The science of ultra loyalty

Multi-Strategy Retention:
120+ User Retention Tactics

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1 Personal Welcome from Founder After people join up for your product, show them a personalized message from the ... ActivationRetention emailonboarding
2 Search Box Inside Email Incorporate a search box within the email copy to increase email click-through ... ActivationRetention email
3 Resend Emails to Non-openers with New Subject Lines Send your email again with a different subject line about 48 hours after the first ... ActivationRevenueRetention emailcopywriting
4 What Users Created Using Your Product Display examples of work created with your product to help inspire creativity in potential ... AcquisitionActivationRetention content
5 Find the customers "language" by asking them simple questions You can only write good copy once you take the time to understand your customers. Many ... ActivationRetention copywritinguser insights
6 Convince & convert with this 48 headlines templates Here is a spreadsheet with 48 models for catchy, viral headlines that convince and get ... AcquisitionActivationRetention emailcontentcopywriting
7 Prioritize growth ideas easy with this template To determine the value of any development concept, use this prioritization template ... AcquisitionActivationRevenueRetention process
8 Reduce churn by requiring significant effort to opt-out ⚠️ Approach with caution! ⚠️ This is called "Roach Motel," it happens when a website or ... RevenueRetention dark patternchurn prevention
9 Maximizing data mining ⚠️ Approach with caution! ⚠️ To obtain the most out of data mining, you must get the user ... RevenueRetentionReferral dark patternuser insightsdata
10 Replace one word to get 90% more clicks An A/B test showed that the number of clicks on buttons written in the first person increased ... ActivationRevenueRetention copywriting
11 Drip auto-followings from friends When you sign up for Pinterest or Slideshare through Facebook, your friends who already use ... Retention onboardingsocialblack hat/gray hat
12 Get customers back once they've churned 1. Find out why they are leaving. 2. When you fix it, that's the best time to reach out and say ... RevenueRetention churn preventionsurveyads
13 Comment Mention Alert Notify users when another user mentions them in a comment to get them to come back to your ... Retention emailcrmsocial
14 Progressive Profiling By using advanced analysis, you can learn more about your customers and better serve them. By ... Retention crmdata
15 Onboard Users Manually Excellent user onboarding can dazzle the user and increase brand desire. To increase user ... ActivationRetention onboardingthings that don't scale
16 Forgive Previous Payments When a card changes, you can let the user off the hook for any payments they would have had to ... Retention paymentsproduct
17 Variable Rewards Instead of giving regular rewards for actions, it seems to make a product more addictive to ... Retention product
18 Send Physical Gifts To Users This plan is easy to understand. By giving physical gifts to active users, usually in the form of ... Retention brandsharing
19 Discount For Deactivated Customers Customers who last bought from you a while ago or used to subscribe to your service can be brought ... Retention emaildiscount
20 Delay Card Error Email After the card fails, wait to email the customer for five days. It's possible that the problem doesn't ... Retention paymentsdata
21 Use words that a sixth-grader could understand A Harvard study found that the ease of use of a product was strongly linked to how likely it was to be ... ActivationRevenueRetention copywritingcontent
22 Check your features in a variety of browsers Very straight forward - Make sure your designs work well on all platforms and screen sizes. Sometimes a ... ActivationRevenueRetention productuser experiencedesign
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The Hidden Leverage No One Talks About:

Engineering Customer Retention

Image of Fredrik Lyreskog
By Fredrik Lyreskog, Founder
Fredrik Lyreskog
Product Manager & Business Developer
Snap Inc. Partner Lead • Ex-Google • Certified Product-Led Growth • IBM Certified AI Pro • 4x author

20 years of professional experience in product development, whereof the last 15 dedicated to leading agile product teams. Strong focus on FinTech (insurance, mortgages, investments, banking services for 59 banks) and E-com (5 global, US expanding DTC's). Additional experience in SaaS services, Leads Generation, and managing 500+ websites across 120 countries. Read more.
Snap Inc. Partner Lead • Ex-Google • Certified Product-Led Growth • IBM Certified AI Pro • 4x author
20 yrs of Product Dev in FinTech (banking services for 59 banks), E-com (5 global, US expanding DTC's), SaaS, and Lead Gen. Managed 500+ websites in 120 countries.

It's 5-9x more cost-effective to increase sales with existing customers compared to acquiring new ones1, 2, 3. This opportunity should not be overlooked. Did you know that a company that reduces its customer churn from 5% to 2.5% will become 50%4 (yes, 50%!) larger in 5 years than it would have otherwise? It's true. We've developed a full retention tactics database to maximize this compounding effect.
Tons of businesses will optimize their products and processes based on these filterable tactics during the coming year. Are you one of them? Or is it one of your competitors?
Utilize our retention tactics database to significantly increase the value of existing customers.

WHAT YOU GET
  • With higher customer retention, you will substantially increase your revenue and profitability without needing to acquire a single new customer.

