Who This Helps
This is for you, Junior Analyst. You have a pile of data and a to-do list that keeps growing. You want to ship clean analysis with clear recommendations, but you're not sure which experiment to run first. The Metrics & Dashboards Basics course is built for exactly this moment.
Mini Case
Meet Maya. She's a Junior Analyst at a small SaaS company. The team tracks 20 numbers every week, but no one agrees on what matters most. Maya needs to prioritize the next experiment. She picks one primary metric: weekly active users (WAU). Then she defines three supporting metrics: sign-up rate, activation rate, and retention rate. She sets realistic targets: 12% increase in sign-ups, 8% increase in activation, and 5% improvement in retention over 7 days. Now she can focus her effort on the highest-impact move.
Do This Now (5 Steps)
- Pick your North Star metric. Choose one number that tells you if your product is working. For Maya, it was WAU. For you, it might be revenue per user or daily active users.
- Define three supporting metrics. These are the levers you can pull to move your North Star. Examples: sign-up rate, activation rate, retention rate.
- Set realistic targets. Don't guess. Use past data. Maya aimed for a 12% lift in sign-ups. You can aim for a 10% improvement in your key metric.
- Build a weekly scoreboard. Track your North Star and supporting metrics every week. Use a simple dashboard. No clutter. Just the numbers that matter.
- Add guardrails. Set alerts for when a metric drops below a threshold. This keeps you calm and focused on the big moves.
Avoid These Traps
- Tracking too many numbers. If you have 20 metrics, you have none. Stick to one North Star and three supporting metrics.
- Vague definitions. "Engagement" is not a metric. Define it clearly: "number of sessions per user per week."
- No targets. Without targets, you can't prioritize. Set a number and a deadline.
- Ignoring guardrails. A sudden drop in retention can kill your experiment. Watch for it.
- Analysis paralysis. You don't need perfect data. Ship a clean analysis with clear recommendations today.
Your Win by Friday
By Friday, you will have one North Star metric, three supporting metrics with targets, and a weekly scoreboard dashboard. You'll know exactly which experiment to run next. And you'll feel like a calm, focused analyst who ships work that matters. (Plus, you'll finally stop chasing shiny numbers.)