SaaS Analytics: 9 Metrics Every SaaS Company Should Track

Why SaaS analytics is different from web analytics

SaaS analytics combines web analytics (traffic, conversion) with product analytics (usage, retention) and business analytics (revenue, churn). Most tools do one of these well. GA4 does web analytics but not revenue. Mixpanel does product analytics but not web traffic. Stripe does revenue but not traffic. A SaaS company needs all three perspectives. This guide covers the 9 metrics that connect them — the ones that tell you whether your SaaS business is healthy and growing.

Metric 1: Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR)

MRR is the sum of all active subscription values per month. If you have 100 customers paying $29/mo and 20 paying $99/mo, your MRR is $4,880. Track MRR monthly and watch the trend. Healthy SaaS companies grow MRR 5-15% month over month. Below 3% is concerning. Negative MRR growth means you are losing customers faster than you are gaining them. MRR is the north star metric for SaaS — every other metric should be evaluated in terms of its impact on MRR.

Metric 2: Visitor-to-trial conversion rate

This is the percentage of website visitors who start a free trial. A healthy SaaS landing page converts 2-5% of visitors to trials. Below 1% means your landing page is not matching visitor intent or your trial friction is too high. Above 5% means you have strong product-market fit. Track this weekly. If it drops, check your landing page copy, page speed, and whether you changed the signup flow. In Dashly, this is automatic when you track signup as a custom event.

Metric 3: Trial-to-paid conversion rate

This is the percentage of trial users who become paying customers. A healthy SaaS trial-to-paid rate is 15-30%. Below 10% means your product is not delivering enough value during the trial, or your pricing is too high. Above 40% means you have an exceptional product. Track this by cohort (when did they sign up?) to see if it is improving over time. If your trial-to-paid rate is declining, your product may be getting worse or your marketing may be attracting the wrong audience.

Metric 4: Monthly churn rate

Churn rate is the percentage of customers who cancel each month. For early-stage SaaS, 5-8% monthly churn is common. Below 3% is excellent. Above 10% is dangerous — you are losing customers faster than you can replace them. Track churn by cohort to understand when customers leave. If most churn happens in month 1, your onboarding is broken. If it happens in month 3-4, your product is not delivering ongoing value. Churn is the silent killer of SaaS — a 10% monthly churn means you lose 72% of customers in a year.

Metric 5: Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

CAC is how much you spend to acquire one customer. If you spend $1,000 on ads and get 10 customers, your CAC is $100. Track CAC by channel — ads, content marketing, referrals — because different channels have very different costs. A healthy SaaS CAC is less than 1/3 of Customer Lifetime Value (LTV). If your CAC is $100 and your LTV is $300, you have a 3:1 LTV:CAC ratio, which is healthy. Below 1:1 means you are losing money on every customer.

Metric 6: Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)

LTV is the total revenue you expect from a customer over their lifetime. Calculate it as (average revenue per user ÷ monthly churn rate). If your ARPU is $29/mo and churn is 5%, LTV = $29 ÷ 0.05 = $580. LTV tells you how much you can spend to acquire a customer. If your LTV is $580, you can profitably spend up to $193 to acquire a customer (at a 3:1 ratio). Track LTV over time — if it is declining, your churn is increasing or your pricing is too low.

Metric 7: Activation rate

Activation rate is the percentage of new signups who reach your product's "aha moment" — the action that predicts long-term retention. For a SaaS analytics tool, the aha moment might be "saw their first data point." For a project management tool, it might be "created their first project." Define your aha moment, track it as a custom event, and measure what percentage of signups reach it within their first session. If your activation rate is below 40%, your onboarding needs work. If it is above 70%, you have strong product-market fit.

Metric 8: Revenue per visitor (RPV)

RPV is total revenue divided by unique visitors. It connects marketing (traffic) to business (revenue). If you get 10,000 visitors and make $2,000 in MRR from them, your RPV is $0.20. If your CAC is $0.10 per visitor (ads), you are profitable. RPV is the metric that tells you whether your marketing is working — not just driving traffic, but driving revenue. Most analytics tools do not track RPV because they do not connect to your payment processor. Dashly does this automatically with Stripe integration.

Metric 9: Net Revenue Retention (NRR)

NRR measures revenue from existing customers, including upgrades and downgrades, minus churn. If you start the month with $10,000 MRR, lose $500 to churn, gain $1,500 from upgrades, and lose $200 from downgrades, your NRR is ($10,000 - $500 + $1,500 - $200) ÷ $10,000 = 108%. An NRR above 100% means your existing customers are growing in value — you could acquire zero new customers and still grow. World-class SaaS companies have 120%+ NRR. Below 90% means you are shrinking your existing base. NRR is the single best indicator of SaaS health.

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