  • Loyal customers and recurring revenues are more important than ever now that the cost of customer acquisition has skyrocketed[1]. We've done the heavy lifting for you and serve up Best Practice on a silver platter.

  • You're just 1 minute and a few clicks away from full access to the database through an easy-to-use interface (simpler than a spreadsheet).

Available now. Our compilation of tactics was previously offered exclusively to our premium clients on consulting contracts. Now, for a limited time, we want to provide more people with the opportunity.

Fredrik Lyreskog
Founder, Rocket Toolkit

User retention meaning

Increase your recurring revenues by 10x (962%[A]) – and achieve 94% customer satisfaction[B]
User retention means how often people keep using a website, app, product or service. It's a measure[2] of how successful the digital product or service is. It counts the percentage of people who come back after trying it out the first time. By fostering loyal customer relationships, you can enhance revenue and profit streams without the constant need for new customers. Unlock these benefits by leveraging a comprehensive tactics dataset, drawn from the expertise of retention masters themselves.
CASE 1
[A] At a Swedish investment bank, my team and I executed the Discover project to increase retention and recurring revenue. The project yielded a digital revenue growth of 10x ARR (Annual Recurring Revenue) - more precisely 962.3% - after 11 months with our SaaS business model. Expected ARR growth of 20x 4 months ahead and 30x 8 months ahead, September -20 [Confirmed in writing by CEO]
CASE 2
[B] For the same company, we achieved 93.9% customer satisfaction, of which 43.8% responded they were very positive, and 78.6% indicated (after their initial visit) that they would continue using the service, August 2019 [Sourced from third-party service]
Endorsement from an Executive Team Member
"A person who can deliver high-quality digital work with excellent team and relationship building abilities. He managed to help an unexperienced team to launch a great digital product. He is certainly one I would recommend." – Founder & CEO [Source]

The User Growth Funnel

That Drives Recurring Revenue

To comprehend the significance of a high CLV (Customer Lifetime Value), one needs to grasp the entire funnel – starting from customer acquisition cost on one end, navigating through the various stages (and potential conversion leaks), and ultimately arriving at the customer's lifetime value. The model below - the AARRR funnel[3] - is designed to propel users through the entire flow and transform them into profitable customers5. AARRR is a concept representing Acquisition, Activation, Revenue, Retention, and Referral.
For nearly a decade, hyper-growth companies have harnessed this structure with great success to optimize their businesses.

The products we offer at Rocket Toolkit are built upon the AARRR framework for the simple reason that we have observed its exceptional performance across a multitude of business types.

Acquisition
Sold separately
Activation
Sold separately
Revenue
Sold separately
Retention
You are here
Referral
Sold separately

 + ACQUISITION +
 #####################
 -> Acquisition determines the funnel size in terms of users
 -> "How do we find more users?"

   1) The most basic thing here is to understand where to get visibility and to be able to get a response to the visibility
   2) Once you reach visibility and you see an initial response - make sure the quality of the response and the target audience are aligned with your requirements
   3) Make sure you have a significant and scalable, addressable audience of customers or users
       
< g clip-path="url(#a)">

 + ACTIVATION +
 #####################
 -> Activation is the upstream bottleneck
 -> "How do we convert users to leads?"

   1) This is about finding an offer and shaping marketing messages that solve a tangible problem for a user
   2) The faster and better you can communicate the value of solving the problem to users, the faster you can activate them
   3) Their first impression is the lasting impression, so creating an experience where you can deliver value and solve the problem quickly is critical

 + REVENUE +
 #####################
 -> Revenue determines the funnel size in terms of dollars and cents
 -> "How do we convert leads into high-profit paying customers?"

   1) Offer premium products or services that add value to your leads, free users or subscribers they would be willing to pay for
   2) Identify additional pain points where added value can be created beyond what you already do for your existing customers
   3) How to upgrade and upsell customers who purchased an entry-level product or service of yours, but has the potential to become an even more profitable customer
       
< g clip-path="url(#a)">

 + RETENTION +
 #####################
 -> Retention is the downstream bottleneck
-> "How many of your customers are you keeping, and why are you losing the others?"

   1) What do we do to make customers stay longer with their subscription, or become a repeat customer in your e-com store?
   2) Identify which triggers are not only keeping your customer longer, but also makes the customer continue to spend more
   3) How to dig deeper into solving customer problems while creating added value, so that the customer wants to stay longer and spend more money on your products and services
       
< g clip-path="url(#a)">

 + REFERRAL +
 #####################
 -> Referral or recommendations are the icing on the cake
 -> "How can you turn your customers into your ambassadors?"

   1) Which of your customers are the ones that would be most ideal to represent your brand and get more customers through the door?
   2) Which activities would be triggers? It takes an incentive to get customers to act on your behalf and bring you more customers
   3) How to get customers to act - not only to get you a single new customer - but also to promote your brand and make you look good and get plenty of new customers
       
Acquisition Sold separately
Activation Sold separately
Revenue Sold separately
Retention You are here
Referral Sold separately

++ ACQUISITION ++
####################
-> Acquisition determines the funnel size in terms of users
-> "How do we find more users?"

