The Startup Chat with Steli and Hiten podcast.

In today’s episode, Steli and Hiten discuss the KPIs (key performance indicators) a company should be tracking—from startup phase to the more established. Most emerging companies are clueless about which metrics to track while others are trying TOO many metrics measuring the numbers incorrectly. While it is common to make such mistakes, Steli and Hiten wish to SAVE YOU TIME and give you the rundown of where your focus needs to be. Tune-in as Steli and Hiten discuss everything metrics and emphasize the importance of goal-setting when it comes to improving your numbers.

Time Stamped Show Notes:

00:03 – Today’s Startup Chat is about what KPIs to track as a startup

00:55 – Most emerging startups are asking which key metrics to track and how to measure success

01:42 – As a startup grows, the struggle is there’s too much data to track or they’re tracking the wrong information

02:46 – Most startups don’t have many performance indicators in the early stages that are trackable

02:57 – For Hiten, there are several lenses that he flips on a business to determine the KPI

03:05 – First, is the stage of the company

03:24 – Second, is the type of business

04:08 – If a new company doesn’t know its initial product market fit and the product is working:

04:17 – The metrics will be around the product

04:25 – The key performance indicator will be on customer satisfaction

04:43 – As a business moves on to a later stage and the business model is more defined; the metrics will be determined by the business model

05:00 – Hiten’s Crazy Egg had only one feature called Heat Map for the last 12 years

05:14 – Recently, they’ve added 3 new features

05:32 – Their metrics have changed because of this

05:50 – The only metric that they’re focused on now is the MRR (monthly recurring revenue) for every new paying customer

06:02 – They want existing customers to become used to the new features

06:41 – Content specific KPIs are what Hiten is after more than anything else

06:51 – Steli shares the most impactful thing for them during their first week with Y Combinator

07:00 – They had a chat with Paul Grant and they described to him how their business was doing

07:14 – The conversation was around the measure of success and how people are getting value from the business

07:35 – Paul asks them if they can promise him a 10% weekly growth until the end of YC

07:58 – Steli was confident and he agreed

08:18 – Steli then asked Paul if he has his credit card with him so he can sign up on their website

08:29 – Paul wanted Steli to focus on one number

08:45 – Steli’s team were able to focus in on that one goal

09:15 – Prioritizing is important

09:50 – Challenge yourself to pick a number for your goal that is the most meaningful and closest to reality

10:58 – Tracking the wrong numbers won’t be helpful for your business

12:35 – Hiten shares the common mistakes he’s seen with tracking KPIs

12:42 – If you pick the wrong metric to improve, you’re going to improve the wrong metric

14:18 – One of the mistakes is not measuring the metric properly

15:32 – Compounding growth is what you’re going after

16:04 – MRR is naturally a compounding metric

16:36 – Third mistake is people having TOO many metrics

17:28 – A lagging indicator tells you where your goals should be

17:35 – A leading indicator helps you understand if you’re moving in the right direction or not

18:02 – You don’t want to focus your KPIs on a leading indicator

18:46 – KPIs are fluid—don’t change them unless you’re learning why you should change it

19:03 – If you keep changing your KPIs, you keep changing your goals which isn’t good

19:08 – Some would also change KPIs because they ...