Matching metrics to business model and startup stage

The key to successful analytics is to focus on the right metrics at the right time. This means understanding your business model and your current stage of development.

The Lean Analytics framework provides a roadmap for this. By identifying your business model and your current stage, you can determine which metrics are most important to track.

Business models and stages

The following is a summary of the key metrics for each business model at each stage:

• E-commerce business model

  • Empathy: Understanding customer needs and pain points.
  • Stickiness: Conversion rate, shopping cart size, customer loyalty.
  • Virality: Customer acquisition cost, sharing volume.
  • Revenue: Transaction value, revenue per customer, LTV/CAC ratio.
  • Scale: Affiliate performance, channel effectiveness, support costs.

• Two-sided marketplace business model

  • Empathy: Understanding the needs of both buyers and sellers.
  • Stickiness: Inventory creation rate, search frequency, fraud rates.
  • Virality: Acquisition of buyers and sellers, sharing volume.
  • Revenue: Transaction volume, commission rates, value-added service revenue.
  • Scale: Expansion into new verticals, bundling of third-party offers.

• SaaS business model

  • Empathy: Understanding customer workflows and pain points.
  • Stickiness: Engagement, churn, feature utilization.
  • Virality: Viral coefficient, customer acquisition cost.
  • Revenue: Upselling, LTV/CAC ratio.
  • Scale: API traffic, channel performance, support costs.

• Free mobile app business model

  • Empathy: Understanding the target market and gaming habits.
  • Stickiness: Onboarding, adoption, churn, time played.
  • Virality: App store ratings, sharing, invites.
  • Revenue: Download volume, ARPU, ARPPU, acquisition costs.
  • Scale: Spinoffs, publisher deals, international versions.

• Media site business model

  • Empathy: Understanding content consumption habits.
  • Stickiness: Traffic, visits, return rate.
  • Virality: Content sharing, SEO/SEM performance.
  • Revenue: CPM, CTR, affiliate revenue.
  • Scale: Syndication, licensing, partnerships.

• User-Generated Content (UGC) business model

  • Empathy: Understanding community needs and motivations.
  • Stickiness: Content creation rate, engagement funnel changes.
  • Virality: Content sharing, user invites.
  • Revenue: Ad revenue, donations, data licensing.
  • Scale: Analytics, user data, private ad models.

By focusing on the right metrics at each stage, you can increase your chances of success.