1) The most basic thing here is to understand where to get visibility and to be able to get a response to the visibility
2) Once you reach visibility and you see an initial response - make sure the quality of the response and the target audience are aligned with your requirements
3) Make sure you have a significant and scalable, addressable audience of customers or users
    

++  ACTIVATION ++
####################
-> Activation is the upstream bottleneck
-> "How do we convert users to leads?"

1) This is about finding an offer and shaping marketing messages that solve a tangible problem for a user
2) The faster and better you can communicate the value of solving the problem to users, the faster you can activate them
3) Their first impression is the lasting impression, so creating an experience where you can deliver value and solve the problem quickly is critical

++ REVENUE ++
####################
-> Revenue determines the funnel size in terms of dollars and cents
-> "How do we convert leads into high-profit paying customers?"

1) Offer premium products or services that add value to your leads, free users or subscribers they would be willing to pay for
2) Identify additional pain points where added value can be created beyond what you already do for your existing customers
3) How to upgrade and upsell customers who purchased an entry-level product or service of yours, but has the potential to become an even more profitable customer
    

++ RETENTION ++
####################
-> Retention is the downstream bottleneck
-> "How many of your customers are you keeping, and why are you losing the others?"

1) What do we do to make customers stay longer with their subscription, or become a repeat customer in your e-com store?
2) Identify which triggers are not only keeping your customer longer, but also makes the customer continue to spend more
3) How to dig deeper into solving customer problems while creating added value, so that the customer wants to stay longer and spend more money on your products and services
    

++ REFERRAL ++
####################
-> Referral or recommendations are the icing on the cake
-> "How can you turn your customers into your ambassadors?"

1) Which of your customers are the ones that would be most ideal to represent your brand and get more customers through the door?
2) Which activities would be triggers? It takes an incentive to get customers to act on your behalf and bring you more customers
3) How to get customers to act - not only to get you a single new customer - but also to promote your brand and make you look good and get plenty of new customers
    

Retention Marketing

Loyal Customers as a Strategy

Retaining customers has long been known as important. However, creating loyal customers and recurring revenue is now more crucial than ever, especially as the cost of customer acquisition has risen significantly. In this guide, we will cover everything you need to know to create, measure, and enhance customer loyalty and retention.

Your past and existing customers are a massive asset to your company[4]. It's therefore absolutely critical to maintain a strong relationship with your past and existing customers to keep them as loyal customers.

Despite this, many companies still allocate a major portion of their marketing budgets to finding new customers instead of nurturing relationships and retaining the customers they already have.

Research confirms that there are significant benefits to prioritizing existing customers and building customer loyalty. In fact, according to the book "Marketing Metrics"6 by Paul Farris et al., the probability of selling to an existing customer is 60-70%, compared to less than a 20% chance with new prospects7.

The effectiveness of efforts to retain customers is hard to underestimate. Existing customers are 50% more likely to try new products and spend 31% more8. Therefore, it's likely that 80% of your future profits will come from 20% of your existing customers. The ability to keep customers loyal is the key to success9.

Hence, if executed properly, your customer retention strategy can actually be your biggest business opportunity this year.

What is a good user retention rate

A good user retention rate is a crucial metric that reflects the effectiveness of a business in retaining its existing customers over a specific period[5]. It provides insights into customer satisfaction, loyalty, and the overall health of a company's offerings. Generally expressed as a percentage, user retention rate quantifies the proportion of customers who continue using a product or service over time. However, what constitutes a "good" retention rate can vary widely based on factors such as industry, business model, and customer expectations.

In many industries, a user retention rate above 20-25% is considered godd or decent, but a truly favorable retention rate typically exceeds 30%. Industries with subscription-based models or those with inherently loyal customer bases, such as software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies, might strive for retention rates upwards of 70%. Contrastingly, businesses with more transactional relationships or frequent purchasing patterns may have lower benchmarks for retention due to the nature of their products.

To define a "good" user retention rate, it's crucial to consider the context and goals of the specific business. Comparing the rate to industry standards and analyzing trends over time provides a better understanding of customer behavior and the effectiveness of retention strategies. A declining retention rate could signify dissatisfaction or market shifts, while a consistently high rate could indicate strong customer loyalty. Regardless of the industry, a higher retention rate generally corresponds to lower customer acquisition costs and increased customer lifetime value, both of which contribute to sustained business growth.

In conclusion, a good user retention rate varies depending on industry dynamics and business objectives. It's a key performance indicator that showcases a company's ability to engage, satisfy, and retain its customer base. Regularly monitoring and improving this metric can lead to enhanced customer relationships, greater profitability, and long-term success.

