Your growth slide survives about 90 seconds of a good board.
It is true, it is up and to the right, and it cannot say which channel, at what cost, repaying when. We build the reporting that answers those 4 questions — and then we run the channels that come out of it.
Every founder has this slide. It is true, it is up and to the right, and it survives about 90 seconds of a good board.
Three failures that look like a growth problem and are not.
01
Growth is real and the arithmetic underneath it is not
Signups climb, the graph looks like the deck, and nobody has divided the money spent by the money returned. A channel can produce beautiful volume for two quarters while quietly taking eighteen months to repay a cost you booked today. The number that kills startups is not CAC. It is when.
02
Every experiment is run once and never finished
A channel is tried for six weeks, judged on a month of data inside a payback period measured in quarters, and switched off before it could have told you anything. The next one is started the same week. After a year there are nine dead experiments and no answer about any of them.
03
The board asks one question the reporting cannot answer
Not how many users. How much did each one cost, how long until they pay it back, and how much of the last raise is funding growth that would stop the moment you stopped paying for it. A dashboard built around sessions cannot answer that, and the meeting is next week.
What we would report on, and what each one is for.
These are the numbers a board actually asks about. Managed together, on one definition, so a cheaper user can never quietly become a shorter-lived one.
CAC payback in months
How long until a cohort has repaid what it cost to acquire. The single number that decides whether growth is funded by customers or by the last raise.
Burn multiple
Net burn divided by net new ARR. It answers the only question that matters between rounds: how much cash you consume to add a dollar of recurring revenue.
CAC by channel, held apart
Blended CAC hides the channel that has stopped working. Every source is costed separately so the moment one turns is visible in the week it happens.
Activation rate, not signup rate
The share of new accounts that reach the moment the product becomes useful. Growth above a broken activation step is the most expensive thing a startup can buy.
Months of runway, recalculated monthly
Every spending decision is presented against how long the money lasts, because the right answer at eighteen months of runway is the wrong answer at seven.
Retention by cohort
Whether the users a channel brings are still there at month six. It decides whether the payback calculation was ever real.
4 straight answers, not 4 channels.
- Nothing yet. Queue an experiment.
Tick what is true. Three or more and this is your stage.
The stage you need is decided by what you can already prove, not by what you raised. Switch stage below and the list changes with it.
Tick the ones that are true.
Nothing is submitted and nothing is stored — this is here so you can rule the stage out as easily as rule it in.
Tick the ones that are true.
Nothing is submitted and nothing is stored — this is here so you can rule the stage out as easily as rule it in.
Tick the ones that are true.
Nothing is submitted and nothing is stored — this is here so you can rule the stage out as easily as rule it in.
Foundation for Tech Startups, line by line.
Every line links to the service page it comes from, with its standalone price, so you can check the arithmetic rather than take our word for it.
Excludes ad spend, which you pay directly to the platforms.
One channel with a payback period you can defendTwo channels and an activation step that holds under volumeAcquisition, activation and retention run as one model
Cohorts and payback instrumented first
Before a dollar of acquisition moves we make the last two quarters readable as cohorts — what each intake cost and what it has repaid. Buying users on top of numbers nobody trusts is how runway disappears quietly.
Part of CRO & Analytics → 02One acquisition channel, run properly
Up to $10,000 a month in ad spend on the channel closest to existing intent. At this stage narrow is not caution, it is the only way to get a clean read inside a payback period.
Part of Media Buying → 03Two ad sets a month
Eight pieces sized for every placement, written around the problem your product removes rather than around the feature list.
Part of Performance Creative → 04Activation measured before acquisition scales
The step where a new account becomes a useful one, instrumented and watched. If it does not hold, we tell you to stop rather than to spend more.
Part of CRO & Analytics → 05A monthly call against the model
Thirty minutes with the person running the account, reported as CAC, payback and months of runway rather than as impressions.
Part of Media Buying →Media buying across two channels
Up to $25,000 a month in ad spend. The second channel is added because the first has run out of people who convert at the payback you need, not because it was available.
Part of Media Buying → 02A creative retainer, not a creative order
Eight statics and four videos a month, produced against what the cohort data says is tiring rather than against a brief written at the last offsite.
Part of Performance Creative → 03Two experiments a month on activation and signup
Run where accounts are actually lost, with the decision rule written before the test and the result recorded whether it worked or not.
