Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

The spread between your LTV and blended CPA determines either your profitability or your rate of growth, and a high valuation depends on balancing these two factors. To the extent that you have good word-of-mouth, activation or retention, these factors tend to drive down your CPA or drive up your LTV, and so are nice bonuses.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco CPA SEM CTO Hire 167

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

As the product got better, we could see the rate getting closer and closer to the mythical “ one percent rule.&# Luckily, we also discovered that certain other metrics, like LTV and CPA were much better than we initially projected. Even that early, it became clear that 4% was not an achievable goal. Expo SF (May.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 14, 2009

A business that strives for something like this should absolutely be charging money from day one, in order to establish baselines for their two key metrics: CPA (the cost to acquire a new customer) and LTV (the lifetime value of each acquired customer). This is the simplest ecosystem and simplest driver of growth. Expo SF (May.

Customer 156

Customer San Francisco Viral Lean 156