Product Metrics to Use Instead of Vanity Metrics

Overview Product metrics are the compass of product management, showing how customers interact with a product and how those behaviors connect to business outcomes. The article warns against relying on vanity metrics such as DAU, WAU, or NPS without context, and highlights the importance of choosing metrics that reflect true value and impact.

Key Takeaways

• Vanity metrics can look impressive but often hide underlying problems like churn.
• Context matters: metrics that work for consumer apps may be irrelevant for B2B SaaS or other domains.
• Choose metrics that tie customer behavior to business outcomes (e.g., activation, retention, revenue).
• Over-reliance on easy-to-measure numbers can mislead stakeholders and impede product success.
• Real-world examples (e.g., BranchOut) illustrate the risks of focusing on DAU without deeper health indicators.

Who Would Benefit

• Engineering managers overseeing product development.
• Technical leaders responsible for data-driven decision making.
• Product managers and product owners.
• CEOs and founders of SaaS or tech startups.
• Analysts and data scientists supporting product teams.

Frameworks and Methodologies

• Outcome-driven product metric selection.
• Lean product development principles.
• Growth hacking frameworks that prioritize activation, retention, and revenue over raw usage numbers.