Retention¶
The Retention stage in the AAARRR framework is about keeping users engaged and coming back to your product over time. While acquisition gets users in the door, retention is what ensures they stick around and continue to receive value. High retention often signals strong product-market fit, while poor retention suggests users aren’t finding enough value to return.
Retention is typically measured using retention curves, which show what percentage of users return after a certain number of days, weeks, or months since their first use. A curve that stabilizes over time—meaning users continue to come back—indicates healthy retention. On the flip side, a steep drop-off followed by a flat line points to a 'leaky bucket' problem: you're acquiring users, but they’re slipping away quickly.
Improving retention requires identifying and reinforcing the behaviors that correlate with long-term usage. This might include: - Creating habit loops through timely reminders, emails, or in-app nudges. - Streamlining the user experience to reduce friction. - Continuously delivering value through new features, content, or personalized experiences.
It’s also important to define usage frequency—daily, weekly, or monthly—based on the nature of your product. For example, Slack expects daily usage, while a travel booking site might expect monthly or seasonal usage.
Retention and loyalty are related but distinct: retention is about repeated usage, while loyalty includes emotional attachment and willingness to advocate for your product.
Related KPIs¶
| Metric | Description |
|---|---|
| Activated-to-Follow-Up Engagement Rate | Activated-to-Follow-Up Engagement Rate measures the percentage of activated users who engage with the product again within a specific time window. It helps evaluate short-term retention and stickiness post-activation. |
| Activation Cohort Retention Rate (Day 7/30) | Activation Cohort Retention Rate (Day 7/30) measures the percentage of users who, after reaching activation, return to use the product 7 or 30 days later. It helps evaluate how well activation leads to ongoing engagement and early product adoption. |
| Active Feature Usage Rate | Active Feature Usage Rate measures the percentage of active users who engage with a specific feature within a given time period. It helps determine the feature’s relevance, discoverability, and stickiness. |
| Advocate Re-Engagement Rate | Advocate Re-Engagement Rate measures the percentage of previously engaged brand advocates who return and participate in a new activity (e.g., referral, review, or campaign). It helps assess brand loyalty and the strength of your advocacy program. |
| Average Customer Lifespan | Average Customer Lifespan (ACL) refers to the total duration a customer remains actively engaged with a company’s product or service. It’s an estimated timeframe from the point of customer acquisition to churn, during which the customer is actively using, purchasing, or subscribing to the product. |
| Average Purchase Frequency | Average Purchase Frequency (APF) is a metric that measures how often customers make a purchase within a specified time period. It provides insight into customer behavior and the consistency of their interactions with a brand. |
| Average Resolution Time | Average Resolution Time (ART) measures the average amount of time it takes to fully resolve a customer issue or support ticket from the moment it is raised to when it is marked as resolved. |
| Average Returning Revenue | Average Returning Revenue (ARR) represents the total predictable and recurring revenue a company expects to generate annually from its subscription-based products or services. |
| Brand Sentiment | Brand Sentiment measures the tone of opinions, feelings, and attitudes that customers, prospects, and the public express about your brand. It can be categorized as positive, neutral, or negative. |
| Breadth of Use | Breadth of Use measures the number of distinct features, modules, or product areas used by a single customer or account. It helps assess product adoption depth and customer stickiness. |
| Check-In Impact Score | Check-In Impact Score measures the correlation between customer success check-ins and positive business outcomes (e.g., retention, expansion, product usage). It helps quantify the value of proactive account engagement. |
| Churn Risk Score | Churn Risk Score is a predictive metric that estimates the likelihood of a customer canceling or downgrading within a given period. It helps identify at-risk accounts for proactive retention efforts. |
| Cohort Retention Analysis | Cohort retention analysis involves tracking a group of users (a cohort) over time to measure how many of them continue using a product or service, providing insights into retention and churn patterns. |
| Community Growth Rate | Community Growth Rate measures the percentage increase in members of your brand’s community over time. It helps track momentum, awareness, and the success of community-led strategies. |
