The Stat that Matters Most

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What stats you might track

• Numbers
  • Downloads
  • Subscriptions
  • Website traffic
  • Ratings and reviews
  • Ranking
• Engagement
  • Feedback
  • Shares
  • Ratings and reviews
• Money
  • Donations
  • Affiliates
  • Sales
  • Services
• Intangibles
  • Relationships
  • Opportunities

So what matters most?

The most important stat is the one that measures your progress toward your goal.

But one stat is usually the catalyst for another. For example, a measurable progress for growing your audience is downloads per episode. But the catalyst might be in shares and feedback.

Or if you want to increase the money you raise, the catalyst may be in improving your relationships.

Every step of progress has a catalyst, you only need to find it.

How to know what’s working

Stats have a far greater purpose than show raw numbers. They can also be used to see which actions are moving you closer to or farther from your goal.

Let’s take income for example. You might look at your finances and see that you made a certain amount of money in a month. But you need to know where that money came from and where it didn’t.

Some raw stats can be filtered and better understood. But sometimes, you need more preparation to enable better filtering.

Going back to the income example, many affiliates will allow you to setup separate variables (usually “sites,” “IDs,” or “campaigns”) that give you different links. Then, you would know exactly where the income comes from.

Similarly with social-sharing tools, you can add Google Analytics tracker codes to certain things to see who is coming in from those particular links.

Don’t get obsessive with any of this. Setup to measure what is actually important, not simply what’s possible to see.