What is a value metric?

Written by Madalena Rugeroni, founder of Mazo · Updated 15 September 2026

A value metric is the unit a SaaS company charges by — per seat, per contact, per invoice, per location — chosen so that the price rises as the customer gets more value from the product. A good value metric lets small customers start cheaply and large customers pay more without a renegotiation.

The three tests of a good value metric

Patrick Campbell, founder of ProfitWell, puts it as three tests. A good value metric:

Aligns with the value the customer receives. More of the metric means more value delivered.
Grows as the customer succeeds. Your revenue expands without a new sales cycle.
Is predictable enough to budget. A buyer can estimate next quarter's bill.

Per seat is the default in B2B SaaS, and it's often wrong: charge per seat only if value actually scales with the number of people using the product.

Worked example

A fictional booking tool for physiotherapy clinics compares three value metrics for two customers. Clinic A has 2 admin users, 4 practitioners and 600 bookings a month. Clinic B has 2 admin users, 20 practitioners and 3,000 bookings a month.

€30 per admin seat: both clinics pay €60. Clinic B gets five times the value for the same price. Fails test one.
€0.10 per booking: A pays €60, B pays €300 — aligned, but the bill swings with every busy or quiet month. Weak on test three.
€15 per practitioner: A pays €60, B pays €300, the bill grows as the clinic hires, and it's easy to budget. Passes all three.

Why the value metric matters from €0 to €1M ARR

Pre-revenue: ask about the metric in discovery. How do prospects think about the size of the problem — people, volume, locations? That's usually where the metric hides.
Around €10k MRR: check whether your biggest users pay the most. If your heaviest customers pay the same as your lightest, the metric isn't tracking value.
€50k+ MRR: the value metric is your expansion engine. Blake Bartlett's point about product-led companies is that they land small and expand on the value metric — which is what pushes net revenue retention above 100%.

Kyle Poyar's guidance for early-stage companies is one value metric, not several. A hybrid — a subscription floor with usage on top — can work, but pure usage-based pricing before product-market fit makes revenue very hard to forecast.

Mazo's rule of thumb: before €1M ARR, charge on one value metric that grows as the customer gets more value, with three tiers at most. A buyer should understand your pricing in 30 seconds without a sales call.

Common value metric mistakes

Per seat by default. If one admin runs the whole account, seat pricing caps your revenue at the smallest number.
A metric the buyer can't predict. Surprising invoices create churn, not expansion.
Stacking metrics. Seats plus contacts plus API calls turns a pricing page into a calculator.
Pricing on cost, not willingness to pay. Your server costs are not your customer's value.
Switching existing customers without notice. When you change the metric, grandfather current customers the first time.

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FAQ

What is the difference between a value metric and a pricing model?

The pricing model is the overall structure, such as subscription, usage-based or hybrid. The value metric is the specific unit inside it that the price scales with, such as per practitioner or per 1,000 contacts.

Is per-seat pricing a bad value metric?

Only when value does not scale with seats. If each additional user gets real value, per seat works. If one person can run the whole account, per-seat pricing undercharges your best customers.

Can I change my value metric later?

Yes, and many companies do after they learn how customers get value. Change it for new customers first, give existing customers notice, and keep them on their current terms the first time.

Who wrote this

Madalena Rugeroni built Mazo. She's an ex-Googler, a startup advisor and investor, and runs a portfolio of internet companies. Before that, as Head of Growth at Amplemarket, she scaled a B2B SaaS to $10M ARR. LinkedIn

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Further reading. Operators and books referenced: Patrick Campbell (ProfitWell), Kyle Poyar (Growth Unhinged), Blake Bartlett (OpenView). These are published methodologies credited to their authors; Mazo is not affiliated with or endorsed by them.