User retention analytics funnel
Track cohorts from signup through returning users, segment by behavior.
Retention is the metric that matters: does your second user return? This template tracks the classic funnel: signup → first session → onboarding completion → day-1 return → week-1 engagement → month-1 retention. Each drop-off is a churn cohort with its own story. Users who never finish onboarding have a different problem than users who activate but never return — and your fix has to match the failure mode.
The bottom half segments retained users into power users, regulars, and at-risk. This segmentation is critical: "retention improved 5%" is meaningless until you know if power users are returning more often or if at-risk users are getting lassoed back. Real retention strategy means targeting the right cohort with the right nudge.
When to use this template
- Data analysis dashboards — build a Looker / Metabase dashboard with the same funnel, adding counts and percentages at each step so the team sees where to focus.
- Growth planning — each drop-off represents an optimization opportunity; map your 90-day roadmap by the biggest drops and their fix (improve onboarding, send day-1 nudge, add power-user features).
- Investor pitch decks — show the funnel stage-by-stage: "70% activate, 40% return day 1, 25% stay week 1, 15% month 1 — here's how each cohort improves as we ship."
How to adapt it
Customize the metrics and timelines to your product's actual usage patterns:
- Replace onboarding completion, day-1, and week-1 with the critical moments in your user journey — for Slack, it's first message; for Figma, it's first project created.
- Add feature-specific retention branches — instead of generic "week-1 retained," segment by "used collaboration" vs. "solo editing" to see which features sticky users most.
- Annotate each node with real cohort numbers — 1,000 signups → 700 activated → 280 day-1 retained — so the team internalizes the scale and prioritizes the biggest leak.
Visual edits regenerate clean Mermaid code, so you can iterate the funnel as your product changes and always export clean diagrams for your wiki.
Mermaid code
Copy it anywhere Mermaid is supported — GitHub, Notion, or your docs.
flowchart TD
A[Users signup] -->|Day 0| B[First session]
B --> C{Complete onboarding?}
C -->|Yes| D[Activated users]
C -->|No| E[Churn: never engaged]
D -->|Day 1| F{Open app next day?}
F -->|Yes| G[Day 1 retention]
F -->|No| H[Churn: one-time user]
G -->|Day 7| I{Using feature 2x+?}
I -->|Yes| J[Week 1 retained]
I -->|No| K[Churn: low engagement]
J -->|Day 30| L{Active past month?}
L -->|Yes| M[Month 1 retained]
L -->|No| N[Churn: seasonal/lapsed]
M --> O[Analyze retained segment]
O -->|High frequency| P[Power users]
O -->|Medium frequency| Q[Regular users]
O -->|Low frequency| R[At-risk users]
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