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Writer's pictureSerena Andrioli

The Definition of North Star Metrics

How to set-up clear goals and massively improve the efficiency and happiness of your team.

The metrics that define success create incentives influencing team's behavior and set priorities. When metrics are poorly defined, chaos reigns within the team: misalignments and mismanagement of the resources might occur.

The North Star Metrics are the most important metrics that measure the success of a multi-channel strategy. It depends on the size and scope of the team, some teams have only one north star metric, other teams they have multiple ones.


Defining the right north star metrics is a pivotal foundation for a solid multi-channel marketing strategy. Even if you are not responsible for deciding the north star metrics, you need to be able to influence the leaders who make that decision. Please push back if you fear that the metric doesn't represent the right outcomes.


Why are north star metrics so vital?

1. These metrics measure the outcomes we need to drive to ensure growth by leveraging the mix of channels. Powerful strategies begin with the end in mind, rather than starting with the inputs we have available. Depending on the “end” that we’re working towards, we’ll make different choices on how to use our combination of channels.


2. These metrics go straight to the point, they provide the team with enough clarity to evaluate tradeoffs between initiatives or channels. Metrics are most valuable when they are specific enough to inform prioritization. When this clarity is missing, our north stars can seem aspirational becoming "big hairy audacious goals," or BHAGs. BHAGs are useful tools for building motivation around a long term initiative, but they don’t provide great direction for actually developing and running a multi-channel strategy.

This clarity is important for how you define strategy, but also critically important for showing the team how their work contributes to the goal.


Additionally north star metrics create incentives and feedback loops that align the efforts of each individual part of your multi-channel strategy with a high-level outcome. Your north star metrics define success. The metrics point teams in a specific direction, towards initiatives and ideas that move the metric, incentivizing prioritization that aligns with how you grow. With this clarity, they know which outcome is most important, and can evaluate how different initiatives contribute to moving that number. It incentivizes the behaviors you want to drive.


The north star metrics align our choices because they:

  • Measure the outcome we should ensure with the combination of our channels

  • Provide clarity to evaluate tradeoffs between initiatives or channels

  • Align the efforts of each individual part of your multi-channel strategy with a high-level outcome.




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