KPIs and Metrics to Measure Startup Growth
Why KPIs Matter from Day Zero
Two founders in a sublet apartment swapped late-night debates for a weekly activation target. Within four sprints, feature arguments vanished, and wins multiplied. Pick one target now, track it visibly, and tell us which metric pulled you out of indecision.
Why KPIs Matter from Day Zero
When experiments fly and alerts buzz, teams drown in datapoints. A short list of priority KPIs filters the noise to action. Share how you keep focus when everything feels important, and we’ll feature smart tactics in our next issue.
Why KPIs Matter from Day Zero
A living dashboard unites product, growth, and finance. When marketing and engineering celebrate the same KPI, collaboration skyrockets. Drop your favorite shared metric in the comments, and subscribe for templates to build your first unified scoreboard.
Choosing a North Star Metric
What qualifies as a true North Star
A true North Star reflects user value, not merely activity. For SaaS, think “weekly active teams,” not “signups.” For marketplaces, consider “fulfilled orders,” not “listings.” Comment with your candidate NSM, and we’ll send feedback in a future roundup.
Avoiding vanity and proxy traps
Vanity metrics climb fast and mean little. Proxies can mislead if they drift from value. Stress-test with this question: if this metric grows, are users happier and retention stronger? Share your test results and subscribe for our NSM checklist.
A quick story: recalibrating for clarity
A food marketplace tracked app installs and stalled. Switching to “first repeat order” changed product priorities overnight—onboarding simplified, incentives shifted, and retention rose. Tell us your pivot story and join our list for more case studies.
Acquisition Metrics That Predict Growth
Measure the percent of new users who reach a meaningful first value—upload a file, complete a task, or connect data. This bridges campaigns and onboarding quality. What is your activation milestone? Share it and compare notes with peers.
Retention, Engagement, and Churn
Plot retention by signup month and segment by channel or persona. Look for flat tails and user-level stickiness. Stories beat averages: which cohort behaves differently and why? Post your biggest cohort surprise and subscribe for our cohort teardown guide.
Retention, Engagement, and Churn
A healthy DAU/MAU hints at habit. But context matters: workflows may be weekly or monthly. Define expected cadence per use case, then track engagement accordingly. Tell us your ideal cadence, and we’ll share relevant engagement formulas.
Monetization and Unit Economics
Lifetime Value should reflect gross margin, realistic retention curves, and discounting. Avoid overconfident projections from noisy cohorts. What assumptions drive your LTV? Post them, and subscribe for our sensitivity model to stress-test scenarios.
Monetization and Unit Economics
Average Revenue Per User and Per Account can mask mix shifts. Track by segment and plan. Rising ARPA with stable churn often signals stronger fit. Share your segmentation approach, and we’ll highlight clever strategies in our newsletter.
Burn multiple = net burn divided by net new ARR (or revenue). Lower is better. During uncertainty, prioritize experiments that improve this ratio. What’s your current burn multiple? Share anonymously and compare with aggregated community data.
For SaaS, growth rate plus profit margin near forty can indicate healthy balance. Early-stage teams adapt this rule to gross margin and cash burn reality. Tell us your version, and subscribe for a stage-by-stage interpretation guide.
Track revenue or ARR per employee to spot complexity creep. Pair it with cycle time and release frequency to diagnose bottlenecks. Share one focus change that improved this metric, and we’ll compile a community playbook of wins.
Dashboards, Cadence, and Culture
Weekly metric review ritual
Set a standing meeting with a tight agenda: wins, misses, learnings, decisions, owners. Rotate presenters to grow literacy. What’s your agenda template? Post it, and subscribe for our facilitation checklist and example slides.
Instrumentation without drowning
Start with a handful of key events, name them clearly, and document ownership. Expand only when decisions demand it. Which events define your value moments? Share them and we’ll suggest gaps to close in your instrumentation plan.
Close the loop with experiments
Tie every metric change to a hypothesis and a decision. Log experiments, expected impact, and learnings. Celebrate retiring bad ideas quickly. Comment with your favorite experiment, and join our list for an experiment tracker template.