Friday morning, 9:32 AM. The Monday partner meeting includes a portfolio review. Three of your portcos are below plan on marketing-driven pipeline. You don't have a fractional CMO to send. You don't want to send four.
Built for Seed, Series A, or growth-stage VC firm partner buying portfolio marketing diagnostic capacity. Applies to Platform partners, operating partners, VP of Platform, fund principals overseeing portfolio operations, and similar fund-level marketing oversight buyers.
VC Portfolio Retainer is a Bay Area Layer 2 engagement product priced at $25,000–$50,000/quarter. Format: Quarterly billing aligned to fund operations. Deliverable: 60–90 minutes per portco per month plus quarterly VC partner briefing document. Built for Seed, Series A, or growth-stage VC firm partner buying portfolio marketing diagnostic capacity. Routes through ICP funnels, problem pages, and referrals; reached when the buyer has matched their state to the tier. Each engagement is fixed-scope at the start and cannot drift mid-engagement.
A Bay Area Series A fund engaged SF-6 with four portcos showing flat pipeline. The quarterly briefing identified the same positioning failure across three portcos: ICP defined too narrowly at Series A, leaving 60% of the addressable market unaddressed. Two of three portcos shifted positioning within the next quarter. Both reported pipeline acceleration in the following partner meeting.
VC fund operating cadence is quarterly. Partner meetings, LP reporting, and fund operating reviews all align to quarter close. Quarterly billing matches the fund's read-out rhythm, and 90 days is the minimum window where cross-portco pattern recognition becomes legible.
The partner selects. We recommend including portcos with marketing diagnostic capacity gaps rather than portcos that already have strong CMOs (where SF-6 adds less leverage). Portco list refreshes at quarter close if needed.
Yes. The partner briefing is the fund's internal document. We do not share portco-level details across funds. Cross-portco pattern recognition stays anonymized in any external publication.
Yes, separately. SF-6 covers portfolio diagnostic capacity. If a single portco needs embedded leadership, that is a separate SF-5 engagement at $15,000-$20,000/month. The partner approves the upgrade and the portco's CEO contracts directly.
We work only on portfolio diagnostic and pattern recognition, not on revenue-attributable execution. We do not share portco strategic detail across the partner's own fund (only pattern signal). Outside the fund, we maintain confidentiality per standard advisory practice.
No. The partner briefing is internal. LP-facing material is the partner's responsibility. We can provide pattern signal that supports the partner's LP communication, but we do not write LP-facing copy under SF-6.
The quarterly partner briefing names this directly. If a portco's marketing diagnostic capacity gap persists, the briefing recommends path correction: SF-5 Fractional CMO embedded engagement, internal CMO hire, vendor change, or strategic pivot. The diagnostic does not pretend success that did not happen.
VC Portfolio Retainer · $25,000–$50,000/quarter · Quarterly billing aligned to fund operations. Bay Area engagement, fixed-scope at intake.
Begin SF-6 VC Portfolio Retainer → See all eight SF tiers