How well do you retain your users

Assessing the effectiveness of user retention strategies is a pivotal aspect of measuring the overall success of a business. To truly gauge how well a company retains its users, a comprehensive evaluation of various metrics and engagement factors is essential. Tracking user retention rates[6] over specified time frames provides valuable insights into the percentage of customers who continue using the product or service, indicative of their satisfaction and loyalty. Additionally, analyzing user engagement patterns, such as frequency of interactions, depth of usage, and interaction longevity, can offer a deeper understanding of how well the user base is retained.

Furthermore, soliciting direct feedback from users through surveys, reviews, and customer support interactions contributes to a more qualitative assessment of user retention. Positive feedback, a consistent flow of repeat customers, and a strong sense of brand loyalty all point to successful user retention strategies. Conversely, identifying areas where users are dropping off or encountering difficulties can help pinpoint areas for improvement. By constantly monitoring and adapting user retention tactics based on these evaluations, businesses can enhance their ability to keep users engaged, satisfied, and committed over the long term.

Customer retention example

Diving into the long-term perspective of what customer loyalty truly entails and looks like requires building a forward-looking quantitative growth model. Let's take a look at an example that compares two competitors - Company A and Company B.

Company A Company B Difference Comment
New users per month 1 million 2 million 2x Company B is getting twice as many new users/month, so they should be the best, right?
Retention (customer loyalty) 85% 65% -20% Okay, but -20% isn't that bad, right?
MAU (Monthly Active Users) 6 months 4,152,337 5,283,321 1,130,984 Company B still seems to be winning here
MAU 1 year 5,718,388 5,681,783 -36,605 Company A catches up and overtakes
MAU 2 years 6,531,782 5,714,101 -817,681 Company A is well ahead of Company B
MAU 3 years 6,647,480 5,714,285 -933,195 Note that Company B is losing almost all the users they gain each month

In addition to disregarding retention, another classic mistake that companies make is defining their retention metrics incorrectly. Getting this definition wrong, which results in inaccurate measurement of retention and customer loyalty, can spell doom for your business.

Improve customer retention

Increasing customer retention by 5% boosts profits by 25% to 95%, according to research conducted by Fred Reichheld of Bain & Company10. So, at this juncture, we can establish that retention is a crucial puzzle piece for your business. However, what is a bit more controversial, or perhaps just less known, is how to go about enhancing retention and customer loyalty.

Improving customer retention[7] can be achieved via a multitude of strategies and tools designed to enhance customer satisfaction and engagement. Some of the commonly employed strategies include:

  1. Personalization: Tailoring product recommendations, communication, and offers based on each customer's interaction history, preferences, and demographics can significantly enhance their experience, leading to higher retention.
  2. High-Quality Customer Service: Prompt and effective customer service can help resolve issues quickly, enhancing customer satisfaction, and increasing the chance of retention.
  3. Regular Contact & Engagement: Keeping customers informed about new product launches, sales, tips, and other relevant information helps maintain continuous engagement.
  4. Loyalty Programs: Rewarding customers for their continued loyalty with exclusive discounts, early access, perks, etc., encourages them to remain active customers.
  5. Seeking Feedback: Regularly requesting feedback and acting on it not only makes customers feel valued but also gives businesses insights into areas for improvement.

Website retention rate

The website retention rate[8], also known as visitor retention rate, is a key metric used to assess the effectiveness of a website in keeping visitors engaged and returning over a specific period. It provides insights into how well a website retains its audience, which is a crucial factor for online success. The retention rate is typically expressed as a percentage and indicates the proportion of visitors who continue to interact with the website after their initial visit. A high website retention rate suggests that visitors find the content, user experience, and value provided by the website compelling enough to return, while a low retention rate might indicate that improvements are needed to keep visitors interested.

Monitoring the website retention rate is essential for optimizing user experience and content strategy. By analyzing the behaviors of returning visitors[9] and identifying patterns, website owners can tailor their content to better match their audience's preferences and needs. Factors contributing to a strong retention rate include relevant and valuable content, user-friendly navigation, personalized experiences, and prompt responses to user feedback. Ultimately, a high website retention rate not only enhances the user experience but also contributes to increased brand loyalty, higher conversion rates, and sustained growth for online businesses.

User engagement

User engagement refers to the level of interaction, involvement, and connection that individuals have with a particular platform, product, or content[10]. It serves as a fundamental indicator of how effectively an entity is capturing and retaining the attention and interest of its audience. User engagement encompasses a variety of interactions, such as likes, comments, shares, clicks, time spent on a website, or the depth of interaction with an application. It's not just about passive consumption but also active participation and the emotional connection users develop with the offered content or experience.

Businesses and platforms across various industries strive to enhance user engagement as it directly correlates with key performance metrics and success factors. High user engagement typically leads to longer session durations, repeat visits, and a sense of community and loyalty among users. Companies often employ strategies like personalization, gamification, and interactive features to drive user engagement. By fostering meaningful interactions and catering to users' preferences and needs, organizations can create a more immersive and valuable experience, which, in turn, translates into improved brand perception, higher customer satisfaction, and ultimately, better business outcomes.

