The 5 marketing numbers founders should watch

Marketing dashboards tend to grow until nobody reads them. As a founder, you only need a handful of numbers to know whether marketing is healthy. Here are the five I look at first.

1. New customers

Count them from your own records, not from ad platforms. This is the number everything else should serve.

2. Cost to get a customer

Total marketing spend divided by new customers. Include agencies and people, not just ads, or the number looks better than it is.

3. Conversion rate

Of the people who visit your site or talk to sales, how many buy? This is often the cheapest number to improve. At NuNorm, fixing the experience took store conversion from 0.4% to 3.23% before we spent more on traffic. (Read the case study.)

4. Repeat or retention rate

How many customers come back or stay? If it's low, more acquisition spend just fills a leaky bucket.

5. Payback time

How long until a customer's purchases cover what it cost to get them? Shorter payback means you can grow faster with the same cash.

How to use them

Look at the trend, not one week. Put all five on one page and review it weekly. When one moves, ask why before you change anything. That's the backbone of a weekly meeting that decides things.

Want to see how your marketing scores across the basics? Get your free Marketing Scorecard. It takes 15 minutes.