How Do We Get More Customers?
in Fintech

The short answer

More customers is an outcome. The decision is which route to them keeps contribution margin positive after charge-offs and can be repeated without warehouse facility limits tightening. For fintech companies, this shows up in a particular place. The numbers that carry the answer are blended take rate and charge-off rate, and the complication specific to this industry is that lending fixed the P&L and converts revenue worth a 7x multiple into revenue worth a 2x multiple. The general version of this problem and the one you are actually in have different first moves.

Almost every fintech can name several ways to acquire merchants and few can say which one improves blended take rate after CAC. That is the actual constraint: not a shortage of tactics, but no evidence about which channel lifts TPV without eroding contribution margin once charge-off rate is applied.

The productive framing is route economics. For each plausible route the operator must calculate CAC by channel, how many periods of take rate are required to recover it, and whether the channel can scale without the warehouse facility demanding higher reserves or lower advance rates.

Most routes fail the third test. They produce early TPV because they depend on the CEO's existing banking relationships or one-off partner introductions, and volume flattens once those personal contacts are exhausted.

How to tell this is actually your problem

These three together are the signature. One on its own usually points somewhere else.

✓ Growth in TPV traces to a small set of merchant relationships managed directly by the CEO or head of partnerships.
✓ Blended take rate and contribution margin are reported only at the company level, with no breakdown by acquisition channel.
✓ Marketing spend appears across five or six channels each month, yet none has accumulated enough merchants for a stable CAC or charge-off curve.

The move that usually makes it worse. Running several channels at sub-scale simultaneously, which produces inconclusive contribution margin numbers on every route and consumes warehouse capacity that could have been allocated to testing one channel to measurable payback.

Who this is for — and who it is not

It is for you if you run or finance a fintech and growth depends on one person's relationships. It is the situation where the numbers are available but nobody has put them in an order that produces a decision.

It is not for you if Percision is the wrong tool if you already know the answer and only need execution capacity, or if the business is pre-revenue — then the constraint is evidence about the market, not analysis of your own figures. Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library. Also wrong if you need facilitation, politics, or someone to sit with a lender or buyer. Those are human jobs.

Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library.

What this looks like when the analysis is actually run

Below is an excerpt from a real run of this analysis on a fintech. It is a sample profile rather than a customer, and it is unedited engine output — this is the format you get, on your own numbers.

The subject is Verrano Pay, a sample company profile used for testing rather than a customer — $84M net revenue, 28,000 merchants, $9.4B of payment volume.

This is one move out of a full analysis. Read a complete report — every page, no email required.

What the engine does with this question

This question routes to Go-to-Market & Commercial Strategy, one of 29 engagements the platform runs. For fintech companies it works through blended take rate, charge-off rate, contribution margin and CAC by channel, then produces the sequence rather than a list of options — which move first, what it funds, and the observation that would say the sequence is wrong.

You watch the analysis get built before paying anything. Read a complete report here if you would rather see the depth first.

Questions people ask about this

Which acquisition channel is best?

The one where your buyer already is and where you can pay back the acquisition cost within a period you can finance. That is business-specific, and the general answer is worth very little.

How many channels should I run?

One that works, then a second. Running four at a quarter of the necessary budget reliably produces four inconclusive results and the belief that nothing works.

How long before a channel proves itself?

Your sales cycle plus one payback period, with enough volume to distinguish the result from noise. Setting that number in advance is what stops the decision being made by whoever is most persuasive.

Is this different in fintech than in other industries?

Materially, yes. Lending fixed the P&L and converts revenue worth a 7x multiple into revenue worth a 2x multiple — which changes both the diagnosis and the order of the fixes. The metrics that decide it here are blended take rate, charge-off rate, contribution margin, and an answer built on industry-general benchmarks will usually point at the wrong one first.

What data do I need before this analysis is worth running for a fintech?

Less than most people expect. Your last twelve months of revenue and cost split the way you already split it, plus whatever you hold on blended take rate and charge-off rate. The analysis is explicit about what it is assuming where your data stops, which is more useful than waiting for numbers you may never have.

When is Percision the wrong tool?

Percision is the wrong tool if you already know the answer and only need execution capacity, or if the business is pre-revenue — then the constraint is evidence about the market, not analysis of your own figures. Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library. Also wrong if you need facilitation, politics, or someone to sit with a lender or buyer. Those are human jobs.

Does Percision replace a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, or AI implementation team?

Percision is not a lawyer, tax advisor, auditor, licensed appraiser, clinical or regulatory filer, or an AI implementation shop. It does not do HR casework, creative-only brand work, or impersonate a named consulting firm. It is a strategy analysis engine — not a template library.