9. Assumptions and Open Inputs
The idea came as one line in the 30 Sept 2026 catalog (C4). No team, hours, price, geography or traction were given. Here's what was assumed, and how the verdict changes if each assumption is wrong.
9.1 Assumptions made
| Input | Assumption used | If actually different… |
|---|---|---|
| Founder | One developer, able to build web apps. Forge experience unknown. | If you've shipped a Forge app (e.g. StatusLens), the odds in WHAT-TO-DO-AND-AVOID hold. If not, multiply them by ~0.6. |
| Hours per week | Two cases: ~15 hrs/week and full-time | Under 10 hrs/week: the $1k rung drops to ~25%, and the Marketplace review race is lost. |
| Content store | Moved from Notion to Confluence Cloud | If you insist on Notion, use the "Notion help center" column in 01: $10k at ~3%. |
| Buyer | Software companies with 10–250 Confluence users paying for a separate help center | If you have a network in one vertical (e.g. property management), the vertical help center may score higher. It's untested here. |
| Price | Blended ~$50 a month, per-user tiers (07) | Below $30 blended, you'd need ~330 customers for $10k. Out of reach. |
| Geography | Worldwide through the Marketplace, in USD | An EU-only focus needs EU data residency from day 1. |
| Other portfolio ideas | You may also pursue StatusLens, which is also a Forge app | Recommended order: StatusLens first, this second, only after StatusLens passes its month-6 checkpoint. |
| Churn | ≤2% monthly revenue churn after month 6 | Unverified for Confluence publishing apps. At 4%, the $10k rung moves past month 24. |
| Atlassian native features | No free native public help center with search in Confluence today | If "Public Pages for Confluence" is Atlassian's own and it's free, cut the Standard edition's odds by about half. |
9.2 Inputs that would change the verdict most (please supply)
- Have you shipped a Forge app? And is this your first product or your second?
- Hours per week available, held for 24 months.
- Who can you reach? Any support leads, docs owners or Atlassian partners in your network.
- Any vertical access (property management, clinics, franchises, schools) that could make a vertical help center worth testing instead.
- Budget for a year of hosting, Marketplace listing and security work (small, probably under $3k).
9.3 Definitions used throughout
- Tier A: $1M ARR within 36 months, ≥70% gross margin, ≥50% month-12 logo retention.
- Tier B: $20k+ MRR within 24 months, profitable, ≥80% gross margin, ≥70% month-3 retention.
- MRR ladder: the chance of reaching each MRR level by month 24 while profitable at that level. All odds are judgment estimates.
- Revenue churn: MRR lost to cancellations and downgrades in a month, divided by MRR at the start of the month.
- Doc-owner loop: failed searches, "not helpful" votes and stale pages turned into weekly tasks for the Confluence page owner.