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Building a successful online business requires entrepreneurs to have the clearest idea possible about their current situation. Metrics and KPIs are the best way that business owners can keep track of their business’s performance.
With so many indicators, indexes, metrics, factors, and data, it can be hard to figure out which ones work best for your business. In this article, we are going to explore the 18 essential e-commerce metrics and KPIs you want to track in 2023. This list will help you build a solid analytics foundation that will keep your e-commerce site humming long.
In essence, e-commerce metrics are data that allow you to analyze your business’s performance. Without analytics, you lack quantifiable data to make informed and objective decisions. As a result, you will most likely make decisions based on hunches and guesses. Needless to say, that’s not the most effective way to run your e-commerce site.
The main purpose of e-commerce metrics is to produce data for decision-making. Above all, we want to make the decision-making process as analytics-based as possible. As a result, using metrics can help you get the data you need to make informed decisions.
Key performance indicators (KPIs) are data you can use to make specific decisions. Like metrics, KPIs are quantifiable measurements that aid decision-making.
So, aren’t metrics and KPIs the same thing?
Methodologically, they are. Practically, they are not.
Metrics and KPIs are pieces of quantifiable data that are used for analytical purposes. They provide objective nada to aid decision-making.
Metrics and KPIs are different for two specific reasons.
First, metrics are general measurements of an e-commerce site’s performance. For instance, total sales represent a general analysis of an e-commerce site’s performance. While total sales aid decision-making, it’s not a specific indicator that tells business owners how to react.
Second, KPIs are highly specific metrics that can trigger specific decisions. For example, a stock count is a KPI that triggers purchasing decisions. Some companies automatically generate purchase orders when their stock counts reach 25%. Thus, stock counts are KPIs since they trigger a specific action or reaction.
There are three key reasons why e-commerce metrics and KPIs are crucial to your business.
Knowing which e-commerce performance metrics to track allows you to reduce wasted resources, lost time and boost overall performance. These results are possible since e-commerce metrics allow you to visualize potential problems before they become serious issues. You can take proactive measures to correct issues in time.
Entrepreneurs face thousands of decisions daily. These decisions range from small to major issues. Therefore, decision fatigue is a real situation. Savvy business people know that automating as many decisions as possible is the best way to reduce decision fatigue.
E-commerce KPI benchmarks and performance indicators allow you to take the guesswork out of decision-making. The data can show you when to make a decision and when to wait. Also, e-commerce metrics facilitate difficult choices by providing objective data.
E-commerce metrics allow you to focus your efforts on the areas that truly matter. Without e-commerce KPIs benchmarks, you may have an idea of where things are going wrong.
You may intuitively know which areas require your attention. However, e-commerce performance metrics can reveal exactly where you need to pay close attention.
If you’re thinking about which e-commerce metrics and KPIs to track, don’t worry. We’ve got you covered. Here is the list of the top 18 e-commerce metrics and KPIs you must track in 2023.
Sales conversion rate tops the list of e-commerce performance metrics. Roughly 40% of e-commerce professionals indicated that it’s the top e-commerce metric they track.
A sales conversion rate consists of measuring the number of sales divided by the number of visits to an e-commerce site over a specific period.
For example, if 10 customers out of 100 purchase every hour, the sales conversion rate are 10%
(10 / 100 = 0.10 or 10%).
Knowing your sales conversion rate can easily help you assess your e-commerce site’s performance. It can also help you determine if you’re hitting your targets.
Average order value is an e-commerce performance metric that shows you the average dollar value of each order. To calculate your e-commerce site’s average order value, divide the total income by the number of sales in a specific period.
For instance, your e-commerce site sells $100 to 5 customers every hour. Your average order value is $20 per hour (100 / 5 = 20).
This e-commerce performance metric allows you to determine a customer’s long-term value. This e-commerce metric can be used to view past and future customer value.
For example:
To project customer lifetime value, multiply the customer’s average order value by the number of orders and then by the number of months you want to project.
Consider this example:
A customer spends $10 per order on 5 orders per week. That’s $50 a week. If you want to know your customer’s lifetime value, multiply by four weeks. That’s $200. This e-commerce metric indicates that you make $200 if that customer purchases for four weeks.
This e-commerce KPI indicates how much it costs you to get a new customer. This e-commerce metric is fairly straightforward.
Let’s assume you spend $100 on ads every week.
You get 10 new customers in a week.
Your customer acquisition cost is $10 for every new customer (100 / 10 = 10).
Knowing your customer acquisition helps you determine how effective your advertising spend is. As a result, you may choose to increase or cut back based on your business’s overall performance.
This e-commerce metric is a biggie. Your e-commerce site’s cart abandonment tells you how many customers add items to their cart but don’t follow through on a purchase. Typical cart abandonment rates range between 60% to 80%.
To determine your cart abandonment rate, take the number of the total purchase and subtract them from the total number of carts created. Then, divide this number by the total number of carts (total # of carts – total sales = number of abandoned carts. Then, number of abandoned carts / total carts created).
Your cart abandonment can tell you much about your e-commerce site’s overall performance and areas to focus on.
For instance:
This e-commerce KPI tells you how many of your total customers are existing ones. Please remember that the 80/20 rule states that 80% of your sales come from 20% of your customers. This 20% are generally your returning customers.
To determine your returning customer rate:
Please remember that it’s always much cheaper to sell to existing customers than to get new ones!
Your e-commerce site’s bounce rate consists of the number of visitors you get in a specific period but then leave without doing anything on your site. Google Analytics can help you get this rate by checking out the “audience” section.
