How to set your KPI as a startup founder

Executive overview

Most founders struggle to know which metric actually matters. Pick one primary KPI from four standard options — revenue, usage, enterprise contracts, or technical milestones. Below it, track three to five secondary metrics that drive it.

The top KPI should be conventional; the secondary metrics are where you customise.

The four primary KPIs

1. Revenue — monthly, MRR, or annual; suits most product companies
2. Usage — DAUs, WAUs, MAUs; suits ad-supported or social products
3. Enterprise signals — LOIs, free pilots, paid pilots, signed contracts
4. Technical milestones — experiment results, manufactured parts; suits science or moonshot companies

The metrics pyramid

• One top metric tells you how the business is doing overall
• Three to five secondary metrics sit below it and directly drive the top number
• Brainstorm features and weekly optimisations against the secondary metrics, not the top one
• Airbnb example: top metric = revenue; secondaries = inventory volume, average listing price, host responsiveness, search performance

Why the top KPI must be standard

• Investors benchmark you against similar companies using common metrics
• A custom top KPI makes comparative analysis impossible
• Secondary metrics can and should be product-specific — that is where creativity belongs