A) Acquisition Metrics
1. Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)
Definition: The total cost to acquire one paying customer
Formula: CAC = Total Marketing + Sales Spend / Number of New Customers
Why It Matters in Growth Marketing:
- Helps measure how efficiently you’re scaling your acquisition efforts
- Tells you whether your marketing programs are sustainable
- Allows comparison with LTV (Customer Lifetime Value) to ensure profitability
Growth Tip: Optimizing campaigns, funnel efficiency, and content strategy can reduce CAC
2. Cost Per Lead
Definition: How much you’re paying to acquire a lead (not a customer)
Formula: CPL = Total Spend / Total Leads Generated
Why It Matters in Growth Marketing:
- Essential for top-of-funnel (TOFU) optimization
- Tells you the quality and cost-efficiency of your lead generation campaigns
- Helps benchmark channel and campaign performance
Growth Tip: Optimize targeting, creatives, and landing pages
3. Click-Through Rate (CTR)
Definition: The percentage of people who clicked on your ad after seeing it
Formula:CTR = (Clicks / Impressions) × 100
Why It Matters in Growth Marketing:
- Direct measure of how relevant or compelling your ad/message is
- Higher CTR = better engagement → usually lower CPC (cost per click)
- CTR can also be used as a signal for ad fatigue or creative effectiveness.
Growth Tip: Continuously A/B test creatives, headlines, and CTAs to improve CTR over time
4. Impression Share
Definition: The percentage of total available impressions your ad is eligible to receive but actually got
Formula:
Impression Share = Impressions / Total Eligible Impressions
Why It Matters in Growth Marketing:
- Helps measure market presence and share of voice in paid channels
- Low impression share could mean budget constraints or poor ad rank
- Critical for brand visibility campaigns and bidding strategies
Growth Tip: Use impression share to balance reach vs. spend — especially important for competitive search terms
B) Activation Metrics
1. Activation Rate
Definition: The percentage of users who perform a “key first action” that indicates they’ve experienced the product’s value
Why it Matters
It shows how compelling your first impression is. A high activation rate means users are finding immediate value and are more likely to continue engaging or convert to paying customers.
Examples of key actions (based on your product):
- Completed sign-up
- Created a wedding registry (in a registry platform)
- Added an item to cart
- Invited friends
- Published their first post
Formula:
Activation Rate = (Users who complete key action / Total signups) x 100
2. Time to Value (TTV)
Definition: The amount of time it takes for a new user to reach their “aha moment”, when they understand or experience the value of the product
Why it Matters
The quicker the user sees value, the more likely they are to stick around. If TTV is too long, users may drop off before realizing why they should continue
Examples:
- How fast someone starts using key features
- Time it takes to generate their first report
- Time from sign-up to first successful transaction
Goal: Reduce friction and shorten the path to value with better onboarding and UX design
3. Onboarding Completion Rate
Definition: The percentage of users who complete the full onboarding process (e.g., setting up a profile, connecting accounts, following a tutorial)
Why it Matters
Successful onboarding = higher activation and retention. This metric helps identify where users drop off during the setup or learning curve
Formula: Onboarding Completion Rate = (Users who completed onboarding / Total new users) x 100
What to Watch For:
- Which step causes most drop-offs?
- Is onboarding too long or complicated?
- Are key features introduced clearly?
C) Retention Metrics
1. Churn Rate
Definition: The percentage of users who stop using your product or service over a specific period.
It’s a direct measure of how many users you’re losing
Why it Matters
High churn can kill growth. Even if you’re acquiring new users, poor retention means you’re constantly replacing users instead of compounding growth
Formula: Churn Rate = (Users lost during period / Total users at start of period) x 100
Recommendation
Analyze why users churn, poor onboarding, lack of value, bad experience, and then run experiments to reduce churn with retention tactics like email re-engagement, product nudges, or loyalty programs
2. Customer Retention Rate
Definition: The opposite of churn, this tells you the percentage of users who stick with you over time
Why it Matters
A strong retention rate means users are seeing ongoing value and are more likely to upgrade, refer others, and become loyal advocates
Formula: CRR = ((Users at end of period - New users during period) / Users at start of period) x 100
Growth Tactics
- Personalised email nurturing
- Loyalty rewards
- Product upgrades that solve key pain points
3. DAU / WAU / MAU
Definition:
DAU – Daily Active Users
WAU – Weekly Active Users
MAU – Monthly Active Users
These are measures of how often people are engaging with your product or platform
Why it Matters
- Track engagement and usage trends over time
- Spot early signs of user fatigue or growth
- Compare growth of short-term vs long-term usage
Example:
A drop in DAU but stable MAU? That means users aren’t using the product as frequently, an opportunity to build in features that increase stickiness
4. Cohort Retention
Definition
Tracks groups of users (cohorts) based on a common action, like signup date or acquisition channel, and observes their retention behavior over time
Why it Matters
It helps you understand how specific segments of users behave. Are users from Google Ads churning faster than those from email referrals? Do users from March last year stick around longer?
Use it to
- Identify what’s working for specific cohorts
- Double down on channels that bring in sticky users
- Improve onboarding or features for low-retention cohorts
