There are hundreds of marketing metrics you could track. Most startups don't need hundreds. A useful startup marketing dashboard should focus on a relatively small number of metrics covering reach, acquisition, conversion, cost and customer value.

1. Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

Customer Acquisition Cost measures how much you spend to acquire a new customer.

The basic calculation is:

CAC = Total Marketing & Sales Costs ÷ Number of New Customers

For example, if you spend £10,000 on marketing and acquire 200 customers:

£10,000 ÷ 200 = £50 CAC

CAC is one of the most useful metrics for understanding whether your growth model is sustainable. However, be careful about looking at CAC in isolation. A £50 customer acquisition cost could be excellent if customers generate £500 of lifetime value, but expensive if they only generate £60.

2. Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)

Customer Lifetime Value estimates how much revenue or profit a customer generates over the relationship with your business.

A simplified calculation is:

LTV = Average Customer Value × Average Customer Lifespan

Comparing LTV with CAC gives you a much better understanding of the economics of your marketing.

For example:

• CAC = £50

• LTV = £250

• LTV:CAC = 5:1

This suggests a potentially attractive acquisition model. The exact ratio you should target will depend on your business model, margins, retention and growth strategy, but the principle is simple: the value created by acquiring a customer needs to justify the cost of acquiring them.

3. Conversion Rate

Conversion rate tells you what percentage of people take a desired action.

That action could be:

• Making a purchase

• Signing up

• Booking a demo

• Completing an application

• Requesting a quote

• Joining a mailing list

For example, if 5,000 people visit your website and 250 become leads:

250 ÷ 5,000 × 100 = 5% conversion rate

Conversion rate is particularly useful because it helps identify where improvements can be made without necessarily increasing your marketing budget. If you double your conversion rate, you can potentially double your customers without doubling your traffic.

4. Cost Per Lead (CPL)

For startups with a lead-generation model, Cost Per Lead can be an important acquisition metric.

CPL = Marketing Spend ÷ Number of Leads

However, don't assume that a cheaper lead is automatically better. A campaign generating leads at £10 each may look better than one generating leads at £25 each. But if the £10 leads rarely become customers while the £25 leads convert at a much higher rate, the more expensive campaign may actually be the better investment. Always connect lead generation metrics to downstream conversion and revenue.

5. Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)

ROAS measures the revenue generated for every pound spent on advertising.

ROAS = Revenue Attributed to Advertising ÷ Advertising Spend

If you spend £5,000 and generate £20,000 in attributed revenue:

ROAS = 4:1

ROAS can be useful for measuring paid advertising performance, particularly for ecommerce businesses. But it shouldn't automatically be treated as the ultimate marketing metric. Different channels can influence customers at different stages of the journey, and some businesses have repeat purchases or long sales cycles that make immediate revenue attribution less meaningful.

For startups, it's often better to look at ROAS alongside CAC, LTV, conversion rate and contribution margin. Industry and product type also make ROAS a metric that can be useful or not depending on how your product works.

6. Website Traffic

Website traffic is useful, but traffic alone isn't a measure of marketing success. A startup can increase traffic by 200% and still generate fewer customers.

Instead, look at:

• Organic traffic

• Paid traffic

• Direct traffic

• Referral traffic

• Branded search

• Non-branded search

• Landing-page performance

• Conversion rate by channel

The important question isn't simply: "How many people visited our website?" It's: "What did those visitors do?"

7. Engagement Metrics

Depending on your marketing strategy, engagement metrics can help explain what happens before conversion.

These might include:

• Email open and click rates

• Video engagement

• Social engagement

• Content downloads

• Time on page

• Returning visitors

• Landing-page engagement

These are useful diagnostic metrics, but they shouldn't become vanity metrics. A post receiving 100,000 impressions is not necessarily more valuable than one receiving 10,000 impressions if the smaller audience generates substantially more customers.