Tools · Health panel

SaaS Metrics Scorecard

The five numbers a revenue leader gets asked for first — NRR, GRR, magic number, CAC payback, and Rule of 40 — computed from raw inputs and scored against public benchmarks. No dashboard login, no BI queue. Type, read, decide.

Retention — same customers, trailing 12 months

Upsell and cross-sell into that same cohort.

Downgrades — kept the customer, lost some dollars.

Efficiency — one quarter

Trajectory — the year

Negative is allowed — that’s the point of the Rule of 40.

Net revenue retention

≥115% strong · 100–115% solid · <100% the bucket leaks.

Gross revenue retention

≥90% strong · 80–90% solid · <80% watch. No expansion can hide it.

Magic number

Net new ARR per S&M dollar. ≥1.0 strong · 0.5–1.0 solid · <0.5 watch.

CAC payback

Months to earn back the spend, on gross margin. ≤12 strong · 12–24 solid · >24 watch.

Rule of 40

Growth % + FCF margin %. ≥40 strong · 25–40 solid · <25 watch — the growth-versus-profit trade, in one number.

The formulas (textbook, on purpose): NRR = (start + expansion − contraction − churn) ÷ start; GRR = (start − contraction − churn) ÷ start; magic number = net new ARR ÷ same-quarter S&M spend; CAC payback = S&M spend ÷ (net new ARR × gross margin), in months; Rule of 40 = growth + FCF margin. Bands reflect the public SaaS benchmark surveys everyone quotes — medians move with the market, so treat them as orientation, not law. Runs in your browser; nothing is sent anywhere unless you ask for the readout below.

Want this panel read properly?

Leave an email and I'll send back your five numbers with the three cross-checks that make or break them — whether the NRR cohort is honest, whether net new ARR is gross or net of churn, and which single metric to fix first. Written by me, not a sequence. Usually within a day.

These five numbers are the health panel; the pipeline math is the engine room. The coverage planner runs the quarter underneath them.

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