One Metric That Matters

One Metric That Matters (OMTM) is a focused, singular metric that a team prioritises to evaluate the success of a specific project, experiment, or stage of development. It is widely used in both Design Thinking and Growth Hacking to ensure clarity, alignment, and actionable results while avoiding distraction from less critical data points.

In Design Thinking:

• Guiding Design Decisions: In the Testing stage, OMTM helps teams focus on a key outcome, such as task completion rate or user satisfaction score, to evaluate the effectiveness of a prototype or design iteration.
• Aligning with User Goals: The selected metric reflects the primary value the solution aims to deliver to users, ensuring that design efforts are user-centred and impactful.
• Driving Iteration: By concentrating on a single, measurable goal, teams can make targeted improvements based on feedback and results, refining the solution to better meet user needs.

In Growth Hacking:

• Optimising Experiments: Growth teams use OMTM to measure the success of campaigns or strategies, such as conversion rates, retention rates, or customer acquisition costs, providing a clear focus for iterative testing.
• Prioritising Efforts: OMTM helps growth hackers prioritise actions that contribute directly to the chosen metric, ensuring efficient use of resources and maximising impact.
• Aligning Teams: By focusing on a single metric, all stakeholders remain aligned on the same objective, fostering collaboration and minimising conflicting priorities.

Examples of Application:

• In Design Thinking: Choosing “percentage of users completing a specific task without assistance” as the OMTM for a prototype of an e-commerce checkout flow, ensuring usability improvements are prioritised.
• In Growth Hacking: Using “monthly active users” as the OMTM for a social media app, driving experiments aimed at increasing engagement and retention.

The concept of One Metric That Matters ensures that teams in both Design Thinking and Growth Hacking maintain focus on what is most important at any given stage. By prioritising a single, meaningful metric, teams can streamline decision-making, enhance alignment, and achieve more targeted and effective results.