Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending June 30, 2023

1. SaaS METRIC OF THE WEEK: Start with a Point Nine Capital article on everything you always wanted to know about cohort analysis (but were afraid to ask), and here is a free Cohort Analysis template from the SaaS CFO. GoPractice has a Product-focused article on forecasting key product metrics through cohort analysis, and The Startup looks at this metric from a VC Due Diligence perspective.


2. DUNNING: Bringing this actual term with a weird-ass name back to the newsletter - it's a phrase for involuntary churn (aka bad or failed payments). According to Baremetrics, on average, SaaS and subscription businesses lose around 9% of their MRR due to failed payments. Learn more about a successful dunning (and pre-dunning) process.


3. TRIALS: Are proven funnel methods for a solid go-to-market strategy. Check this article on 9 ways to optimize your SaaS trial, and then note from Tomazs Tunguz how long your customer trial period should be?: TL;DR: Longer trials do not convert customers at greater rates. Two weeks, two months, same results.


4. DEEP TECH: Commercializing scientific research can take a longer horizon than most VCs are comfortable with. Bessemer Venture report on the sector this month and introduce us all to the XB100 - a ranking of the world's top private deep technology companies across AI, Aviation, AgTech, Quantum, and Space.


5. SALES TEAMS: Take a good read of this article from David Sacks on the simple math you can use to set up a sales team. Individual plans, team plans, and expansions/renewals are all considered for a high-growth sales team structure.


6. REFERRALS: Cracking the referral loop is a dream outcome, but making this work is pretty rare. Kyle Poyar has written a guide on how to do it ( a collab with Stefan Bader from Cello, makers of referral software).


7. TRUST: For #6 above to work, people trust people over brands when it comes to trust. Chart Mogul has posted an 'Ultimate' Guide to Using Customer Testimonials to Boost Sales, noting that a generic and insincere endorsement is just as helpful as not using anything. It's also possible to take it further by leveraging those frothiest customers into a referral channel.


8. AI: I find this topic fascinating - Mark Roberge of Stage 2 Capital looks at the hype cycle about AI and asks who could win the go-to-market AI race - Startups vs. Incumbents? Adding fuel to this one with CB Insights AI 100, the 100 most promising AI startups of 2023.


9. VR: Facebook's ambitions for the Metaverse were embarrassingly out shadowed by Apple's announcement of their Vision Pro earlier this month - but my biggest question with all things VR and a big hurdle given the price tag is: Why should I care? Ben Evans explores these same sentiments in this essay, exploring what the heck it is exactly Apple is trying to build.


10. CASE STUDY: Moving upmarket into larger organizations is a standard SaaS growth strategy. Increasing ARPU (Average Revenue Per Customer) is good! But there is a lot to learn and a lot of time, knowledge, and effort required to succeed in this market segment. It's not easy, but it can be done. Here is an excellent guide from Outreach on breaking into deals over $100k ARR.


POD OF THE WEEK: From Lenny's Podcast this week is Melissa Tan (Webflow, Dropbox, Canva) discussing how to build high-performing teams.