Ryan Rutan

CMO

Startups.com

About

Founding Partner @ Startups.com platform | Clarity.fm, Launchrock, Fundable, Zirtual, and Co-Host of The Startup Therapy Podcast. Ryan has 15 years of experience as a Founder, Advisor, Mentor, and Investor — the quintessential startup guerrilla. He works with 100's of the best startups every year on everything from ideation, idea validation, early marketing traction, customer acquisition to fundraising, scaling, and operations.

Expertise

Equity & OwnershipFoundationsProductCofounders & TeamBusiness PlanningFunding StagesExits & M&AAI StrategyLegal StructurePitchingAdvisorBootstrappingCapital GainsCustomer ContractDebt FinancingESOPGrowth MarketingNetwork EffectsVendor ContractAi StartupGenerative AiFoundation ModelLarge Language ModelMachine LearningTransformer ArchitectureTraining DataFine TuningPrompt EngineeringContext WindowRetrieval Augmented GenerationAi AgentMultimodal AiInference CostGpu CostToken EconomicsAi MoatData FlywheelAi WrapperAi SafetyAi AlignmentVibe CodingBusiness PlanBusiness StrategyBusiness Model CanvasLean CanvasSwot AnalysisBlue OceanGrowth StrategyGo To Market StrategyGtm MotionStrategic PlanningAnnual PlanningQuarterly PlanningScenario PlanningMilestone PlanningRoadmap PlanningOkrsKpisNorth Star FrameworkDashboardFinancial ModelFinancial ProjectionsRevenue ModelRevenue ForecastBottoms Up ForecastSensitivity AnalysisExpense BudgetPricing ModelPricing StrategyP And L StatementBalance SheetCash FlowArrMrrAcvTcvBookings Vs RevenueRevenue RecognitionDeferred RevenueExpansion RevenueContraction RevenueLogo RetentionUnit EconomicsCacLtvLtv Cac RatioCac PaybackMagic NumberRule Of 40Sales EfficiencyContribution MarginGross MarginEbitdaMarket ResearchMarket SizeMarket SegmentationTam Sam SomAddressable MarketIndustry AnalysisVertical Analysis

Articles

Net Promoter Score (NPS)

Net Promoter Score (NPS) is the customer loyalty metric calculated by subtracting the percentage of Detractors from the percentage of Promoters.

NDA

A Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) is a contract between parties to keep specified information confidential, used to protect trade secrets, business plans, and other sensitive information.

Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

An MVP is the smallest version of a product that allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort.

Mutual NDA

A mutual NDA is a two-way confidentiality agreement where both parties agree to protect each other's confidential information, common in partnerships, M&A discussions, and joint ventures.

Multimodal AI

Multimodal AI refers to models that handle multiple input/output modalities (text, image, audio, video) within a single system, enabling applications impossible with text-only models.

Multi Touch Attribution

Multi-touch attribution (MTA) is the family of attribution models that apportion conversion credit across multiple marketing touchpoints in a customer's journey.

MRR

MRR (Monthly Recurring Revenue) is the normalized monthly value of a subscription business's recurring revenue, used by month-billed SaaS companies and consumer subscription businesses where monthly granularity matters.

Monthly Business Review

A monthly business review is the recurring cross-functional meeting reviewing business performance, variance against plan, and strategic adjustments needed for the month ahead.

Moat

A moat is a durable competitive advantage that protects a company from competition over time, with categories including network effects, scale economies, brand, switching costs, regulatory, and proprietary technology.

Mission Statement

A mission statement is the concise articulation of why the company exists and what it aims to accomplish, used to align team and stakeholders around purpose.

Minimum Lovable Product

Minimum lovable product (MLP) is an evolution of MVP that emphasizes shipping something users actually love at launch, not just the bare minimum that works.

Milestone Planning

Milestone planning is the practice of defining specific time-bound accomplishments the company will achieve, used in capital planning, fundraising commitments, and operational execution.

Micro-VC

A micro-VC is a small venture fund ($50M-$200M) that leads pre-seed and seed rounds with $100K-$2M check sizes, often founded by former operators or angels.

MFN Clause

MFN (most-favored-nation) provisions automatically give an investor any better terms offered to subsequent investors in the same or future rounds, protecting early investors against later, harder-negotiated terms.

Mezzanine Financing

Mezzanine financing is a hybrid of debt and equity, typically subordinated debt with warrants or convertible features, used at growth and pre-IPO stages.

Master Services Agreement

A Master Services Agreement (MSA) is the framework contract establishing terms governing ongoing relationships between two parties, with specific projects executed under separate Statements of Work (SOWs).

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

A Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) is a lead that has met defined marketing criteria indicating readiness for sales follow-up.

Marketing Funnel

A marketing funnel is the staged model of how a person moves from first awareness of a product to a paying, retained, and referring customer.

Marketing Automation

Marketing automation is the use of software platforms to execute, schedule, and measure marketing tasks across email, SMS, web, push, and ad channels.

Marketing Attribution

Marketing attribution is the practice of assigning credit for a conversion or revenue outcome to the marketing touchpoints that influenced the customer's journey.

Marketing Analytics

Marketing analytics is the discipline of collecting, measuring, and interpreting marketing data across channels, campaigns, audiences, and customer journeys.

Market Validation

Market validation is the process of gathering evidence that a product or business model fits a real market need, typically through customer interviews, MVPs, pilots, and pre-orders.

Market Size

Market size is the total revenue potential of a market, typically expressed via the TAM/SAM/SOM framework, with the discipline being to estimate from bottoms-up rather than tops-down market-share fantasies.

Market Segmentation

Market segmentation divides a broad market into smaller groups with shared characteristics (demographics, firmographics, behavior, needs), enabling targeted product, marketing, and sales approaches.

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