One Metric That Matters
In one sentence
At each stage, pick the single number that best shows progress — and focus on it.
The simple version
Dashboards with 50 numbers make you feel informed but rarely tell you what to do. Lean Analytics suggests choosing one key metric for your current stage (like weekly active users or repeat purchases), improving it, then moving to the next.
- 1Empathy
- 2Stickiness
- 3Virality
- 4Revenue
- 5Scale
Why it matters
Focus. A clear number aligns the whole team and makes it obvious whether an experiment worked.
How to do it
- 1Work out your stage: finding the problem, building stickiness, growing, earning, or scaling.
- 2Choose the number that best reflects success at that stage.
- 3Set a target based on your business model.
- 4Run experiments aimed at moving that number.
- 5Change the metric when you move to a new stage.
Real-world example
An early fitness app focuses only on 'workouts per user per week' until people come back reliably, before worrying about sign-ups or revenue.
What the books say
Focus on One Metric That Matters for your current stage, and ignore the rest for now.
Common mistakes
- Tracking vanity metrics like total sign-ups or page views.
- Changing the metric every week.
- Picking a metric you can't actually influence.
Questions people ask
What's a vanity metric?
A number that goes up and makes you feel good but doesn't help you decide anything — like total downloads ever.
References
- [1]
- [2]
More books on this in the library
Lean Analytics
Alistair Croll and Benjamin Yoskovitz provide a data-driven approach to building startups, emphasizing the importance of analytics in decision-making.
Mide lo que importa
Spanish edition of John Doerr’s "Measure What Matters", this book explains the Objectives and Key Results (OKR) framework used by startups and tech giants like Google to set goals, drive focus, and achieve rapid, aligned growth.
Hacking Growth: How Today's Fastest-Growing Companies Drive Breakout Success
Sean Ellis and Morgan Brown outline growth hacking tactics for founders, including cross-functional teams testing acquisition, activation, retention levers. Key metrics like viral coefficient and North Star Metric drive scaling teams via rapid experiments. Vs Blitzscaling, it focuses on data-driven efficiency over pure speed.
Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth
Ash Maurya's follow-up to Running Lean, this book teaches founders how to measure what matters, predict startup success using key metrics, and scale effectively. Includes traction models, customer factory frameworks, and real examples from Airbnb and Dropbox.
Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth
Ash Maurya equips founders with traction and customer factory models to measure predictable growth, focusing on throughput metrics for scaling teams post-PMF. Key use cases include 10x rollout strategies and viability tests vs. vanity metrics. Compared to Blitzscaling, it prioritizes metric-driven sustainability over speed.
Do More Faster: Techstars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup
Brad Feld compiles accelerator tactics for founders to accelerate growth through rapid iteration, team building, and customer validation. Key metrics include weekly progress velocity and milestone achievement for scaling early teams. Vs. Blitzscaling, it focuses on structured acceleration for pre-scale startups.