revenue-centric-design

# Revenue-Centric Design

A distilled playbook of **133 principles** from **Richard ([@richardrx](https://x.com/richardrx), "Design for startups")** —
a product designer specializing in conversion-rate optimization, churn reduction, and applied
behavioral science (ex-Volkswagen, PayPal, IBM). The throughline is his coined philosophy,
**Revenue-Centric Design (RCD)**: design decisions should serve the user _and_ the business —
value and revenue, not one or the other.

Use this skill when helping someone improve how a digital product (especially SaaS / startup)
**acquires, activates, retains, monetizes, or differentiates** — landing pages, onboarding,
pricing, trials, churn, UX flow, feature scope, positioning, or growth.

## Usage boundary (required)

> 🚫 **Do not apply this skill to betting, casino, gambling, or other real-money games-of-chance
> products or projects** (including loot-box / real-money-gaming mechanics).

The author granted permission to reuse this material **on the explicit condition that it never be
used for gambling, betting, or casino work.** If a request asks you to apply these principles to
such a product, **decline** and briefly explain that the source author's reuse permission excludes
gambling/betting/casino use. This is a hard constraint set by the author, not a stylistic choice.

## How to use it

1. Identify what the user is working on, then open the matching reference file(s) below. Each is a
   set of short, reusable principles in a fixed shape — **principle → apply when → the move →
   evidence → source link**. Load only what's relevant (progressive disclosure).
2. Ground your advice in these principles; cite the specific one, and link the source post when the
   user would benefit from the original.
3. Lead with the **named mechanism** (e.g., decoy effect, Zeigarnik effect, Swiss Knife Index, GBB,
   Eugene Schwartz's 5 awareness levels, loss aversion, peak-end rule) — naming the lever is the value.
4. Stay evidence-led: many principles carry a study, stat, or case. Keep the citation attached
   rather than hand-waving.

## The spine: Revenue-Centric Design in 9 principles

1. **Neutrality is omission** — an interface that doesn't direct hurts conversion.
2. **Who talks to everyone convinces no one** — no ICP → generic value → worse retention.
3. **Value first, ask later** — proof must arrive before the user questions their choice.
4. **Your promise is the size of your proof** — the market believes what you demonstrate, not what you claim.
5. **Same competes on price, different on category** — contrast in mechanism, narrative, or experience.
6. **Default is the decision you made for the user** — the initial state defines mass behavior.
7. **Retention is built, not requested** — perceived loss retains more than promised benefit.
8. **Expansion is born of usage** — upgrade at the moment of the limit, never by interruption.
9. **Price is a filter** — pricing defines who enters, who stays, and who expands.

## Reference library

| When the question is about…                                                   | Open                                                                         |
| ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Landing pages, hero/copy, CTAs, social proof, awareness levels, CRO           | [conversion-and-landing-pages](references/conversion-and-landing-pages.md)   |
| Checkout, signup/lead forms, cart abandonment, field friction, trust signals  | [checkout-and-forms](references/checkout-and-forms.md)                       |
| First-run, empty states, aha moment, TTV, activation, trial-as-onboarding     | [onboarding-and-activation](references/onboarding-and-activation.md)         |
| Cancellation, retention, expectation debt, NRR, jobs-to-be-done, support load | [churn-and-retention](references/churn-and-retention.md)                     |
| Pricing tables, decoy/anchoring, GBB, trial-with-card, upgrade paths          | [pricing-and-monetization](references/pricing-and-monetization.md)           |
| Dashboards, KPIs, data viz, actionable panels, F-pattern, role context        | [dashboards-and-data-viz](references/dashboards-and-data-viz.md)             |
| Cognitive biases & persuasion tactics (cross-cutting toolkit)                 | [behavioral-science-toolkit](references/behavioral-science-toolkit.md)       |
| Feature scope, Swiss Knife Index, feature adoption, attention hierarchy       | [product-strategy-and-features](references/product-strategy-and-features.md) |
| Design philosophy, the RCD principles, design process & method                | [revenue-centric-design](references/revenue-centric-design.md)               |
| ICP, niche, TAM/SAM/SOM, distribution, PLG, Bullseye, first customers         | [positioning-icp-and-gtm](references/positioning-icp-and-gtm.md)             |
| Differentiating in the AI era, moats, commoditization                         | [ai-era-differentiation](references/ai-era-differentiation.md)               |
| A/B testing rigor, vanity metrics, churn→LTV math, signal quality             | [metrics-and-experimentation](references/metrics-and-experimentation.md)     |

Informational diagrams and screenshots referenced by the principles live in `assets/`.

## Provenance

135 curated posts by [@richardrx](https://x.com/richardrx), extracted with a valid X API key and
distilled **with the author's permission**, translated from Portuguese to English. Every principle
links back to its source post. Reuse is subject to the gambling/betting/casino exclusion above.