An important aspect of accurately measuring user engagement lies in choosing the appropriate frequency for product engagement. When considering the right frequency for your product's engagement metrics, you can ask yourself: "Does a user of my product need to engage daily, weekly, or monthly to be considered active (or possibly longer for certain products)?". Measuring retention and engagement with the wrong cadence can deceive you into thinking that your product has good retention when it actually doesn't.

Chances are that the frequency for your product is fairly intuitive, but there's also a systematic way to approach this with data if you want to validate your work:

  1. Filter users by some type of minimum engagement threshold
  2. Look at the past 30 days of product event data[11]
  3. Calculate how many days each user returned during that period
  4. Visualize the results in a histogram and identify clusters

If you see the most significant cluster of people returning < 3 days, lean towards a monthly frequency. Similarly, if most return within 3-10 days, weekly is preferable, and 10+ days indicate daily is best. I would trust your intuition and your understanding of the problem you're solving, but this exercise can be helpful as validation.

Retention KPI

When delving into Retention KPIs, the frequency aspect is just the beginning, with the behavior you're optimizing for constituting the next crucial puzzle piece. Drawing from our experience, we've found that this step often poses the greatest challenge.

Our recommended approach centers on identifying the pivotal behavior that signifies the realization of value within your product. Ideally, you should have identified that transformative moment when users truly grasp your value proposition. If this hasn't been pinpointed yet, there's no need for excessive concern; these insights can be uncovered. Concrete examples can be particularly illuminating:

  • Uber: Booking a ride
  • Facebook: Engaging with the news feed
  • Slack: Sending messages to others
  • Notion: Creating a new note
  • Airtable: Logging a data point

Given our affinity for data-driven insights, there exists a more systematic method to determine this core behavior. After brainstorming a handful of actions that might mark value-realizing instances, you can harmonize them with the established frequency and then visualize retention curves[12] for each of these behaviors.

Retention strategies

Retention strategies are the carefully crafted approaches that businesses employ to retain and engage their existing customers over the long term. These strategies aim to strengthen the bond between the customer and the brand, ultimately enhancing customer loyalty and lifetime value. Successful retention strategies go beyond mere transactional relationships, focusing on delivering consistent value, personalized experiences, and excellent customer service.

One common retention strategy involves enhancing the customer experience through personalization[13]. By tailoring products, services, and interactions to individual preferences and needs, businesses can make customers feel valued and understood. This personal touch fosters a sense of loyalty, as customers are more likely to stick around when they feel a strong connection to the brand.

Additionally, loyalty programs[14] and rewards systems incentivize repeat purchases and engagement, providing customers with tangible benefits for remaining loyal.

Communication is also a pivotal aspect of retention strategies. Regular engagement through targeted emails, newsletters, and notifications keeps customers informed about new offerings, updates, and promotions, thereby maintaining their interest and involvement. Moreover, actively seeking and responding to customer feedback demonstrates a commitment to improvement and shows customers that their opinions matter. Ultimately, successful retention strategies involve a combination of understanding customer needs, building strong relationships, and continually adapting to deliver value that keeps customers coming back.

Appendix: Retention metrics

Retention metrics are the quantifiable measures used to assess the effectiveness of a business's efforts in retaining its customers over a specific period. These metrics provide valuable insights into customer loyalty, satisfaction, and the overall health of a company's relationship with its clientele.

Common retention metrics include customer churn rate, which quantifies the percentage of customers who stop using a product or service within a given timeframe, and customer retention rate, which reflects the percentage of customers who continue to engage with the brand over time. These metrics enable businesses to evaluate the success of their retention strategies, identify areas for improvement, and make informed decisions to enhance customer loyalty and long-term profitability.

Churn rate calculation

The calculation of churn is a simple formula[15]. Take the number of customers you lost in the previous period (such as the quarter) and divide it by the number of customers you started with in the same period (quarter). The resulting fraction is your churn rate. Multiply by 100 to express it as a percentage.

Formula

(lost customers/starting customers) * 100 = churn

Examples

(10/250) * 100 = 4%
(1644/11734) * 100 = 14%
(46/9212) * 100 = 0.5%

For instance, if your company had 250 customers at the beginning of the month and lost 10 customers by the end, you would divide 10 by 250. The answer would be 0.04. You then multiply 0.04 by 100 to get the percentage, resulting in a churn rate of 4%.

Note

In the example above, we calculated churn rate as a percentage of lost customers, but there's more than one way to calculate churn. You can calculate churn based on:

  • Number of customers
  • Value of lost recurring contracts
  • Percentage of lost recurring revenue

What is a good churn rate

Benchmark data from Lenny Rachitsky11 and Ryan Law12 provide us with a clear picture of what constitutes good churn and really good monthly churn, segmented accordingly[16].

