Metrics that matter: how to drive growth through smart KPIs

In a climate where every dollar is scrutinised and growth doesn’t come cheap, understanding what to measure (and when!) can make or break a startup. Vanity metrics just don’t do the magic anymore: investors, teams, and even customers are looking for signals of substance. The good news? You don’t need to track everything. You just need to track what matters.

Too often, startups treat KPIs like a checkbox. A retrospective exercise. But the best companies know KPIs are forward-looking. What separates a smart KPI from a vanity one? Your chosen metrics should tie directly to behaviour, focus, and value. Let’s break that down:

Align KPIs with the stage you’re in, not the one you hope to be in

Early-stage founders sometimes fall into the trap of measuring success the way Series C companies do. They talk about CAC when they barely have consistent acquisition. They focus on LTV before they’ve proven retention. It’s like tracking fuel efficiency before you’ve built the car.

Take Superhuman, for example. In its early days, the team famously didn’t launch until they achieved a Product-Market Fit (PMF) score of 40%. Specifically, they asked users: “How would you feel if you could no longer use this product?”. When 40% answered “Very disappointed”, the company moved forward. That single qualitative KPI guided their entire early strategy and enforced discipline before scale.

At Zing Coach, we’ve found it helpful to group metrics into three tiers: Health, Growth, and Signal. Health metrics track our business vitals: LTV:CAC, crash-free sessions, cashflow balance. They tell us whether the system is alive and stable. We track progress and evolution with Growth metrics, like user retention, feature adoption, or completed workouts in our case, and use Signal metrics like total MAU or lifetime usage to tell Zing’s story externally. As you can see, each set serves a very specific purpose if you’re intentional about when to emphasise which.

The takeaway? Match the metric to the moment. In the earliest stages, qualitative signals like user satisfaction, NPS, and product engagement are often more useful than revenue or user counts.

Ruthlessly prioritise leading indicators over lagging ones

Revenue is important. Still, it’s a lagging indicator. So is churn. So are most of the headline numbers investors love to see on pitch decks. The real game-changer is tracking what causes those outcomes in the first place.

Say you’re building a B2B SaaS tool. You notice that users who activate three features in the first week have a 70% higher retention rate. That’s not just an insight, that’s a leading KPI.

Now your focus shifts: How many users activate three features within seven days? That becomes a team-wide North Star. It influences onboarding flows, product design, and support strategy. It’s proactive, not reactive. Besides, teams work best when they’re aligned, when the ideal outcomes are shared.

Companies like Notion have publicly emphasised activation as a critical KPI. Their internal teams track how quickly new users hit “aha” moments (like creating their first doc or sharing a workspace) because they know it predicts long-term stickiness better than user count ever could.

Make KPIs actionable, not just admirable

A good KPI drives behaviour: it tells your team where to lean in and where to pivot. If a metric is interesting but doesn’t change how you operate, it’s a distraction.

Take Chilli Piper, a startup in the meeting lifecycle space. At one point, they realised that “meetings booked” didn’t correlate strongly with pipeline conversion. But “meetings held within 48 hours” did. That slight shift in measurement reframed sales operations and improved conversion rates significantly.

You don’t need a huge data science team to spot these patterns. Sometimes the most valuable KPIs are hidden in plain sight. But they require you to ask: What specific behaviour do we want to drive? What’s the clearest proxy for that? When you’ve answered these questions, reduce your dashboard to a few high-impact metrics per team. Tie each one to an owner, a timeframe, and a set of levers. What to do with all the other numbers? Teams can use them for internal decisions, but don’t clutter the top view. Strategy should be sharp, not noisy.

Don’t track what you’re not ready to act on

Speaking of noise: there’s a temptation (especially with modern analytics stacks) to measure everything. Session duration, bounce rate, click-throughs, scroll depth, time to first response, you name it. But unless you’re actively using that metric to drive change, it’s just noise.

One founder I worked with had a beautifully complex KPI dashboard with 30+ metrics updated in real time. But when I asked which three they discussed at their Monday meeting, he said, “Honestly… mostly revenue and MRR.” The rest? Data wallpaper.

A better approach: choose 3 to 5 meaningful metrics per team. They should be reviewed weekly and backed by levers the team actually controls. Anything else is a distraction. And don’t be afraid to shift focus. If growth feels stalled or you’re hitting product bugs, it’s a signal to temporarily focus on Health metrics. If things are stable, invest in growth. If you need to build buzz or validate demand, spotlight your Signal metrics. But mix them with purpose, not by default.

Your KPIs tell a story. Make sure it’s the right one

Metrics aren’t just internal tools: they shape external perception. Investors, journalists, potential hires… everyone looks at your numbers to understand momentum.

Take the rise of “efficiency metrics” in 2023 and 2024. With capital tighter, VCs started scrutinising Burn Multiple (how much you spend to generate a dollar of net new ARR) and Magic Number (how efficiently you turn sales and marketing spend into revenue). Startups that adapted their metrics to reflect sustainable growth, not just raw growth, found themselves in better fundraising conversations.

Ramp is a good example. They’ve made efficiency a core part of their brand. In interviews, they talk openly about burn discipline, customer payback periods, and profit-centric growth. The result? Strong investor confidence and a public image of being built for the long haul.

Revisit, refine, and retire regularly

Just because a metric was important six months ago doesn’t mean it still is. Startups evolve fast, and KPIs need to evolve with them.

Set regular check-ins (quarterly or even monthly) where your leadership team audits your core metrics. Ask the following questions:

• Is this still the most predictive number we can track?
• Are we influencing it with our current strategy?
• Has our product or market shifted in a way that requires rethinking this?

A stale KPI is worse than no KPI: it gives you a false sense of control.

KPIs are a compass, not a trophy

Growth doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It’s the result of hundreds of micro-decisions made daily: across product, marketing, sales, and support. Smart KPIs bring those decisions into focus. They rally teams, attract capital, and drive real outcomes.

The next time you open your dashboard, ask yourself:

• Does this number reflect what we actually care about right now?
• Is it tied to something we can influence?
• Does it shape how we operate this week, not just how we look in a pitch deck?

Growth is all about measuring the right things, at the right time, in the right way. And that’s what turns momentum into a movement.

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