What should our omnichannel scorecard look like? What key metrics should be included? What metrics are we missing?

These are some of the questions I often get from retailers.

Retail performance dashboards will most certainly include touchpoint-focused, point-in-time metrics such as online conversion rates. These are valuable measures, but conversion rates alone do not give a complete and accurate picture of overall retail performance.

We are in a world where digital touchpoints are influencing store sales and providing extended aisle sales in-store. Retailers are struggling to keep track of customers interacting, in different ways, across multiple digital and physical touchpoints throughout the customer lifecycle. And at the same time, retailers must realign incentives and goals internally, as teams, functions, and systems must work together in different ways to support new customer outcomes and experiences.

To really understand their performance, retailers need to extend their measurement over time, adding longer-term metrics like customer lifetime value to their performance dashboards. Our latest report outlines how retail metrics and measurement must evolve to continue to provide an accurate view of retail performance. Key takeaways from this latest report include:

Take metrics beyond conversion to encompass omnichannel performance. Changes to the traditional retail business model mean you must also change your objectives and definitions of success — and the metrics you use to measure both.

Declutter your metrics dashboards. Take inspiration from Marie Kondo, and ask whether your metrics spark . . . action. Replace metrics that don’t with those that do.

Include long-term, customer-focused, and predictive metrics. Retailers still tend to focus on channel-specific short-term metrics such as channel conversion rather than longer-term indicators like customer lifetime value. Instead, find and monitor metrics that help you predict long-term business health.