| Complaints Received | Complaints Received refer to the number of formal or informal complaints submitted by customers or users about a product, service, or experience. These complaints highlight dissatisfaction and can cover a range of issues, from product defects to customer service challenges. |
| Complaints Resolved | Complaints Resolved refers to the number or percentage of customer complaints that have been successfully addressed and resolved within a given timeframe. This metric tracks how efficiently and effectively customer service teams are handling complaints. |
| Content ROI | Content ROI measures the return on investment generated by content marketing initiatives. It evaluates how much revenue or value your content delivers relative to the costs involved in creating and distributing it. |
| Contract Renewal Rate | Contract Renewal Rate measures the percentage of expiring customer contracts that are renewed within a given period. It helps track customer retention, revenue continuity, and CS performance. |
| Cost of Poor Quality | Cost of poor Quality (COPQ) refers to the costs incurred by an organization due to defects, inefficiencies, and errors in product or service delivery. It includes the financial impact of delivering substandard quality, both in internal operations and external customer-facing activities. |
| Cost per Resolution | Cost per Resolution (CPR) refers to the total cost incurred to resolve a customer issue or complaint. It includes the expenses related to customer support, staff time, and resources used in handling and resolving a single case. |
| Cost Per Ticket | Cost Per Ticket (CPT) measures the average cost incurred by a business to resolve a single customer support ticket. It reflects the efficiency of support operations and resource allocation. |
| Cross-Sell Conversion Rate | Cross-Sell Conversion Rate measures the percentage of existing customers who purchase additional, complementary products or services, typically during or after the initial sale. It reflects the effectiveness of cross-selling efforts aimed at increasing revenue from existing customers. |
| Customer Churn Rate | Churn Rate is the percentage of customers who stop using a company’s product or service during a specific period of time. It reflects the rate at which customers leave or cancel their subscriptions, typically used in SaaS and subscription-based businesses. |
| Customer Downgrade Rate | Customer Downgrade Rate measures the percentage of existing customers who reduce their subscription value (e.g., lower tier, fewer seats, removed features) within a given period. It helps assess product fit, pricing friction, and account health risk. |
| Customer Effort Score | Customer Effort Score (CES) measures how easy it is for customers to accomplish a task, such as resolving an issue, making a purchase, or using a feature. Typically, customers are asked to rate their experience on a scale, with lower effort indicating a better experience. |
| Customer Engagement Score | Customer Engagement Score measures how actively and consistently a customer is interacting with your product, content, or brand. It helps assess product adoption, value realization, and retention potential. |
| Customer Feedback Retention Score | Customer Feedback Retention Score measures the retention rate of customers who have provided feedback (positive, negative, or neutral). It helps assess whether engaging customers in feedback loops improves loyalty and long-term value. |
| Customer Feedback Score | Customer Feedback Score measures customer sentiment and satisfaction based on responses to feedback requests, often collected through surveys, ratings, or qualitative input. This metric provides direct insight into customer opinions about your product, service, or overall experience. |
| Customer Feedback Score (Post-activation) | Customer Feedback Score (Post-activation) measures the average rating or sentiment provided by customers after reaching a defined product activation milestone. It helps assess product satisfaction and value delivery in early stages. |
| Customer Health Score | Customer Health Score (CHS) is a composite metric used to evaluate the likelihood of a customer renewing, upselling, or churning. It typically combines multiple data points related to product usage, satisfaction, engagement, and support interactions into a single, actionable score. |
| Customer Lifetime Value | Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) represents the total revenue a business expects to earn from a customer over the entire duration of their relationship. It is a predictive metric that combines customer spending, loyalty, and retention rates to quantify the value of each customer. |
| Customer Loyalty | Customer Loyalty is a measure of a customer’s likelihood to repeatedly engage with and purchase from a brand over time, often driven by positive experiences, satisfaction, and perceived value. Loyal customers show a strong preference for a brand, even when alternatives are available. |
