Metrics are the compass that guides your Customer Success efforts.
For early-stage companies, understanding which metrics matter and how to track them ensures you can measure progress, identify risks, and prove the value of CS to stakeholders. Without data, you’re flying blind- and no startup can afford that. In this module, we’ll break down the critical metrics that drive Customer Success, how to interpret them, and how to use them to make better decisions.
“One of the most common mistakes I’ve seen (and made) at early stage companies is confusing strong advocacy from early adopters with generalised product market fit. Early adopters are often visionaries. Finding early advocates among them is critical to success, but it doesn’t guarantee scale or product market fit. You need to look to other metrics to tell you you’re finding success…”
Andrea Spillman-Gajek – Founder at
Success Accelerators and Brighteye Mentor
1. Core Customer Success Metrics:
To understand how well your Customer Success efforts are performing, you need to focus on metrics that align with your company’s goals- namely retention, satisfaction, and growth. At this stage, it’s about keeping things simple while ensuring you track the right indicators.
The most critical metrics include:
Churn Rate: This measures the percentage of customers who stop using your product over a specific period. A high churn rate can quickly undo any progress you make with new customer acquisition.
Retention Rate: The inverse of churn, retention measures the percentage of customers who stick with you.
Net Revenue Retention (NRR): NRR combines customer retention with upsells and expansions to show how revenue from your existing customers is growing.
Time-to-Value (TTV): TTV highlights how quickly customers achieve their first success milestone. The faster this happens, the less likely they are to churn.
Customer Lifetime Value (CLV): CLV measures the total revenue a customer generates over their relationship with your company, providing a long-term view of customer value.
Top Tip: Focus on no more than 2-3 of these metrics to start. Prioritisation will keep your efforts targeted and actionable.
2. Customer Health Scores:
Customer health scores bring multiple data points together to create a holistic picture of each customer’s relationship with your product. These scores are invaluable for identifying at-risk customers early and ensuring you focus your energy on those who need help the most.
At this stage, a simplified health scoring system is best. Here’s how to think about it:
Engagement: Are customers actively using your product? Track logins, feature usage, and time spent in the tool.
Satisfaction: How happy are your customers? Use NPS (Net Promoter Score) or CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score) surveys to capture this data.
Outcomes: Are customers getting value from your product? Are customers hitting their success milestones? Check if they’ve achieved the goals they set out to accomplish with your product.
Combine these inputs to score customers as Healthy (Green), At-Risk (Yellow), or Critical (Red).
Top Tip: Automate where possible but don’t skip the human touch. Customers flagged as “At-Risk” should trigger proactive outreach from your team.
3. Using Metrics to Drive Action:
Tracking metrics is only useful if you take action on the insights they provide. In this section, we’ll focus on turning data into proactive steps that improve Customer Success outcomes.
Regular Reviews: Schedule weekly or monthly reviews of your CS metrics to identify trends and risks early.
Spot Trends: Are churn rates creeping up? Is Time-to-Value increasing? Address issues immediately to avoid compounding problems.
Prioritise At-Risk Customers: Use health scores and key metrics to focus on customers who need support before they churn.
Communicate Metrics: Share your metrics regularly with internal teams and stakeholders to align everyone around CS priorities and demonstrate progress.
Top Tip: Metrics aren’t just for internal use. Sharing success outcomes with customers—such as how they’ve improved productivity or ROI—strengthens relationships and builds trust.
"What you track can and should change based on top priorities for impact. If you know you’re having a challenge in a particular area, that’s where you might want to focus for a bit, while you deprioritise areas that are working better.”
Andrea Spillman-Gajek – Founder at
Success Accelerators and Brighteye Mentor
Practical Tool: Metrics Dashboard Template
Use a simple dashboard to track and visualise your core metrics. A good dashboard includes churn rate, retention rate, NRR, TTV, and customer health scores. Update it regularly to spot trends and opportunities for improvement.
Takeaways for Founders:
Focus on metrics that drive retention, value realisation, and growth.
Use customer health scores to proactively identify and support at-risk customers.
Turn data into action by addressing trends and sharing metrics with stakeholders.
A simple metrics dashboard keeps everyone aligned and focused on results.
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