Article · 10 min read

Key Startup Metrics

Y Combinator Startup Library Free Beginner

A short, no-nonsense walkthrough of which handful of numbers actually matter at your stage, straight from YC's own coaching material. It's the right first stop if you've never set up a metrics dashboard and don't know where to start.

  • The right metric changes with your stage, not just your business model
  • Growth rate and retention matter more than absolute totals
  • Pick a small set of numbers you check every week, not a wall of charts
Open on ycombinator.com ↗

The question it answers

  1. How do I actually measure whether a launch worked, beyond the vanity upvotes and traffic spike?

Read with it

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  5. When there is no category report to point at, you have to build the number yourself, and this is the essay that teaches you... Andreessen Horowitz Essay · ~20 min read 16 More Startup Metrics Anu Hariharan, Frank Chen, Jeff Jordan
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