Understanding what success looks like for your digital product isn’t always obvious. Downloads and traffic may look impressive on the surface, but they don’t always reflect true product value or long-term viability. To build a product that thrives, you need to measure the right things at the right time.
Let’s break down the essential product success metrics, explain what they mean, why they matter, and how to act on them.
Getting people to discover and try your product is the first milestone. But acquisition is not just about volume — it's about quality.
New Users / Downloads
This shows how many people are starting to use your product. It’s a basic growth signal, especially relevant during early launch phases or after big campaigns. However, high numbers don’t guarantee engagement — it’s easy to download an app and never open it again.
Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)
This metric tells you how much you’re spending to acquire each new customer. To calculate it, divide total marketing and sales expenses by the number of new users over a period. A healthy CAC is lower than the user’s lifetime value — otherwise, you’re burning money for short-term wins.
Traffic Channels
Are your best users coming from organic search, social media, paid ads, referrals, or app store search? Channel-specific insights help optimize your marketing budget and focus efforts on what works best.
Tip: Use UTM parameters or campaign-specific tracking tools to measure the performance of each acquisition source accurately.
Acquisition means nothing if users don’t engage. That’s where activation comes in — it measures the percentage of users who complete a key action that indicates they’ve received real value from your product.
For example:
Low activation rates usually mean users are either confused, overwhelmed, or unimpressed. It’s often a sign that onboarding needs to be simplified or that your value proposition isn’t clear enough in the early steps.
Best Practice: Identify your product’s "aha moment" — and build onboarding flows that get users there as quickly and smoothly as possible.
Once users are activated, the next question is: Do they keep coming back? Engagement metrics show whether your product becomes part of the user’s routine or gets abandoned after the first try.
Key metrics include:
DAU, WAU, MAU (Active Users)
These metrics show how frequently people use your product. Tracking daily, weekly, and monthly active users helps gauge how "sticky" your product is. A high DAU/MAU ratio (often called stickiness) suggests strong engagement.
Session Frequency & Duration
How often do users open your app? How long do they stay per session? A high session count with very short durations might signal friction or lack of value.
Feature Usage
Engagement isn’t just about opening the app — it’s about using it meaningfully. Tracking which features get used (and which don’t) helps teams prioritize future development and simplify the product over time.
Insight: Engagement is where many products succeed or fail silently. A product with modest acquisition but high engagement is usually more valuable than one with viral reach and shallow usage.
Retention — this is the metric that tells you how long users stick with your product. It’s one of the most critical indicators of any digital product's success because without retention, there’s no sustainable growth.
Day 1, Day 7, Day 30 Retention
These milestones help you understand how quickly users lose interest. For example, if you have good conversion but only 10% of users return after a week, that signals issues with engagement.
Churn Rate
This is the opposite of retention. It’s the percentage of users who stop using the product during a given period. It’s especially important to look at honest churn — not just those who haven’t logged in, but those who quit for good.
Tip: Work with cohorts. Instead of average figures, look at how users who joined during specific campaigns or at certain times behave.
Numbers are important, but without understanding why users behave the way they do, it's easy to go in the wrong direction. Here’s where satisfaction metrics come in.
Net Promoter Score (NPS)
A universal question: "How likely is it that you'd tell others about your experience with our product?" Users rate from 0 to 10, and you divide them into promoters, passives, and detractors. This score is highly correlated with future growth and loyalty.
CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score)
Typically asked after key actions: "How satisfied are you with this experience?" Great for assessing customer service, specific features, or updates.
Reviews and In-app Surveys
These channels give valuable qualitative feedback. Read what people are saying — sometimes one sentence from a user provides more insight than 10 charts.
For products that generate revenue, the key question is how well they are monetizing. Revenue metrics show how effective the business model is and where growth can be accelerated.
MRR / ARR (Monthly and Annual Recurring Revenue)
Especially important for SaaS: these metrics indicate the stability and predictability of your revenue. They are excellent for tracking growth rates and the impact of subscription plans.
ARPU (Average Revenue Per User)
How much revenue does one user bring on average? It helps compare the value of different user segments (e.g., paying vs. free users or users in different countries).
LTV (Lifetime Value)
The total revenue you’ll earn from a customer throughout their relationship with your product. If LTV is greater than CAC, you're on the right track.
Conversion Rate to Paid Plans
Particularly important for freemium models: what percentage of users move from free to paid? You can track this by channels, time since registration, and activation type.
Universal metrics are great — but every product has unique indicators that reflect its specificity, business model, or goals.
Examples:
For Mobile Apps:
Install-to-activation rate
Crash-free sessions
App Store rating & reviews
Push notification opt-in rate
For SaaS Products:
Conversion from free trial to paid
Feature adoption by user segment
Average time to first value (TTFV)
Support ticket volume (per MAU)
For Marketplaces:
Number of successful transactions
Time to first sale (for sellers)
Buyer repeat rate
Liquidity ratio (activity vs. number of items)
Tip: Don’t be afraid to create custom metrics. As long as they accurately reflect the value you're providing users, they’ll help guide your product decisions.
Measuring the success of a product is not just about numbers; it’s about understanding the real behavior of users and the product’s impact on the business.
Start with the basic metrics: activation, engagement, and retention.
Add revenue and feedback as the product scales.
Don’t forget to tailor metrics to your product’s specific nature.
The clearer you understand what drives growth, the faster you can scale, improve the UX, and make data-driven decisions.
At Frontetica, we’ve been building mobile applications for years — helping businesses launch, scale, and refine their digital products with confidence. Learn more about how we can support your next mobile project.