| Customer Renewal Rate | Customer Renewal Rate measures the percentage of existing customers who renew their subscription, contract, or membership during a specific time period. It reflects how well your product or service retains its customer base over time. |
| Customer Retention Rate | Customer Retention Rate (CRR) measures the percentage of customers a company retains over a given period. It reflects the ability to keep customers engaged, satisfied, and loyal to the brand, minimizing churn. |
| Customer Satisfaction Score | Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT) measures how satisfied customers are with a specific product, service, or interaction. It is typically calculated by asking customers to rate their experience on a scale, such as 1–5 or 1–10, with higher scores indicating greater satisfaction. |
| Customer Support Tickets | Customer Support Tickets is a classification metric that organizes customer support inquiries into predefined categories, such as technical issues, billing problems, product questions, or feature requests. This helps identify trends and prioritize areas for improvement. |
| Downgrade to Churn Conversion Rate | Downgrade to Churn Conversion Rate measures the percentage of customers who downgrade their plan or usage and later churn. It helps identify whether downgrades are leading indicators of customer loss. |
| Engagement Metrics | Engagement Metrics are data points that measure how users interact with your product, content, or campaigns. They assess the depth, frequency, and quality of user interactions, providing insights into customer interest, satisfaction, and loyalty. |
| Engagement Rate | Engagement Rate measures the level of interaction users have with your content, product, or campaigns relative to the size of your audience. It provides insight into how effectively your efforts capture attention and encourage meaningful user actions. |
| Error Rate | Error Rate measures the percentage of errors or failures occurring during a specific process, interaction, or system operation. It reflects the quality and reliability of a product, service, or workflow. |
| Escalation Rate | Escalation Rate measures the percentage of customer support cases or issues that are escalated to a higher level of support, such as specialized teams, managers, or senior agents. It reflects the complexity of issues and the ability of frontline support to resolve them effectively. |
| Exit Reason Frequency (Segmented) | Exit Reason Frequency (Segmented) measures how often specific reasons for churn or cancellation occur across different customer segments. It helps identify patterns in churn behavior and root causes by cohort. |
| Expansion Activation Rate | Expansion Activation Rate measures the percentage of existing accounts that adopt a new product, feature, or service that can lead to upsell or cross-sell. It helps track momentum in expansion readiness and usage. |
| Expansion Feature Usage Frequency | Expansion Feature Usage Frequency measures how often a specific upsell-eligible feature is used by existing accounts. It helps assess product stickiness, value realization, and readiness for expansion. |
| Feature Adoption Rate (Ongoing) | Feature Adoption Rate (Ongoing) measures the percentage of active users who regularly use a key product feature over a longer period. It helps track sustained value delivery and product adoption health. |
| First Contact Resolution | First Contact Resolution (FCR) measures the percentage of customer inquiries or issues resolved on the first interaction with customer support, without requiring follow-up actions or additional contacts. |
| First Critical Feature Reuse Rate | First Critical Feature Reuse Rate measures the percentage of users who return to use a key feature for a second time within a set period. It helps assess whether the feature delivered enough value to encourage repeat behavior. |
| First Response Time | First Response Time (FRT) is the average time it takes for a customer support team to provide an initial response to a customer inquiry. It reflects the speed and efficiency of a company’s ability to acknowledge and address customer concerns. |
| Gross Revenue Churn Rate | Gross Revenue Churn Rate measures the percentage of total recurring revenue lost due to cancellations or downgrades over a given period. It helps quantify the direct revenue impact of churn. |
| Key Feature Exploration Rate | Key Feature Exploration Rate measures the percentage of users who engage with a high-value feature for the first time—regardless of whether they complete or repeat use. It helps evaluate feature discoverability and user curiosity. |
| Loyalty Participation Rate | Loyalty Participation Rate measures the percentage of eligible customers actively engaging with a loyalty or rewards program. This metric helps assess how well the program attracts and retains participants. |
| Meaningful Session Frequency | Meaningful Session Frequency measures how often users return and complete a set of high-value actions within a session. It helps quantify behavior quality, not just raw usage. |
