isn’t a new concept. But it's a constantly moving target and can be a hard topic for startups to master. In this rapid deep dive, learn What segmentation is:  Why it matters, and How to implement it. If done right, there are massive upsides. But Cohorts are also a necessary ingredient in Segmentation analysis and sometimes segmentation can be a bad idea. 
7. CUSTOMER SUCCESS MODELS: Just like customers, not all CSM’s are built the same either. And it depends, based on stage and strategy, as to how your CSM teams will evolve…...but they will. Gainsight proposes 5 basic kinds of CSM, along with a corollary org chart. But keep in mind IRL they all will be different hues. SaaSx has this model. Which one best resonates with you?
8. CUSTOMER SUCCESS #2 - Quota: In past newsletters, I have referenced AE and SDR metrics and quotas. But what about quota expectations in renewal and cross-sell/upsell within a Customer Success Team? Tomasz Tunguz takes a look based on a report a couple of years back from Gainsight. Most Customer Success Managers can handle between $2-$5M in ARR and somewhere between 10-500 accounts (but it varies based on segment/ACMR).
9. MARKETING: Just save this link to your ideas/inspiration board or something. At first glance, it looks like a lightweight article. But just wait. One day you will be looking for ideas on how to elevate your product or business, when you do open up this bookmark for some true inspiration on 52 Low-Cost Ways to Promote Your Business
10. CASE STUDY: The Freemium and Product Lead Growth master - SLACK - and 5 interesting learnings now that they are at $1B in ARR. They are still growing revenue at 40% year-over-year - likely thanks to Covid and PLG, and thanks to their Freemium model Slack has a great 50/50 split of customers Small/Enterprise.

POD OF THE WEEK: a16z's declaration of a pivot into Media last month was a surprise to no-one who listens to or reads any of their content. So take a listen to this tear-down of how the Solar Winds hack went down (technically). Really great listening for anyone that loves Serial-style podcast covering super tech issues. The SolarWinds hack is no joke. It's a very big deal with political ramifications.