Good Really Good
B2C SaaS 3-5% < 2%
B2B Small/Medium Businesses 2.5-5% < 1.5%
B2B Large Enterprises 1-2% < 0.5%
  • For B2C SaaS: Between 3% and 5% churn per month is good, and less than 2% is really good
  • For B2B Small & Medium Businesses (SMB): Between 2.5% and 5% is good, and less than 1.5% is really good
  • For B2B Large Enterprises: Between 1% and 2% is good, and less than 0.5% is really good

Definitions

For B2C SaaS: Subscription products sold to consumers; e.g. Duolingo, Spotify, Grammarly.

B2B Small/Medium Businesses (SMB): Subscription products primarily sold to companies with fewer than 1,000 employees, generally charging less than 10,000 SEK per month for the average customer; e.g. Gusto, Intercom, Airtable, Asana.

B2B Large Enterprises: Roughly defined as subscription products primarily sold to companies with more than 1,000 employees, generally charging more than 50,000 SEK per month for the average customer; e.g. Salesforce, Snowflake, Workday, ADP.

What is lifetime value (LTV)?

Lifetime Value – abbreviated as LTV – is the total value per customer for a business over the entire duration of their relationship. It is an important metric because retaining existing customers costs less than acquiring new ones – increasing the value of your existing customers is simply a good way to drive growth.

Knowing LTV helps companies develop strategies to acquire new customers and retain existing ones while maintaining profit margins.

How to calculate Lifetime Value?

The simplest formula for calculating Lifetime Value is:

Formula

(customer revenue * duration of the relationship) – customer acquisition cost = LTV

This formula is suitable for situations where the numbers are likely to remain relatively unchanged from year to year.

Note

This is an example of historical Lifetime Value – a variant that looks back at past events.
You can also calculate predictive Lifetime Value/LTV. This is an algorithmic process that takes historical data and uses it to make an intelligent prediction about how long a customer relationship is likely to last and what its value will be.

How to calculate CLV?

CLV, also known as Customer Lifetime Value, is the same as LTV or Lifetime Value. It is calculated in the same way.

Example

800 * 4 = 3200 USD in CLV (revenue)
800 * 4 * 0.2 = 640 USD in CLV (profit)[17]
800 * 4 = 3200 USD in CLV (revenue)
800 * 4 * 0.2 = 640 USD in CLV (profit)

In our example, the average sale in a clothing store is 800 USD, and on average, a customer makes 4 purchases during their lifetime. The lifetime value is calculated as CLV = 800 x 4 = 3200 USD over the duration of the relationship.

However, if we factor in the cost of customer acquisition and the cost of serving the customer (personnel, materials, etc.), there is less left. If the profit margin in our clothing store is 20%, it means that the cost of customer acquisition and serving the customer is 80%.

Therefore, our CLV in profit currency becomes: CLV = 800 x 4 x 0.20 = 640 USD.

How much is a customer worth?

This is how you calculate how much a customer is worth to your company:

  1. Start with your company's total revenue from the past year and divide it by the total number of purchases during the same period. The resulting number is your average purchase value.
  2. Then take your total number of purchases from the past year and divide it by the number of unique customers who made purchases. The resulting number is your average purchase frequency.
  3. Take your average purchase value and subtract the average purchase frequency from it. This gives you the customer value per year.
  4. Calculate the average number of years a customer continues to make purchases from you. If you have tracked unique purchases, this shouldn't be difficult. This number is the average customer lifetime - lifetime value.
  5. Now, multiply the customer value by the average customer lifetime to get the lifetime value for your customer.
  6. Now you know what a customer is worth to you!

How do you measure customer satisfaction?

There are 3 ways to measure customer satisfaction[18]: CSAT, CES, and NPS.

All of these 3 methods involve single-question approaches that significantly simplify the process of gathering customer insights and satisfaction. While you might not think that the survey method matters that much, there's a significant difference in how you phrase the question.

Let's take a closer look at each of the different methods.

What is CSAT? (Customer Satisfaction Score)

Customer Satisfaction Rating, or Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT), on average measures how satisfied or dissatisfied customers are with your product, service, or customer support. Customer satisfaction is calculated by summing up the total of all scores and dividing the total by the number of respondents.

CSAT is one of the most widely used metrics for measuring customer satisfaction. You ask your customers to rate their satisfaction on a linear scale. Your scale can be 1-3, 1-5, 1-7, or 1-10, and there's no general agreement on which scale is best to use.

CSAT is a measure used to instantly evaluate a customer's specific experience, simply put.

Think of it as a transactional metric based on what's happening right now for a user – whether they're satisfied with your product or service. Try to capture CSAT scores as soon as possible after an interaction, for instance, within 15 minutes. It should be one of the key metrics for evaluating customer service performance.

What is CES? (Customer Effort Score)

Customer Effort Score (CES) is very similar to CSAT, but instead of asking how satisfied the customer was, you ask them to rate how effortless their experience was.

You're still measuring customer satisfaction, but in this way, you're measuring the user's effort – the assumption being that the easier a task is, the better the experience becomes. Turning an experience into a low-effort one is one of the best ways to reduce frustration and disloyalty.