| Net Revenue Retention | Net Revenue Retention (NRR) measures the percentage of recurring revenue retained from existing customers over a given period, including revenue gained from expansions (upsells, cross-sells) and subtracting revenue lost due to churn or downgrades. |
| Percent of Accounts Completing Key Activation Milestones | Percent of Accounts Completing Key Activation Milestones measures the proportion of accounts that reach predefined, high-value activation checkpoints. It helps determine whether users are progressing toward long-term adoption. |
| Percent of Accounts with 3+ Activated Users | Percent of Accounts with 3+ Activated Users measures the share of accounts where at least three individual users have completed activation steps. It helps identify depth of adoption and signals potential virality or team-based expansion. |
| Percent of Accounts with Multi-Role Engagement | Percent of Accounts with Multi-Role Engagement measures the share of accounts where users from two or more distinct roles are actively using the product. It helps identify cross-functional adoption and account maturity. |
| Percent of Retained Feature Users | Percent of Retained Feature Users measures the proportion of users who continue to use a specific feature over a defined retention window. It helps assess feature stickiness and long-term value. |
| Post-Renewal Engagement Rate | Post-Renewal Engagement Rate measures the percentage of renewed customers who actively engage with your product or service within a defined period after renewal. It helps assess long-term retention health and expansion readiness. |
| Proactive Support Engagement Rate | Proactive Support Engagement Rate measures the percentage of users who respond to or engage with support initiatives before submitting an issue or ticket. It helps track the effectiveness of preemptive support and self-service education. |
| Product Adoption Rate | Product Adoption Rate measures the percentage of users or customers who adopt a product or feature within a specific time period after its introduction. It reflects how well the product resonates with its target audience and fulfills their needs. |
| QBR Engagement Rate | QBR Engagement Rate measures the percentage of eligible accounts that attend, complete, or meaningfully participate in Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs). It helps track strategic relationship strength and post-sale alignment. |
| Rate of Escalation to Higher Support Tiers | Rate of Escalation to Higher Support Tiers measures the percentage of customer support issues that require escalation from lower-tier support (e.g., frontline or basic support) to higher-tier support (e.g., advanced technical teams or specialized departments). |
| Referral Churn Rate | Referral Churn Rate measures the percentage of referred customers who cancel or stop using your product within a defined period. It helps assess the retention quality of referral-acquired users or accounts. |
| Referral Intent Identified in QBRs | Referral Intent Identified in QBRs measures the percentage of Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs) in which customers express interest or willingness to refer your product. It helps track referral readiness and advocacy opportunity among current accounts. |
| Referral Readiness Score | Referral Readiness Score is a predictive metric that assesses how likely a user or account is to make a referral based on behavioral, usage, and sentiment signals. It helps identify high-potential advocates before they take action. |
| Referral Retention Rate | Referral Retention Rate measures the percentage of referred customers who remain active or subscribed over a specific time period. It helps track the quality and stickiness of referral-driven acquisition. |
| Referral-Ready Account Rate | Referral-Ready Account Rate measures the percentage of accounts that meet internal criteria indicating they are ready to be prompted for a referral. It helps identify which customers are best positioned to refer based on health, engagement, or satisfaction signals. |
| Referred Account Net Revenue Retention (NRR) | Referred Account Net Revenue Retention (NRR) measures the revenue retained and expanded from referred customer accounts over time, factoring in upsell, cross-sell, contraction, and churn. It helps quantify the long-term revenue quality of referrals. |
| Relationship Depth Score | Relationship Depth Score measures the strength and breadth of engagement between your team and customer stakeholders across roles, levels, and functions. It helps assess account health, expansion potential, and advocacy readiness. |
| Repeat Purchase Rate | Repeat Purchase Rate (RPR) measures the percentage of customers who make more than one purchase within a specified period. It’s a key indicator of customer loyalty and the effectiveness of retention strategies. |
| Repeated Visitors | Repeated Visitors are users who return to your website, app, or platform after their initial visit within a specified period. This metric reflects the ability of your content, product, or service to retain and re-engage users. |