Part of CRO & Analytics → 04Onboarding sequences that shorten payback
The fastest way to improve payback is rarely a cheaper click. It is getting more of the accounts you already bought to the moment the product proves itself.
Part of Lifecycle Management → 05A board-ready monthly model
CAC by channel, payback, burn multiple and runway, assembled from your own data rather than by somebody the night before.
Part of CRO & Analytics →Media buying across every channel that earns it
Budget allocated on payback period and burn multiple, moved monthly, with the reasoning written down each time it moves.
Part of Media Buying → 02Creative produced at the rate the channels consume it
Statics, video and the long-form pieces a technical buyer actually reads before signing up.
Part of Performance Creative → 03Organic and AI visibility as a managed programme
The compounding channel, including how your product is described when somebody asks an AI assistant for options. It is the line that lowers blended CAC in year two.
Part of SEO & AI Visibility → 04Lifecycle across onboarding, expansion and churn
The sequences that decide whether a cohort repays in seven months or fourteen. In a subscription business this is where payback is actually won.
Part of Lifecycle Management → 05Reporting and routing handled automatically
The board model assembled from your own data on a schedule, and the internal alerts that fire when a cohort turns rather than when somebody notices.
Part of AI Automation →What this would cost you separately.
Read this honestly: at $1,340 of fixed lines against $1,800, you are not buying a discount here. You are buying the cohort and activation work that decides whether the media spend was ever a good idea — and one person accountable for saying so while you still have runway to react. Figures on the left are the closest equivalent line from the à la carte menu; a line inside a stage is never an exact copy of a standalone service, so treat this as a fair comparison rather than an identical one.
At $3,550 of fixed lines against $3,500, the saving is not the argument. The argument is that acquisition and activation stop being two teams. The same people who buy the user are accountable for whether that user reaches the moment the product becomes useful, which is the only place a payback period actually improves. Figures on the left are the closest equivalent line from the à la carte menu; a line inside a stage is never an exact copy of a standalone service, so treat this as a fair comparison rather than an identical one.
At $6,300 of fixed lines against $6,500, this stage costs slightly more than the parts. That is the honest number, and the reason is the model: one definition of a repaid customer across acquisition, activation and retention, maintained monthly, so the figure you take to a board is the same figure the team optimises against. Figures on the left are the closest equivalent line from the à la carte menu; a line inside a stage is never an exact copy of a standalone service, so treat this as a fair comparison rather than an identical one.
What this stage leaves out, on purpose.
Named here rather than discovered in month three. Each can be added, and each links to what it costs.
A second channel
Foundation deliberately proves one. A second channel before the first has a readable payback period doubles the spend and halves the clarity.
Media Buying — from $900/mo →Organic and AI visibility
Search compounds, which is exactly why it is the wrong first move on a short runway. It belongs at the point where you can wait for it.
SEO Essential — $850/mo →Lifecycle and onboarding sequences
Activation is measured here but not yet rebuilt. Fixing it is the highest-return work available once acquisition is honest.
Lifecycle Management — $800/mo →Organic and AI visibility as a programme
Structure stays in channels that can be read inside a quarter. Compounding search work belongs at the stage where you can afford to wait for it.
SEO Growth — $1,600/mo →Automation of the internal reporting
The monthly model is assembled by us here rather than automated. Worth automating once the definitions have stopped changing.
AI automation Care Plan — $350/mo →A rebuilt marketing site
We will run experiments on the pages that lose signups. A rebuild is a separate piece of work with a separate price.
Business Website — from $1,500 →A rebuilt product or onboarding flow
We will tell you precisely where accounts stop activating and test around it. Building the product change is your team's work.
Fundraising materials
The monthly model is written so it can go into a board pack unchanged. Preparing a raise is a different job and we do not pretend to do it.
Media spend itself
Every figure here excludes the money that goes to the platforms. It leaves your card, not ours.
What we will not do, whatever you pay us.
01
We will not spend against a runway we have not seen
Before anything launches we want to know how many months of cash there are. A plan that repays in fourteen months is a good plan at twenty-four months of runway and a fatal one at nine, and the difference is not a marketing judgement.
02
We will not report a metric your board cannot use
Sessions, impressions and follower counts do not appear in your monthly report. CAC, payback, burn multiple and cohort retention do, because those are the four numbers the next conversation about money will be about.
03
We will not route your ad budget through our account
It goes from your card to the platforms. We never hold it, float it, or take a percentage of it as margin. Management up to $10,000 a month of spend is a flat $900 — scaling your budget does not inflate our invoice.
