When analyzing usage statistics for information to help with retention, I believe you need to look at usage by segment. Identify your Super Users as outliers – and segment them accordingly. You do want to keep them – they help you innovate, but look at them separately so that their behavior doesn’t impact thinking about the other segment of users. Then look at what the majority of the people are doing on the system. Try to make what they are doing as easy as possible. Though either the product or service solutions.
All Aboard! Helping Customers realize value from the get-go!
I would expect that for most subscription type services there can be a reverse bell curve to lifetime. With a blip of churn occurring early. Then customers that stay a subscription cycle or two will end up staying for some time. This is real churn, or at least the churn that is most worrisome, because it is often customers that leave before you recover the cost of acquiring them in the first place.
It’s not you it’s me – going deeper to find out why customers really leave
I find sometimes, people in business will almost go out of their way rather than take in bad feedback. The average person, in wanting to avoid conflict, will sometimes give a pat answer rather than discuss real reasons for stopping doing business with you. No one likes to talk about negatives. No one likes to deal with rejection. So customers vote with their feet, rather than give you constructive feedback as to why they have left.
When the inside matches the outside
Startups should first start with trying to understand the market and what you can uniquely offer of value to that market. That I meant not to ignore traditional branding activities, just not to prioritize that before they have product/market fit validated. And base your branding on this discovery.
Why Founders should focus on Growth at later stages
An early focus on achieving scale takes away from the initial priorities of discovery and validation – achieving product / market fit and then subsequently problem / solution fit. If a company scales without nailing operational efficiencies then they can lose control over customer acquisition costs and operational costs. The more customers you have, then the harder it can be to actually identify the need for and perform necessary pivots.
Why Startups should worry about Brand second
Startups primary focus is customer acquisition. This happens by refining the customer persona, defining and branding positioning statement and responding to the customer buying cycle. You lean this by engaging with customers. Working on brand comes second.