What is NPS customer satisfaction? (Net Promoter Score)

NPS asks the question, "How likely are you to recommend this company to a friend or colleague?".

You calculate your Net Promoter Score, NPS, by subtracting the percentage of "detractors" from the percentage of "promoters". This measures customer satisfaction as well as customer loyalty. By doing so, you can get an overall score, but you can also segment your responses into three categories: "detractors," passive, and "promoters".

NPS is often used as a general indicator of customer loyalty and brand devotion. Most organizations that implement NPS measurements also develop strategies to manage the results and enhance NPS.

What is NPS survey?

An NPS survey is a communication sent to customers with the question of whether they would recommend the company, providing a rating on a scale of 0 (not likely at all) to 10 (extremely likely). Depending on their responses, they fall into one of three categories to determine an NPS score:

  • Promoters respond with a score of 9 or 10 in the NPS survey and are usually loyal and enthusiastic customers.
  • Passives respond with a score of 7 or 8 in the NPS survey. They are satisfied with your service but not satisfied enough to be considered Promoters.
  • Detractors respond with a score of 0 to 6 in your NPS survey. These are dissatisfied customers who are unlikely to purchase from you again, and they might even discourage others from doing business with you.

How to measure NPS?

This is how you measure NPS:

NPS Formula

% promoters - % detractors = NPS

NPS Example

Let's say you received 100 responses to your NPS survey:

  • 10 responses fell within the range 0–6 (detractors)
  • 20 responses fell within the range 7–8 (passives)
  • 70 responses fell within the range 9–10 (promoters)

When you calculate the percentages for each group, you get 10%, 20%, and 70% respectively.

To calculate your NPS, you subtract 10% (Detractors) from 70% (Promoters), which equals 60%. Since an example of Net Promoter Score is always displayed as a whole number and not a percentage, your NPS is simply 60. And yes, you can have a negative NPS because your score can range from -100 to +100. However, it should be noted that a negative score is truly not a good NPS[19].

70% promoters - 10% detractors = 60 NPS score

How to measure eNPS?

eNPS (Employee Net Promoter Score) is measured in the same way as regular NPS. The difference between NPS and eNPS is simply that it inquires about employee satisfaction instead of customer satisfaction.

Employee Net Promoter Score, eNPS, is, in other words, a part of Net Promoter Score (NPS) developed by Fred Reichheld, Bain & Company. Organizations use eNPS to determine how willing their employees are to recommend their employer to others.

Calculating eNPS is straightforward. The percentage of detractors is subtracted from the percentage of promoters (see the formula below). The percentage of passives is not included in the calculation of the score. Your score can range anywhere between -100 (all employees are detractors) and +100 (all employees are promoters).

% promoters - % detractors = eNPS
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References

Footnotes

Customer Acquisition Costs and Best Practices

The cost of customer acquisition refers to the total cost associated with persuading a potential customer to buy a product or service, including research, marketing, and advertising costs. Businesses adopting customer retention strategies can benefit from cost efficiencies in addition to revenue growth. "Best Practice" implies proven strategies or methods that consistently show superior results and are used as a benchmark. ↩︎

Key User Retention Metrics

User retention can be measured using several metrics, such as churn rate (the percentage of users who stop using the product over a given period), daily or monthly active users, and stickiness (the number of daily active users divided by monthly active users, showing how often people use the product). These metrics provide valuable insights into how engaging and valuable customers find a product or service post-purchase. ↩︎

Pirate Metrics and CLV

The AARRR funnel, also known as the Pirate Metrics, is a metrics model introduced by Dave McClure, a startup advisor and angel investor. Increasing the efficiency of this funnel boosts the total Customer Lifetime Value (CLV), which is a predictor of the net profit attributed to the entire future relationship with a customer. ↩︎

Underrated Customer Retention

The value of customer retention is often underestimated. Loyal customers are more likely to purchase again, spend more, and promote the business through word-of-mouth advertising, which is highly trusted and effective. These points emphasize the need for businesses to balance their marketing efforts and budget allocation between customer acquisition and retention for optimal financial performance. ↩︎

Retention Rate's Impact

A low retention rate might signify that although the company is successful in attracting customers initially, it’s less successful in satisfying or keeping them over the long term. Understanding retention rates is essential since a higher retention rate signifies higher customer satisfaction, which in turn often results in increased brand loyalty and profitability. Inversely, improving retention rates can significantly reduce the costs associated with customer acquisition. ↩︎

User Retention Assessment

Evaluating user retention effectiveness is a complex process that requires a combination of quantitative (data-driven) and qualitative (feedback-driven) assessments. Tools like Google Analytics, Tableau, and Adobe Analytics, among others, can be used to assess quantitative data, including user engagement metrics and retention rate over time. ↩︎

