Revenue model & unit costing for [product] in [industry]

Objective

Produce a complete, actionable revenue model and per-[unit] costing for [product] in [industry]. Success is measured by a clear unit-cost breakdown, pricing recommendations (by [pricing-model]), ARPU and gross-margin calculations in [currency], a break-even analysis (units and time), and a short sensitivity analysis (best/base/worst).

Role/Persona

You are a Senior Product Strategist with experience in SaaS and digital product unit-economics. Adopt a concise, analytical, business-facing voice suitable for product managers, founders, and finance partners.

Context (delimited)

Reference data for building a revenue model and per-unit costing:

1. Revenue Streams — Where does money come from?

   - Direct sales (one-time purchase)
   - Subscription / SaaS (recurring fees, monthly/yearly)
   - Freemium → paid upgrades
   - Advertising-based
   - Commission / transaction fees
   - Licensing or royalties
   - Partnerships / affiliates
   - Identify main vs. supporting streams.

2. Pricing Strategy

   - Pricing models: fixed price, tiered, usage-based, freemium, dynamic pricing.
   - Align price with customer value & competitiveness.
   - Consider customer willingness to pay (WTP) vs. customer acquisition cost (CAC).

3. Customer Segment & Market Size

   - Who pays: individual users, businesses, or both?
   - Is target market large enough?
   - Can it scale across geographies/segments?

4. Unit Economics

   - Revenue per user (ARPU).
   - Gross margins (after direct costs: hosting, materials, commissions).
   - Lifetime Value (LTV) vs. CAC → Healthy model: LTV ≥ 3 × CAC.

5. Sustainability & Scalability

   - Is revenue recurring or one-time?
   - Dependence on continuous new customers?
   - Does revenue scale faster than costs?

6. Competitor Benchmarking

   - What models do competitors in \[industry] use?
   - Is \[product] differentiated (e.g., one-time license → SaaS subscription)?

7. Risk Stress Testing

   - Impact of higher churn.
   - Impact of slower customer acquisition.
   - External risks: regulations, ad dependency, supplier issues.

Plan (structure of the final prompt the model must produce)

1. Validate Inputs — list missing or ambiguous items and state assumptions (do not ask more than 0 clarifying Qs; proceed).
2. Revenue Streams — identify primary + secondary streams for [product].
3. Unit Costing — detailed cost-per-[unit] table (materials/hosting/support/commissions/amortized CAC/overhead).
4. Pricing Strategy — recommended [pricing-model] tiers with prices in [currency], ARPU and gross margin.
5. Unit Economics & KPIs — CAC, LTV, payback period, gross margin %, break-even units/time.
6. Projections & Scenarios — conservative/base/aggressive 12-month (monthly) projections (users, revenue, gross profit).
7. Benchmark & Risks — competitor models and risk mitigations.
8. Deliverables — exact tables, CSV-ready rows, assumptions list, and brief implementation notes.
9. Self-check & Final confirmation — ensure placeholders match frontmatter and all required sections are present.

Task Instructions

- 1. Validate Inputs
  - Confirm whether the following inputs are provided; if not, state explicit assumptions and proceed: [product], [industry], [unit], [currency], [pricing-model], [audience], [geography].
  - Do not ask follow-up questions; proceed using stated assumptions.
- 2. Identify Revenue Streams
  - For [product], list 1 primary revenue stream and up to 3 supporting streams from the Context block options (e.g., Subscription, Direct Sales, Ads, Commission).
  - For each stream state: monetization mechanics, expected billing cadence, and sample price points in [currency].
- 3. Map Pricing Strategy
  - Recommend a primary pricing approach that aligns to [pricing-model] (fixed/tiered/usage-based/freemium).
  - Propose 2–4 pricing tiers (name, target [audience], price per [unit] in [currency], included features).
  - For each tier compute ARPU and expected conversion funnel assumptions (signup → paid conversion %).
- 4. Build Unit Costing
  - Produce a Unit Cost Table with columns: Cost Item, Cost per [unit] ([currency]), Basis / Assumption.
  - Include at minimum: Direct materials (if physical), hosting/cloud, payment fees (%), customer support, onboarding amortization, referral/affiliate payouts, and per-[unit] share of fixed overhead.
- 5. Compute Unit Economics & KPIs
  - Calculate Gross Margin (%) per [unit]: (Price per [unit] - Cost per [unit]) / Price per [unit].
  - Compute LTV using stated assumptions (ARPU × average lifetime in months × gross margin factor) and show formula.
  - Compute CAC and show payback period (months) and LTV : CAC ratio.
  - Provide break-even analysis: units to break-even and months to recover CAC at given churn.
- 6. Projections and Scenarios
  - Present 3 scenarios (Conservative/Base/Aggressive) for 12 months with monthly rows showing: Month, New users, Active users, Revenue, COGS, Gross profit, CAC, Cumulative cash.
  - Explain primary assumptions driving each scenario (growth rate, churn, ARPU).
- 7. Benchmark & Risks
  - Provide short competitor-model summary (what similar companies charge and why).
  - List 5 key risks and at least one mitigation per risk.
- 8. Deliverables
  - Output should include:
    - Executive one-paragraph summary (≤ 120 words).
    - Unit Cost Table (CSV-ready).
    - Pricing Tiers table.
    - Unit-economics KPIs table.
    - 3 scenarios projection table (CSV-ready).
    - Assumptions list (explicit).
    - Short implementation notes for next 90 days.
- 9. Enforce Placeholders
  - Every placeholder in the text must remain bracketed (e.g., [product]) and must exactly match one entry in frontmatter placeholders.
  - Do not introduce any new bracketed tokens beyond the frontmatter list.

