Cohort analysis
Cohort analysis groups customers by a shared starting characteristic, usually acquisition month, and follows each group over time. It separates changes in customer quality from changes in company performance, which blended metrics permanently confuse.
Why it matters for ARPU
Blended ARPU can rise while every individual cohort worsens. Cohorts are the minimum rigour required before claiming a growth programme worked.
Related terms
Retention curveA retention curve plots the share of a cohort still active against time since acquisition.ARPUARPU, average revenue per user, is total revenue in a period divided by the average number of active users in that period.Net revenue retentionNet revenue retention measures revenue from an existing cohort at the end of a period against its revenue at the start, including upgrades, downgrades and churn, but excluding new customers.IncrementalityIncrementality is the portion of an outcome that would not have happened without the action.