Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending July 14, 2023

1. SaaS METRIC OF THE WEEK: Get stuck into the world of lead generation metrics with PPC (Pay-Per-Click) and PPL (Pay-Per-Lead) campaigns, where you can track impressions, clicks, click-through rates, cost-per-click, and conversion rates. PPL is super nuanced but can be super effective in driving quality leads.


2. CONVERTIBLE LOANS: They are a kind of debt until they are not. But Convertible Loans are a quick way to access money quickly via an interested investor. Point Nine Capital describes in detail what is involved in a convertible loan and what to look out for.


3. UN-SCALE: Sometimes, while building a repeatable scaleable business model, some un-scaleable things have to be done. This article highlights three specific non-scalable things sales teams should be doing right now.


4. SECONDARY MARKETS: Pitchbook analyzes that LPs are under performance pressures and a lack of liquidity as cash distributions from VC funds are far from great right now. Check this chart for how different pre-2016 funds are to 2019. This is manifesting itself as secondary stakes in portfolio companies, but it's a buyer's market, so only the best assets are in demand.


5. VALUATIONS: Adding onto this buyers market theme above, we all know by now the shift of value in SaaS from growth to valuing based on profitability. Tomasz Tunguz notes that in public markets, software companies have seen 40-112% increases in valuations over the last few months, but only for the top performers - strong unit economics & margins are vital to seeing this valuation creep. The era of efficient growth is now.


6. PLG: A successful PLG strategy goes beyond just having sexy UIs and "delightful" onboarding experiences. This Substack article highlights the importance of what needs to be under the hood - good data analytics, conducting experiments, and building a community centered around the product.


7. DIFFERENTIATION: Tricky question founders get asked all the time. Standing out in a saturated sea of SaaS is a tricky problem to solve - pro-tip - never do it on price alone. So ask yourself, "Why should someone buy from you?" It requires balancing familiarity and differentiation - read this article to get you thinking on the topic more.


8. A/B Tests: If you're looking for a concise guide on how to run, measure, and react to split test experiments, this bookmark-worthy article is a valuable resource.


9. WEBSITE: I've had this discussion at least four times this two weeks, and Jason Lemkin's blog post on the need for quality Marketing Websites this week wraps #6, #8, and #10 in this week's newsletter nicely together. Yes, your marketing site really does matter.


10. CASE STUDY: This chart got me on this one. It visually shows how finding your Ideal Customer Profile can lead to way more organic growth, word of mouth, and referral vs. Paid, low-quality paid signups: How Visily scaled to 100K signups in 5 steps.


POD OF THE WEEK: Customer Acquisition Strategies with Farzad Rashidi, who discusses how to grow and convert website traffic, get landing pages to rank, what content promotion strategies work best, and more.