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Choosing Metrics That Don't Lie

Picking the numbers that tell you whether the product is actually working — and rejecting the ones that just feel good.

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Every dashboard can be made to look good. The job of picking KPIs is picking the numbers that can't be gamed into looking good while the product quietly fails.

1The North Star Metric

A North Star Metric is the single measure that best captures the value your product delivers to users — Airbnb's is nights booked, not signups. It should be a leading indicator of revenue, move with real usage, and be something the whole company, not just Product, can rally behind.

2Input Metrics vs. Output Metrics

Output metrics (revenue, retention) tell you the score; input metrics (features shipped, onboarding completion rate) tell you the moves you can actually control this sprint. A KPI dashboard that only shows outputs leaves a team with no lever to pull — pair every output metric with the inputs believed to drive it.

3Step-by-Step Breakdown

Introduction. A KPI (Key Performance Indicator) is a single number a team is accountable for moving. Without a clearly chosen KPI, every stakeholder optimizes for a different metric, and the product drifts in five directions at once.

Vanity Metrics vs. Actionable Metrics. Total downloads and total registered users only ever go up — they're vanity metrics that make a dashboard look healthy while hiding a dying product. Actionable metrics, like Week-4 retention or activation rate, move up AND down in response to real changes you make.

Leading vs. Lagging Indicators. Revenue and churn are lagging indicators — by the time they move, the cause happened weeks ago. Activation rate and feature adoption are leading indicators that predict those lagging outcomes early enough for a PM to actually intervene.

Knowledge Check. Your app's total download count has grown every month for a year, but the team has no idea if users are actually getting value. What's the problem?

→Downloads is a vanity metric — it only counts installs, not ongoing engagement or retention
→Nothing — a growing download count is proof the product is succeeding

Summary. Choose one North Star KPI that reflects real user value, pair it with 2-3 leading-indicator health metrics, and actively ignore vanity numbers in roadmap conversations even when they look great on a slide.

Pascual Vila

Frontend Instructor // Code Syllabus

Common Pitfalls & Errors

The Error //

Reporting vanity metrics as if they prove success

// Misleading
"We have 500,000 total signups!" (never decreases, ignores churn)

// Honest
"We have 40,000 weekly active users, down from 46,000 last month."

The Solution //

Total registered users can grow every single month even while the product is dying, because it never subtracts users who left. Replace or pair it with a metric that can go down, like active users or retention.

The Error //

Tracking only lagging indicators

// Too late to act
Q3 Revenue: down 8% (discovered in the Q3 close)

// Early warning
Week-1 activation rate: down 12% in July (caught it in week 2, before it hit revenue)

The Solution //

If the only metric on your dashboard is quarterly revenue, you'll find out something is wrong three months too late to fix it cheaply. Add leading indicators that move earlier and give you time to react.