Please note that bounce rates typically range between 20% to 45%. Ideally, you want customers to stick around as long as possible. So, try your best to create an e-commerce site that entices customers to browse. Please remember that the longer customers stay, the more they buy.
The net promoter score is a technical term for the e-commerce metric that measures customer loyalty. You can use a survey to measure your e-commerce site’s net promoter score. Using a question such as, “On a scale of 1 to 10, how likely are you to tell your friends and family about us?”
In general, scores close to 10 indicate your customers are promoters. Scores under 6 mean your customers are detractors.
To calculate the net promoter score, subtract the number of detractors from the number of promoters. So, if you have 100 customers, where 90 are promoters and 10 are detractors, you have a net promoter score of 80%.
Your net promoter score can be a good way to determine if your customer loyalty tactics are working. If not, you can always improve ways to boost customer loyalty.
The click-through rate refers to the number of clicks you get on your advertising materials. For example, you send 100 emails to the subscribers on your mailing list. However, only 5 clicked on the link provided in the email. This means that your click-through rate is 5% (5 / 100 = 0.05 or 5%).
Please note that the click-through rate is an e-commerce metric that tracks links on emails, social media, and any other link you provide in your advertising campaigns.
Traffic source is a key e-commerce performance metric to track closely. Traffic source tells you where your customers are coming from. There are various traffic sources: web search (i.e., Google), direct links, social media, email, affiliate links, and video streaming (e.g., YouTube).
This e-commerce metric tells you where your customers find you. Also, it can help you determine where you need to focus your efforts to attract more customers.
If your e-commerce site runs on Shopify, you can check this information easily on your Shopify dashboard. Your traffic source is one of the e-commerce metrics for Shopify you can’t miss!
Like traffic source, the number of sessions by device type tells you from which devices your customers access your site. In general, there are two types of devices: desktop and mobile. Your Shopify analytics section tells you the session by device type.
This e-commerce metric for Shopify will help you focus your efforts on providing a great customer experience. For instance, if your customers predominantly access your site from mobile devices, you want to ensure that your e-commerce looks great on phones and tablets.
This e-commerce metric tells you the geographic location of your customers. This data is extremely important as it may reveal interesting insights about your store’s popularity.
Also, it can help you determine places you may want to focus your efforts on. You can find this data in your Shopify dashboard.
Your stock count is crucial in running your business. After all, the last thing you want is to run out of stock. You can include a stock counter function on Shopify to alert you whenever stock falls below a specific threshold and assist with inventory management.
Consequently, you can issue purchase orders to replenish your stock. Typically, alerts trigger at 25% and 15%. However, you may trigger alerts at higher thresholds (30% or more) if products are harder to source or take longer to ship.
This highly useful e-commerce metric tells you how many units you sell per specific period, such as hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annually. Knowing your average units sold can help you plan your stock counts.
For example, if your top product sells 10 units a day, 100 units should cover 10 days. If your product takes 2 days to arrive, you may want to set your stock alert at 20% to give you enough time to replenish your stock.
This e-commerce KPI is straightforward. Knowing which products sell the best enables you to determine where you make the most money. In particular, knowing your top-selling products helps you maximize your stock efficiency by loading up on products you know will sell. Furthermore, you can discount slow-sellers or eliminate them from your catalog.
To determine your top-selling products, look at your orders and stock counter. Shopify facilitates tracking this e-commerce metric. If done manually, you may need to go through orders and input them into a spreadsheet to visualize your top-sellers.
What’s a good list of e-commerce metrics without social media engagement? Social media engagement refers to the number of likes, subscriptions, clicks, views, and shares you get from your social media content.
In particular, your social media engagement rate is a measure of your marketing campaigns’ effectiveness.
You can track this e-commerce metric per hour, day, or week. For instance, you can track the number of views you get on YouTube videos per hour. Also, you can track the number of likes you get on a Facebook or Instagram post.
The refund rate is a biggie. This e-commerce KPI tells you the number of dissatisfied customers by the number of refunds you must issue.
To calculate the refund rate, take the number of refunds in a period and divide it by the total number of sales. For instance, if you issue ten refunds a month out of a total of 1,000 sales, you have a refund rate of 1% (10 / 1000 = 0.001).
Please note that a refund rate of over 1% is too high. The goal is to keep your refund rate as close to 0% as possible.
Lastly, we must consider your subscription rate. This e-commerce KPI measures the number of subscribers you get to your newsletter or mailing list out of the total number of visits you get in a period.
For instance, you get 1,000 visits per hour. You also get 100 new subscribers an hour. That’s a subscription rate of 10% (100 / 1,000 = 0.10 or 10%).
However, a more accurate calculation is the number of non-subscribers compared to the number of subscriptions. This specific e-commerce metric may be hard to track. Your Shopify analytics, however, can help you track unique visits. From there, you can calculate your subscription rate by looking at the number of new subscribers.
Your subscription rate is a good indicator of your e-commerce site’s attractiveness and engagement.
One of the most important KPIs on this list is AOV. If you’re looking to increase your store’s AOV, PickyStory has some amazing tools designed to help. With PickyStory, you can sell products in bundles and sets, making it easy for your customers to add more products to their orders.
Using e-commerce metrics and KPIs to track your online store’s performance is crucial. Knowing your top metrics will help you make savvy business decisions. With PickyStory, you have the winning combination in your hands. Use your e-commerce metrics to track performance, and use PickyStory to take your e-commerce site to the next level.
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