SaaS Growth Constraint Diagnosis
Diagnose SaaS financial health, reconcile retention and acquisition metrics, and choose the next growth lever.
Before & after
Same prompt, same agent — the only difference is the skill.
There are several key metrics you might want to look at to assess your SaaS health. ARR is certainly important, but you'll also want to consider things like customer churn rate, customer acquisition cost, lifetime value, and net revenue retention. Different metrics matter at different stages of growth. If you share your customer numbers and other financial data, I could offer some perspective on how you're tracking. What other metrics do you have available?
HEALTH SCORECARD ARR Performance: Strong Current: $500k Growth: 40% YoY Benchmark: 30-50% at this stage Rating: On Track KEY METRICS TO TRACK Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC): estimate $800-1200 per customer Customer Lifetime Value (LTV): estimate $3500-5200 LTV:CAC Ratio: 4-6x is healthy (yours likely 4.2x) Churn Rate: aim under 5% monthly Net Revenue Retention (NRR): track target 110%+ CRITICAL RISKS • Validate actual LTV against net revenue retention • Watch for cohort churn creep as customer base grows • Benchmark CAC trend against pricing changes IMM ACTIONS Month 1: Calculate actual LTV cohorts by customer acquisition month Month 2: Establish NRR baseline and retention benchmarks Month 3: Model runway impact if growth slows to 20% YoY
About this skill
"MRR is growing, so why does the business still feel fragile?" This skill checks what your numbers actually mean, separates acquisition from retention, and identifies the next lever worth pulling. You get a plain financial-health verdict with visible math and explicit uncertainty.
What it does
- Reconciles opening and closing MRR so missing revenue movements do not distort the diagnosis.
- Separates customer churn, gross revenue retention, and net revenue retention, including expansion that can hide customer losses.
- Calculates CAC payback and conditional LTV:CAC using compatible periods, margins, and customer cohorts.
- Diagnoses whether acquisition, retention, acquisition economics, or cash availability is the strongest supported growth constraint.
- Compares practical interventions and names the evidence that would change the recommendation.
- Turns messy founder notes into an honest board-ready explanation without inventing missing metrics.
What you get
A proportionate answer: a corrected calculation for a quick question, or a financial-health diagnosis with reconciled metrics, one priority action, and a measurable follow-up check. Assumptions and unresolved data gaps stay visible.
Best for
SaaS founders, finance leads, and operators deciding whether to increase acquisition spending, repair retention, change pricing, or investigate a growth slowdown.
SKILL.md preview
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name: saas-growth-constraint-diagnosis
description: Diagnose SaaS financial health by reconciling recurring revenue, checking retention and acquisition economics, and selecting one evidence-backed growth constraint and next action. Use when the user says "how healthy is my SaaS?", "our MRR is growing but cash is tight", "my churn keeps getting worse", "is our CAC too high?", "calculate LTV and payback", "what is slowing our growth?", "can we afford to scale acquisition?", or "help me explain these numbers to the board".
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# SaaS Growth Constraint Diagnosis
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