Signature to first experiment: 5 to 10 business days.
What happens, and what we need from you at each point. The second column is the one most agencies leave vague.
We take access to what exists in your name and read the last two quarters as cohorts rather than as months — what each intake cost, and what it has repaid so far.
Approve access requests from your own logins. No shared passwords, ever.
Runway, burn and current payback are written down in one page and agreed. Everything after this is measured against that page.
Thirty minutes with whoever owns the model, and the real cash figure.
Activation is instrumented before acquisition is touched. If new accounts do not reach the useful moment, buying more of them is the most expensive possible mistake.
Point us at the product analytics, or tell us plainly that there are none yet.
First experiment goes live with a decision rule written in advance — what result continues it, what result ends it, and on what date.
One round of comments, and agreement to hold the rule when the data is inconvenient.
First full report: CAC by channel, projected payback, burn multiple, and what we got wrong. It is written so you can put it in a board pack without rewriting it.
45 minutes, and a decision on what changes.
What you are committing to.
The same terms apply to all three stages and every service on the site.
- Invoiced monthly in advance. Three-month minimum, then month-to-month with 30 days’ notice. Three months is the shortest honest term for anything measurable.
- Ad budgets are paid by you, directly to the platforms. We never hold, route or mark up your media spend, and the management fee is the only thing we are paid.
- Platform subscriptions stay on your billing. Advertising accounts, email platform, messaging, hosting — all in your name, so none of it is hostage to the relationship.
- You own every account, asset and piece of data created during the engagement, including after we part ways. That is not a courtesy at the end; it is the arrangement from day one.
- Onboarding is 5 to 10 business days from signature to first launch, depending on which services are in the plan.
- Custom scopes are always available. If none of the three stages fits, tell us the goal and the budget and we will price the actual work rather than sell you the nearest box.
- The $95 strategy session is credited in full toward your first invoice, so if we work together the session costs you nothing.
The questions that decide it.
We have nine months of runway. Is it reckless to spend on marketing at all?
It is reckless to spend on channels that repay in eighteen. At nine months the honest strategy is a narrow one: the channels closest to existing intent, a payback target under six months, and a decision rule that ends an experiment early rather than hopefully. We would rather tell you that in the session than sell you a stage you cannot afford to wait out.
Our CAC looks fine. Why does payback matter separately?
Because CAC is a price and payback is a date. A $400 CAC repaid in four months is a business. The same $400 repaid in sixteen is a financing decision, and it is being made with money you raised for something else. The two numbers can move in opposite directions for a year before anyone notices.
Can you guarantee a CAC?
No, and a guaranteed CAC is usually a promise to buy the cheapest possible users. What we will do is agree a payback target before we spend, report against it monthly, and tell you in month two whether it is reachable. If it is not, we say so while you still have the runway to act on it.
We are pre-product-market-fit. Should we be doing this yet?
Probably not, and we will say so. Paid acquisition against an activation step that does not hold converts runway into churn faster than anything else available. If that is where you are, the session is still worth having — the output is simply a different recommendation.
What happens if we stop?
Every account, asset and piece of data created during the engagement is yours, including after we part ways. Paid channels stop when the spend stops; the instrumentation, the content and the tracking keep working. That is the arrangement from day one, not a courtesy at the end.
Who this works for, and who it does not.
A good fit if
Most of this work looks like the following.
- You know your runway in months and will say the number out loud.
- Something already works: users activate, retain and occasionally pay you.
- You can hold a decision rule for a full payback period, not four weeks.
- You will give access to product analytics as well as ad accounts.
- The board asks about CAC and payback rather than about impressions.
The wrong choice if
Said plainly, so nobody spends a call finding out.
- You want a guaranteed CAC before anyone has seen your activation rate.
- Runway is short enough that only a channel repaying in weeks would help.
- Activation is broken and the plan is to buy more users anyway.
- Experiments get switched off whenever a month looks bad.
- Nobody can say what a customer is worth over twelve months.
A paid strategy session, credited back.
45 minutes. $95, credited in full toward your first invoice.
Bring your runway, your burn, and the last two quarters of acquisition spend. We will calculate your real payback period and tell you whether it lands inside the runway — including if the honest answer is that it does not.
- Your CAC payback period, calculated on your own cohorts
- Whether it lands inside your runway, and by how much
- An honest read on which stage fits, or that none of them does yet