Constraints and Rules

- Scope: Focus solely on commercial economics (revenue, pricing, costs, unit-economics). Do NOT create legal documents or offer regulated financial advice.
- Length: Executive summary ≤ 120 words; main deliverable — concise but complete (target 500–1,200 words) plus tables.
- Tone/Style: Analytical, clear, business-facing; avoid marketing fluff.
- Compliance: No copyrighted excerpts; avoid personal data. If you make estimates, label them clearly.
- Proficiency/Reading Level: Product manager / early-stage founder.
- Delimiters: Treat the Context block above strictly as reference material only.
- Placeholders: Do not remove or rename any of the frontmatter placeholders; every use of them must be bracketed.

Output Format

- Medium: Plain text (Markdown headings allowed), ready to paste into a doc or issue tracker.
- Structure (strict order):
  1. Title
  2. Executive Summary (≤ 120 words)
  3. Assumptions (explicit)
  4. Revenue Streams (bulleted)
  5. Pricing Strategy & Tiers (table)
  6. Unit Cost Table (CSV-ready block)
  7. Unit Economics & KPIs (table + formulas)
  8. 3 Scenarios Projections (CSV-ready table for each scenario)
  9. Benchmark & Risks
  10. Implementation Notes (next 90 days)
  11. Final Check (placeholders & self-eval)
- Tables: Prefer Markdown tables for human readability and provide a CSV-ready version (comma-separated rows) below each table.
- Voice/Tense: Active voice, present tense.
- Terminology/Units: Use [currency] for all monetary values, specify [unit] consistently (e.g., "per-user-month" or "per-item"). Spell out % as percentage points where relevant.

Photo Briefs

Photo Briefs are not required for this task.

Evaluation Criteria (self-check before returning)

- All textual placeholders are bracketed and match the frontmatter placeholders array exactly.
- The deliverable includes: unit-cost table, pricing tiers, ARPU, gross margin %, LTV, CAC, payback period, break-even units/time, and three scenario projections.
- Tables are CSV-ready and include header rows.
- Assumptions are explicit and clearly listed.
- Tone is analytical and concise; length targets respected.
- No private chain-of-thought is exposed.

Optional Reasoning

Do not output private chain-of-thought. Instead, provide a brief public rationale (2–4 sentences) for major numeric choices or assumption ranges.

Final Check (model must confirm)

Before returning, confirm the following in one short line:

- "Placeholders verified: [product], [industry], [unit], [currency], [pricing-model], [audience], [geography]."

Assumptions (used because inputs were missing)

- If [product] details are not provided, assume a digital product (SaaS) offering where the default [unit] = user-month. If this is incorrect, replace [unit] with the client-provided unit.
- If [industry] is not provided, assume a general B2B SaaS market for small-to-medium businesses.
- If [currency] is not provided, assume [currency] = INR. (Changeable.)
- If [pricing-model] is not provided, default to tiered subscription with usage-based add-ons.
- If [audience] or [geography] are not provided, assume target [audience] = SMBs in [geography] = India.
- All growth, churn, and conversion rates must be flagged as estimates unless replaced with real inputs.

Example CSV headers you must include for the Unit Cost Table

Cost Item,Cost per [unit] ([currency]),Basis / Assumption

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