Software Marketing Advisor Blog

Tune into any cable network stock market channel and the airwaves resonate with one consistent theme: SaaS companies are simply too expensive. In fact, we might even be in a bubble!

The argument goes as follows — high revenue growth coupled with lack of profits means these businesses are fundamentally broken. Just as we saw in 1999-2000, investors’ willingness to pay for growth at any cost will end and many SaaS companies will be left behind.

image: Andreessen Horowitz

But that line of reasoning conflates the lessons of the 1999-2000 tech bubble. The businesses that failed in the last tech bubble were valued on metrics that were both poor indicators of the health of the business (“eyeballs”, anyone?) and were nowhere to be found in generally accepted accounting principals (GAAP). In contrast, SaaS companies can be properly valued based on metrics that are both good indicators of financial health and…

As a service provider, how do we know that we are receiving adequate and reasonable value for the products and services we deliver? It seems like such a simple question, but let’s first break it down – “ adequate and reasonable .” Adequate means enough value to generate re-investment in our business to create product innovation as well as profits (I don’t think these are mutually exclusive). Reasonable means at such a level that customers keep coming back time and time again. Achieving this level of value for services can be quite hard – due to competitive factors or the balance of growth/share vs. revenues, etc. But make no mistake, you control the pricing lever.

Many businesses (either mature ones that have slowed their growth due to market share maturity) or even startups can benefit from better practices here. Now, the reality is that many online data businesses are small…