Dashboards with fifty metrics look impressive and get ignored. Early on, a handful of numbers tell you almost everything about the health of your go-to-market.
The six that matter most
- CAC (customer acquisition cost): total sales and marketing spend divided by new customers in the same period.
- LTV (lifetime value): average monthly revenue per account × gross margin ÷ monthly churn rate.
- LTV:CAC ratio: a common rule of thumb is to aim for 3:1 or better.
- CAC payback: how many months of gross margin it takes to earn back the cost of acquiring a customer.
- Funnel conversion: the rate between each stage, from visitor to lead to opportunity to customer.
- Net revenue retention: revenue kept from existing customers after churn, downgrades and expansion.
Make them automatic
These numbers are only useful if they are current. Pull them from your CRM and billing system into one dashboard that updates itself, and review it weekly with the team.
Use the free KPI calculators to work out your CAC, LTV and payback period in a minute.