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product metrics decision-making analytics systems
A product metric should explain a decision
If a metric does not help you decide what to build, fix, or investigate, it is probably noise.
A lot of product teams collect more metrics than they know what to do with. Dashboards get filled with numbers, charts and trends, but not every metric is useful.
A simple way to evaluate a metric is to ask: what decision does this help me make?
A useful metric should reduce ambiguity. It should help you decide what to build, what to fix, what to investigate or what to ignore. Without that, it is just information without direction. Just because something can be measured does not mean it matters.Good metrics track user behaviour and shape product decisions.