| Resolution Time | Resolution Time measures the amount of time it takes to resolve a customer issue or ticket from the moment it is raised to when it is marked as resolved. It tracks the speed and efficiency of support teams in addressing customer concerns. |
| Self-Serve Expansion Revenu | Self-Serve Expansion Revenue measures the total revenue generated from existing customers who independently upgrade or expand their usage without sales involvement. It helps track the scalability of your product-led growth engine. |
| Sentiment Analysis | Sentiment Analysis is the process of analyzing text, speech, or other data to determine the emotional tone behind it. It categorizes feedback as positive, neutral, or negative, providing insights into how customers feel about a product, service, or brand. |
| Sentiment Analysis (Sales + Social) | Sentiment Analysis (Sales + Social) measures the tone (positive, neutral, negative) of feedback and conversations related to your brand across sales call transcripts and social media platforms. It helps track brand perception, objection patterns, and positioning effectiveness. |
| Session Frequency | Session Frequency measures how often users return to a website, app, or platform within a specific period. It tracks the average number of sessions per user, providing insights into user engagement and loyalty. |
| Stickiness Ratio | Stickiness Ratio measures how often users return to your product by comparing daily active users (DAU) to monthly active users (MAU). It helps evaluate how “sticky” or habit-forming your product is. |
| Ticket Volume | Ticket Volume is the total number of customer support tickets created within a specific timeframe. It represents the demand for support services and provides insight into user needs, product issues, or service performance. |
| Time Between Logins (Post-Activation) | Time Between Logins (Post-Activation) measures the average time elapsed between logins for users who have already completed activation. It helps track engagement frequency and detect signs of drop-off or stickiness in the user experience. |
| Time in App | Time in App measures the total amount of time users spend actively engaging with a mobile or web application over a specific period. It reflects how much value users derive from the app and its ability to capture their attention. |
| Time to Exceed Value | Time to Exceed Value (TTEV) measures the time it takes for users to perceive that a product or service has exceeded their expectations or delivered greater-than-expected benefits. It’s a customer success metric that highlights when a user transitions from simply meeting their needs to experiencing delight or exceeding their goals. |
| Time to First Habitual Action | Time to First Habitual Action measures the average time it takes a user to perform a recurring, value-driving action for the second or third time — indicating the start of habit formation. It helps assess how quickly users are becoming engaged and sticky. |
| Time to First Referral | Time to First Referral measures the average time it takes for a customer or user to send their first referral after signing up or activating. It helps track the speed of advocacy and customer trust-building. |
| Time to First Repeat Action | Time to First Repeat Action measures the average time it takes for a user to repeat a key behavior (e.g., log in, run a report, send a message) after their first instance. It helps track habit-formation velocity and early product stickiness. |
| Time to Resolution | Time to Resolution (TTR) measures the average time it takes for a support team to fully resolve a customer inquiry, issue, or ticket. It starts when the issue is reported and ends when it is marked as resolved. |
| Time to Value (Expansion Features) | Time to Value (Expansion Features) measures the average time it takes for users or accounts to adopt and gain value from premium or advanced features after their initial onboarding or activation. It helps assess expansion readiness and product maturity velocity. |
| Trial Engagement Rate | Trial Engagement Rate measures the percentage of users who actively engage with your product during their trial period—using defined engagement behaviors like logins, feature usage, or team invites. It helps assess trial quality and onboarding effectiveness. |
| Unsubscribe Rate | Unsubscribe Rate measures the percentage of recipients who opt out of your email list after receiving a particular campaign or over a specified period. It reflects audience disengagement and serves as an indicator of content or targeting relevance. |
| Usage Depth | Usage Depth measures the extent to which users engage with the features, functionalities, or content of your product. It reflects how comprehensively users utilize available features, providing insight into their engagement and the product’s perceived value. |
| WAU/MAU Ratio | The WAU/MAU Ratio compares the number of Weekly Active Users (WAU) to Monthly Active Users (MAU). It represents the percentage of users who engage with your product weekly out of those who are active within a month. |