Customer Retention: Tailored Strategies

Enhancing customer retention often involves a blend of engagement strategies tailored to a business’s unique customer base. Some businesses might find success with customer loyalty programs that offer rewards or discounts for repeat purchases. Others might double down on personalized marketing strategies, using customer data to tailor their messages and offers to individual consumers. Regular, meaningful communication – such as updates on new products or company news, personalized recommendations, or responsive customer service – can also foster ongoing customer relationships. ↩︎

Understanding Visitor Behavior

Note that for a more nuanced understanding of a website’s performance, website retention rate should be analysed alongside other key metrics like bounce rate, exit rate, and session duration. These can provide valuable insights into a visitor’s behavior on the website. ↩︎

Analyzing Returning Visitors

The term “returning visitors” in this context refers to the individuals who, after their first visit, have had at least one more session on your website during a given period. These can be further segmented into frequency of return, the duration between visits, or the type of content they consume. ↩︎

User Engagement Metrics Variety

It’s crucial to recognize that user engagement is not one-size-fits-all, and the metrics used to measure engagement can vary greatly depending on the platform or product. For example, a high level of user engagement on a social media platform might be represented by numerous likes and comments, while on a news website, longer average time spent on page might be a better indicator. Similarly, for a mobile app, the frequency of use or number of sessions per user might be a more meaningful measure of engagement. ↩︎

Interpreting Product Event Data

The “product event data” mentioned in this context typically includes incidents of interactions that users have with your product or service. These interactions may include actions like signing up, logging in, making a purchase, clicking on certain features or pages, posting comments, and more. Keep in mind, the kind of events tracked might vary based on the nature of your product or service. Transforming raw event data into meaningful insights often involves techniques like event tracking, sessionization, segmentation, and funnel analysis. ↩︎

Retention Curves Explained

The “retention curves” referenced here are graphical representations of how an aspect of customer behavior—such as usage of a particular feature—evolves over time. A steep retention curve can indicate that customers continue to use the product or feature regularly, suggesting high user engagement and product value. ↩︎

AI in Personalization

Personalization can involve data analytics and AI to understand behaviors. This can include personalizing content, recommendations, and marketing messages. ↩︎

Effective Loyalty Programs

Loyalty programs should provide real value to customers to be effective, such as rewards, exclusive offers, or special services for frequent customers. However, the rewards should align with customer preferences to be effective. Also, these programs should be easy to understand and use, as complicated systems can deter customers from participation. ↩︎

Understanding Churn Metrics

The churn rate calculation can only consider customers lost and does not account for new customers acquired within the same period, hence this metric may sometimes paint an incomplete picture of customer churn dynamics. Another related concept is “net churn”, which considers both lost customers and new customer growth. Net churn is calculated by subtracting the percentage of new customers from the churn rate. If the result is negative, this indicates that customer growth has outpaced churn, which is ultimately a positive situation for the company. If the result is positive, however, it signals that the loss of existing customers exceeds the acquisition of new customers, highlighting a potential issue with customer retention. ↩︎

Benchmarking SaaS Churn Rates

These benchmarks reflect the generally accepted standards for SaaS (Software as a Service) businesses. However, it is important to note that ‘good’ churn rates can vary depending on various factors, such as the maturity of the company, market saturation, competitive landscape, and more. For start-ups and young companies, a higher churn rate might be acceptable as they fine-tune their product-market fit. Equally, in highly dynamic or competitive markets, achieving lower churn rates may be more challenging. Therefore, while these figures provide a useful reference point, it’s vital that companies benchmark their churn rates against businesses in a similar context – similarly-sized companies operating in the same sector, facing similar challenges. ↩︎

Factoring Profit Margin in CLV

The profit margin mentioned here refers to the net profit margin, which is calculated by subtracting all a company’s expenses (including taxes, operational costs, cost of goods sold, etc.) from its revenue, and then dividing by the revenue. The figure resulting from this calculation, expressed as a percentage, gives the company’s profit margin. While the concept of CLV focuses on revenue generated from a customer, factoring in the profit margin provides a more accurate picture of the net value a customer brings to a business over their lifetime. This can be especially useful for businesses in determining how much they can afford to spend on customer acquisition while remaining profitable. ↩︎

Choosing Customer Satisfaction Metrics

The choice of customer satisfaction measurement method should align with your specific goals and the type of insights you seek. CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score), CES (Customer Effort Score), and NPS (Net Promoter Score) each offer unique advantages. CSAT assesses overall satisfaction with a specific interaction, CES focuses on ease of use, and NPS gauges loyalty and likelihood to recommend. It’s crucial to consider the context and objectives of your survey when selecting the most appropriate method for your business. ↩︎

Assessing NPS Scores

The assessment of a “good NPS” can vary depending on several factors, including industry benchmarks and customer expectations. Generally, an NPS above 20 is considered “favorable,” indicating that more customers are promoters (those who would recommend your brand) than detractors (those who would not). An NPS score above 50 is often seen as excellent, showcasing a high level of customer loyalty and satisfaction. An NPS score above 80 is considered world-class and is indicative of an exceptional customer experience. ↩︎