Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending November 24, 2023

1. SaaS METRIC OF THE WEEK:  The SaaS Magic Number is simply the balance between Sales and Marketing Spend and new ARR/MRR created. It's a great number for indicative over or under-spend on marketing and sales (ARR efficiency!). Check the SaaS CFO on how to calculate the Magic Number. This article deconstructs it and highlights that it's a complex metric influenced by factors like market conditions and company spending, making it difficult to pinpoint specific areas for improvement.


2. AI part 1: We have to start here this week as we just experienced a crazy week-long year in Tech (and it's still unfolding, so this may already be old news). But to recap: Last Friday Sam Altman was the OpenAI CEO, this past Wednesday, Sam Altman was still the OpenAI CEO. I see no difference. 🤣. But in between, Sam was fired by his Board, a new CEO was then placed, Sam was almost rehired, then not hired as another CEO was hired (for 55.5 hours). Then, in a massive Coup, Sam was hired by Microsoft, 95% of OpenAI employees threatened to quit (including a Board member thought responsible for all this), then he was rehired by OpenAI, back to normal.....nothing to see here. As of the writing of this, we don't know why. Phew. Oh, and the Board has been replaced.


3. AI part 2: In non-popcorn-related AI news, the new AI silicon chip gold rush continues. Sam Altman (see above) has been investigating OpenAI producing their own chips. Microsoft will start using custom-designed AI Chips for their data centers, and NVIDIA, with hardly any current competition, crushed current earnings forecasts.


4. OUTBOUND vs INBOUND: How you handle an inbound lead vs an outbound lead is quite different. Check this article from Jack Jorgovan on how Outbound leads differ (and how to close them). Oh, and do you want to binge-watch some Outbound Sales TV? Yeah, I knew you would. The team at Predictive Revenue has been running over 50 outbound sales experiments to find out what works best (and what doesn't.). Watch the whole series on YouTube.


5. FINANCIAL FORECAST: Your 2023 new financial year is approaching! Now is always the second best time to start (the first being two months ago). This is an excellent article with a complimentary Excel download here from The SaaS CFO - it's a SaaS Financial Plan for Startups (and works for most SMBs). It also comes with a handy complimentary video tutorial for the worksheet.


6. DLG: The post on Scaling Developer-First Products was surprisingly popular a few weeks back. Do quite a few of you have a product that targets Developers? If so, then Developer-Led growth motion is the strategic choice. DLG is different from PLG as Devs are a finicky demographic. So get the DevRel ("Dev Relations") Report for 2023. The report itself is well-designed and interactive. It is also handy as Developers influence at least two-thirds of the decision to buy your product.


7. SECURITY: In recent years, APIs have become business critical. How business critical? Well, Traceable released a report last week (based on 1630 respondents) focused on the Global State of API Security, and here are some numbers for you: 88% of firms use over 2,500 cloud apps, 60% reported a data breach in the past two years, and of these, 74% had at least 3 API-related breaches. And finally, an average of 127 third parties are connected to organizations' APIs.


8. VENTURE: Pitchbook notes that 17.1% of all U.S. VC funding rounds in Q3 '23 were down rounds - but there is some light - according to a fresh Carta article, there is a shifting landscape in VC funding and deals, with a move away from investor-friendly terms despite a challenging environment for startups seeking funding.


9. GROWTH PLANNING: This is a two-part series: Part 1 outlines four high-level ways to grow revenue, and Part 2 - What growth levers should you choose for 2024? https://newsletter.mkt1.co/ 


10. CASE STUDY: Zapier - one of my favorite amazing facts is Zapeir's 25k Landing Pages. But check this article as it's a massive deep dive on their journey from $0 to $230M ARR and $5B valuation: Bootstrapped with $1.3M funding, leveraging SEO (and landing pages!), partnerships, and a user-centric approach for rapid growth and Flywheels everywhere.


POD OF THE WEEK: Great Podcast from the SaaS CFO reviewing the current landscape of private equity deals, the changing dynamics of valuations, and the importance of understanding the actual business model in SaaS companies.