https://www.indiehackers.com/post/the-ltv-cac-trap-why-my-7-1-ratio-made-me-complacent-c16f6e24eb

Last month, I thought we were crushing it.

Dashboard said: 7:1 LTV:CAC. Margins looked great. Team was celebrating.

Then an investor hit me with this:

“Your competitor is scaling 4x faster… at 3:1.”

That stung.

I went from proud → confused → slightly panicked.

Because the one metric I thought was our “strength” was actually a red flag in the LTV:CAC trap.

How I Fell Into the LTV:CAC Trap

I was treating LTV:CAC like a scoreboard:

• Bigger number = winning
• Keep CAC low = efficiency
• Everyone will clap

But here’s the ugly truth: a perfect LTV:CAC ratio can mean you’re under-investing in growth.

We were too cautious on growth spend while competitors raced past.

What I’m Learning About the Ratio Trap

• Early SaaS (pre-Product-Market Fit): 2:1 is fine. You’re testing.
• Scaling stage: 3–4:1 means you’re pushing growth while keeping sanity.
• 6:1+: You’re probably sandbagging. Could grow faster if you spent more.