KPI Tree & North Star

Why it matters

Without a KPI tree, teams optimize different things at the same time: marketing pushes volume, product ships features, revenue discounts — and nobody owns the system. A KPI tree aligns the company around value → behaviors → revenue, with clear guardrails.

Template

1) North Star Metric (NSM)

For PLG B2B, prefer account/workspace metrics:

• NSM: Weekly Activated Workspaces (WAW)
• Definition: number of workspaces that fired activation_completed in the last 7 days

2) Input metrics (layers)

Acquisition

• Visits → Signup Started → Signup Completed
• Signup conversion rate

Activation

• Activation Rate = activated_workspaces / signup_completed_workspaces
• Time-to-Value (TTV) = median(signup_completed → activation_completed)

Retention

• W1 / W4 retention (workspace + user)
• Repeat usage rate (e.g., ≥2 sessions/week)

Revenue

• Trial → Paid conversion
• Expansion (seat growth), GRR/NRR (if applicable)

3) Guardrails

• Refund rate
• Support tickets per active workspace
• Abuse/spam signals

Common mistakes

• Using user-level NSM when monetization is workspace/account-level.
• Metrics without definitions (who counts, in what window, for which segment).
• Optimizing activation while hurting quality (missing guardrails).

Example output

NSM: Weekly Activated Workspaces Activation: workspace created + primary object created + key feature used within 24h TTV target: ≤ 15 minutes