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independence2 unconnected · 1 more author in those circles
standing

contested · 9 claims against 1

applies to

b2b and consumer, no audience needed

confidence

high

evidence

11 claims · 11 articles · 4 receipts

window

2017-08-24 → 2022-01-25

2 builders who never spoke to each other · contested

Plan for a multi-year ramp, not a launch

The first dollar can take months of unpaid work, and the early figures stay small for a long time: two customers, then four, with the compounding only visible in hindsight. Set expectations around percentage growth from tiny numbers rather than around a leap to a livable income in year one.

What both sides agree on

  • Treat five customers right after launch as a signal, not a business; the test is whether the same channel keeps producing hundreds or thousands of paying subscribers.

Where this splits

A slow multi-year climb is treated as normal, against a rule of thumb that companies which succeed rarely take more than about four years to reach a million in recurring revenue and that still needing a day job two years in means the fundamentals are wrong.

9 claims against 1

Cory Zue · Justin Jackson · Pieter Levels

Expect a slow multi-year climb from tiny numbers

  1. 01Expect 20-40% month-over-month recurring revenue growth while your numbers are tiny, and target roughly 15% monthly once the business has momentum.
  2. 02Set expectations around doubling from tiny numbers rather than a leap to scale: the path is two customers, then four, and it stays slow for a long time.
the objection · 1 claimJustin Jackson

Give it about four years or fundamentals are wrong

Put a clock on it: companies that succeed rarely take more than about four years to reach a million in annual recurring revenue, and needing a day job two years in indicates the fundamentals are wrong.

  1. 03Plan for a multi-year ramp rather than a launch: the first dollar can take half a year and the early monthly numbers will look trivial before they compound.
  2. 04Expect the first paying customer to sit a long way behind unpaid effort: months of work and a small cash outlay, most of it spent on validation experiments rather than on the product.
  3. 05Don't budget on a six-figure first year going solo; the numbers come from years of compounding rather than one breakout event.

What it returned

  • 20

    20-40% monthly MRR growth in the early days; ~15% monthly is the goal many SaaS businesses aim at afterwards.

  • 2012

    Chris Nagele's SuperConf talk, 2012.

  • $1

    Place Card Me took nearly six months to earn $1, then $5, $60 and $200 in successive months before reaching $1,000 to $2,000 a month; Zue's annual product profits ran $1k, $12k, $25k, $43k and $113k across five years.

  • $1

    Zue's first $1 of revenue came after just under 210 hours across roughly five months and $110.81 of spending, of which $78.82 was ad tests, at an effective rate near half a cent per hour.

Sources

the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

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the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

963 corroborated plays to draw from · 3 a week

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