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Startup financial models — 12

templates compared for SaaS
Stéphane Nasser · Follow
6 min read · Oct 22, 2020

138 2

This is a summarized article. You can read the original post in full length (20
min read, 20 screenshots, 3 tables) for free here.

As a founder, there comes a time when you need a business plan, complete
with financial forecasts, income statements, and fancy graphs that will
impress your investors.

Don’t build it from scratch — use an existing model.

A financial model allows you to draft financial projections easily, fast, and in
a professional manner. A great template will also force you to think through
all the aspects of your project and make sure you really get the financial
logic behind your business.

It can be annoying but trust me, it’s worth your time.

This post compares the top 12 templates of financial models for SaaS
startups. I have personally tested each model. I have ranked them on 40+
items along 5 categories. I’ve looked at both spreadsheets and SaaS apps, and
both free and paid solutions.

If you are looking at building your SaaS financials, this article is for you.

Table of contents
Methodology — What makes a great financial model for startups?

Disclaimers: affiliation, impartiality, and non-finito

#1 — “FISY Innovation Plan” by Remi Berthier

#2 — “SaaS Financial Plan 2.0” by Christoph Janz

#3 — “SaaS Financial Model” by Jaakko Piipponen

#4 — “Standard SaaS Financial Plan for Startups and SMBs” by Ben

Murray

#5 — “SaaS Startup Kit” by Pro Forma

#6 — “SaaS Financial Model” by Taylor Davidson

#7 — “SaaS: SME & Users” by Alexander Jarvis

#8 — “SaaS: Enterprise, SME & Users” by Alexander Jarvis

#9 — “EY Finance navigator” by Alex and Wout

#10 — “Liveplan” by Palo Alto Software

#11 — “Summit” by Matt Wensing

#12 — “Causal” by Taimur and Lukas

Conclusion: this is the best financial model for SaaS startups

Methodology — What makes a great financial model for SaaS

startups?
Here is the methodology I used to build this benchmark.

I compared 40 points across 5 categories: (a) financial statements, (b)

analysis capabilities, (c) revenue modeling, (d) cost modeling, (e) extra
features. A detailed analysis of each model is available below. In each case, I
tested the software/spreadsheet myself.

Criteria 1: Financial statements

Time scale: Are the statements over 1 year, 3 years or more? You usually
want 3 years as a minimum when you speak with professional investors.

Income statement: Does the template include an income statement? You

usually want a monthly income statement, at least for year 1.

Cash flow statement: Same as income statement

Balance sheet: Same as income statement

GAAP/IFRS: Are the statements compliant with GAAP and/or IFRS rules?

Currency: How many currencies are available?

Criteria 2: Analysis capabilities

Financial analysis: Number of typical financial metrics included e.g.
breakeven point, quick ratio, average inventory, etc.

SaaS analysis: Number of typical SaaS metrics included e.g. MRR growth,
SaaS magic number, CAC/LTV, etc.

Graphs: Number of built-in graphs

Costs by P&L category: Does the template break down costs into P&L
categories (CoGS, RD, G&A, etc.)

Costs by departments: Does the model break down costs into

departments (sales, marketing, CS, engineering, etc)

VS Scenarios: Does the template allow you to compare multiple

scenarios?

VS Industry comparables: Does the template compare your financials

against industry comparables?

VS Actuals: Does the template allow you to run your model versus your
actual numbers?

Criteria 3: Revenue modeling

New client acquisition: How do you enter new clients into the model?
Possibilities include: entering a number manually for each month or year
(it sucks); autofill the model from a base number and a growth rate
(sucks a bit less); autofill several streams — each stream represents a
different type of client e.g SMB/enterprise (better); or even fully model
each acquisition channel (the best, very rare)

Offerings: How many offers can you define and how precisely can you
model them? This includes the possibility to create one-off offers,
recurring offers, or a combo, but also the possibility to create
introduction times and end times for specific offers.

Pricing model: How many pricing models can you define and how
precisely: tiers (free, basic, premium), revenue models (per seat, per
usage, etc), automatically increase or decrease the plans price over years.

Existing clients: Can you model expansion, contraction, churn,

reactivation?
 Commitment: Can you model monthly VS yearly VS multi-annual
contracts?

Service revenue: Can you model punctual service revenue on top of all
the other pricing models and offerings?

Enterprise specific: Does the template offer specific features to model

complex enterprise sales, such as landing/expansion, custom product
developments, various sales cycles, etc?

Criteria 4: Costs modeling

Direct labor costs: The best templates allow you to correlate direct labor
costs with relevant metrics. For example, your sales staff is calculated
based on forecasted income and sales target per account executive. Same
for customer success payroll with number of customers and workload
target per CS staff.

Direct non-labor costs: just like with labor costs, the best templates allow
you to link some direct non-labor costs with relevant metrics. For
instance, server costs can be a % of MRR.

Indirect labor costs: same as above. Even for indirect costs, some
templates find smart ways to tie them to some aspect of the business.

Indirect non-labor costs: same as above

Payment terms: Can you define the payment terms with your vendors
and suppliers? May be useful if there is a hardware component to your
offer.

Hardware-friendly: This is a special mention for templates that model

things like shipping costs, inventory delay, etc.

Criteria 5: Extra features

Documentation: Is there proper documentation in the model and on the
website? Are there good explainer videos? What kind of direct support
(chat, email) comes with the template?

Languages: In what language is the template available?

Third-party integration: Third-party integrations can be useful to input or

update data over time, or to display advanced graphs.

Excel spreadsheet: Can you access your financials as a Microsoft Excel

spreadsheet? This is a must if you need to share it with investors.

Google Sheets: Does the model work in Google Sheets? Not all models
that work in Microsoft Excel work in Google, so you may want to consider
that point.

Editable formulas: Some templates do not allow you to modify formulas

— which is a massive bummer when it comes to customization.

Granted, it’s not a perfect methodology. One could argue forever about
whether cap tables should be included in a startup financial model. But it’s
the best I could come up with — without being a finance nerd myself :)

Search Write

This is a summarized version. You can read the original post in full length (20
min read, 20 screenshots, 3 tables) for free here.

Conclusion: this is the best financial model for SaaS startups

Best free spreadsheet

If you want a “good enough” model but are not willing to pay for it, go for
Ben Murray’s (model #4) or Chris Janz’s (model #2). Customize them a bit to
offset their weaknesses.

See below a side-by-side comparison of the differences between both

models.

Best paid spreadsheet

If you want the best financial model spreadsheet out there and are willing to
pay for it, go for Taylor Davidson’s (model #6) or Alexander Jarvis’ (models
#7/#8). They are by far the best stuff on the market today.

See below a side-by-side comparison of the differences.

Best software
If you want to experience the future of financial modeling, go for Summit
(model #11) or Causal (model #12) — while keeping in mind that both are
very different.

See below a side-by-side comparison of the differences between both

models.

Thanks for reading. Don’t hesitate to leave a question in the comments, I try
to reply personally to each one of them.

Startup Venture Capital Entrepreneurship Finance SaaS

Written by Stéphane Nasser Follow

1.3K Followers

Blogger at stephnass.com

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