Business Context

FreshCart is a mobile grocery delivery app with 2.4M monthly active users. The company launched a redesigned home feed and faster checkout flow 6 weeks ago, and leadership now wants a clear framework for evaluating whether the product is truly successful beyond just top-line order volume.

Metric Scenario

In the last full month, FreshCart reported: 2.4M MAU, 620K weekly active purchasers, 410K first orders, 29% first-order-to-second-order conversion within 30 days, 18.5 orders per purchasing user per quarter, 90-day purchaser retention of 41%, average order value of $46, and NPS of 38. At the same time, app sessions per user rose 12%, but checkout conversion fell from 34% to 31%, and customer support contacts per 1,000 orders increased from 22 to 31. The GM asks: "What metrics should we use to evaluate product success, how should we prioritize them, and what trade-offs should we watch?"

Requirements

1. Define a primary product success metric for FreshCart and explain why it should be the north star.
2. Identify the supporting KPI set across acquisition, engagement, conversion, retention, and customer experience.
3. Explain how you would distinguish leading indicators from lagging indicators.
4. Describe how you would diagnose the rise in engagement but decline in checkout conversion.
5. Recommend guardrail metrics to ensure growth does not come at the expense of user experience or unit economics.

Data Available

• app_sessions: session_id, user_id, session_start, platform, traffic_source, pages_viewed
• checkout_funnel: user_id, cart_id, checkout_started_at, payment_submitted_at, order_completed_at, dropoff_step
• orders: order_id, user_id, order_timestamp, basket_size, order_value, delivery_fee, refund_flag
• user_cohorts: user_id, signup_date, acquisition_channel, city, membership_tier
• support_tickets: ticket_id, order_id, issue_type, created_at, resolution_time
• nps_responses: user_id, response_date, score, free_text