TL;DR: When thinking about retention metrics, what to track and why, founders should start with this: if customers do not stay, growth is fake.
Track four numbers first: customer retention rate, churn rate, repeat purchase or renewal rate, and revenue retention. These show if people keep paying, coming back, and getting enough value to stick around. Then use NPS, CSAT, CES, cohort tracking, and health scores to explain what is happening and where friction is pushing people out. The article’s big point is simple: retention is the clearest test of product-market truth, and every metric needs an owner plus a review routine.
💡 If you want the next step after tracking these numbers, read this customer success framework to turn retention signals into repeatable actions.
Acquiring a new customer often costs 5 to 10 times more than keeping an existing one, and raising retention by just 5% has been linked to profit increases of 25% to 95% across widely cited business research.
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