Define the destination before choosing the instrument

Before choosing which metrics to track or which tools to use, you need to know where you want to go. The instrument only makes sense in relation to the destination.

This is obvious in investing: no serious financial advisor would suggest buying bonds or equities before understanding your time horizon, risk tolerance, and liquidity needs. The instrument follows the goal, never the other way around.

The same applies to e-commerce retention. Optimizing churn rate or CRR without a prior objective is just noise. Do you want to increase purchase frequency? Raise AOV? Reduce early churn? Each answer points to different metrics, different levers, different actions. Picking the metric first is like choosing a vehicle before knowing if you’re crossing a desert or a river.

The mistake is seductive because metrics feel like clarity. A dashboard full of numbers gives the illusion of direction. But measuring the wrong thing with precision is not progress — it’s a distraction with good formatting.

And if you do pick the wrong destination? You risk falling into Goodhart’s Law: once a metric becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure. You’ll optimize perfectly for the wrong thing.