Shameless Rounds, Checkout Flow Setup, SaaS Tsunami – TechCrunch

Converting one-time customers into repeat customers takes on increased importance during a downturn.

Acquiring one new user can be a daunting task, but finding ways to reduce friction during shopping and checkout is a proven method of increasing the lifetime value of existing customers.

Important note: One study found that password difficulties cause nearly 60% of consumers to abandon their cart before making a purchase.

“In times of recession, you need to make things easier, not more complicated,” says Ari Jacoby, CEO and co-founder of Deduce.

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This begs the question: Do you know how many people signed up to your site last month but didn’t confirm their email? Well, why not?

If you’re trying to calibrate online sales, this TC+ guest post contains formulas for calculating Lifetime Loss (LTV) due to churn on a monthly and annual basis.

Seriously, if you’re not working on calibrating each of your systems, you’re just leaving money on the table.

Thanks for reading,

Walter Thompson
Editorial Manager, TechCrunch+
@yourprotaganist

Should founders announce down rounds? This PR guy says you have nothing to hide

If your house was damaged in an earthquake, would you feel embarrassed?

Likewise, founders don’t need to be dismissive of funding that lowers their valuation, advises Kate Johnson, BLASTmedia’s vice president of public affairs.

“Instead of pretending the lower rating didn’t happen, change your mindset,” she writes.

“You have nothing to hide, and from a PR perspective, no news is not good news. So focus on adjusting your expectations.”

3 views: Thoughts on the flow

Image Credits: Edwin Remsberg (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Last week, Andreessen Horowitz wrote the largest individual check in the firm’s history, investing $350 million in residential real estate startup Flow.

The kicker? Flow is founded by Adam Neumann, a former WeWork co-founder who resigned and relinquished majority control after the company withdrew its IPO filing in September 2019.

In what they describe as “an incomplete list of why Marc Andreessen and Adam Neumann got America’s housing problems wrong,” reporters Tim De Chant, Dominique-Madori Davis and Amanda Silberling shared their views on the deal:

• Amanda Silberling: Venture capital won’t save us
• Dominique-Madori Davies: Diligence? Are we doing this?
• Tim De Chant: Neumann is right—you can’t force a community

Why the “last click” in ecommerce matters—and how to get it right

Image Credits: selimaxone (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Marketing drives the sales funnel, while the product team and engineers drive the customer experience while browsing and shopping.

But who owns your payment flow?

“You may have perfected the top of the funnel, but you may have missed the bottom,” says Bolt CEO Maju Kuruvila, who shares several strategies for optimizing the checkout process and why it should start at the top:

For the CMO, the win is about making sure leads are generating revenue and that a better checkout process is driving repeat customers.

To a CFO, the numbers are clear: a percentage improvement in conversion is more significant than a percentage improvement in overall web traffic.

Survive the SaaS Tsunami: Optimize Your Technology Stack to Reduce Risk and Free Up Cash Flow

Image Credits: Calderal (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Startups that don’t use a vendor management infrastructure to control their technology stack are flying in a thick fog: there’s no easy way to know how much they’re spending each month, and on what.

In reality, most IT teams aren’t prepared (or even interested) in managing a recurring software update schedule, let alone tracking costs or performance.

Everyone is looking for places to make incremental improvements: Adopting a dedicated procurement resource can increase your bottom line (and reduce your security risk).