Sales Efficiency Benchmarks
Magic Number — Go-to-Market Efficiency — 172 companies tracked
Data availability note
The Sales Efficiency (Magic Number) metric requires quarterly ARR snapshots and a breakdown of sales & marketing spend by quarter. Most public companies report ARR annually or disclose S&M spend as a combined line item. We are building the pipeline to extract this data from earnings transcripts and supplemental financial packages. Companies will appear here as data becomes available.
Track GTM efficiency in real-time
BriefStock monitors earnings releases and SEC filings to flag shifts in sales efficiency as they happen — before analyst notes hit the wire.
Sales Efficiency (Magic Number) Data
Data pendingWhat is Sales Efficiency / Magic Number?
The SaaS Magic Number, introduced by Lars Leckie, measures how efficiently a company converts sales and marketing spend into new annual recurring revenue. It answers a fundamental go-to-market question: for every dollar spent acquiring customers, how much annualized recurring revenue does the business generate? A score above 0.75 indicates efficient GTM; above 1.0 means each S&M dollar generates more than $1 in new ARR.
Formula:Magic Number = (Current Quarter ARR − Prior Quarter ARR) × 4 / Prior Quarter Sales & Marketing Spend
Interpretation: Magic Number ≥ 1.0 — invest aggressively. 0.75–1.0 — efficient GTM, steady growth. 0.5–0.75 — review before scaling. Below 0.5 — re-evaluate GTM strategy. See also: CAC Payback benchmarks, which measure the same efficiency from a different angle.
Related benchmarks
SaaS benchmarks digest
NRR trends, Rule of 40 movers & insider trades — every Monday.