What are product performance benchmarks?

Product performance benchmarks (also referred to as product benchmarks) are the reference points used for comparing your product to others. As in other spheres of comparison, percentiles are often used to describe how well (or how poorly) your product is performing in particular KPIs relative to products of similar size and vertical.

If you’re looking to compare your product’s performance, here are the most up-to-date product benchmarks. This is a form of external benchmarking—rather than internal benchmarking, which is when a company compares performance to its own past performance.

Why are product performance benchmarks important?

In order for product measurement to be useful, there needs to be meaning behind the numbers. By comparing performance to industry standards, a company can better understand relative performance, including where they have a competitive advantage as well as any areas for improvement. For example, the team at Oranj used Pendo’s product benchmarks to see how they stacked up against their peers for app retention, realized that they had room to improve, and set out to increase retention rates.

It’s also beneficial for companies to benchmark their performance against themselves, which, as mentioned above, is called internal benchmarking. This can be particularly useful for Net Promoter Score (NPS), since tracking NPS over time can help you understand how product updates and improvements impact customer satisfaction.

How should I use product performance benchmarks?

Ultimately, product performance benchmarks exist so that companies can identify ways to make their products better. Benchmarking is a key part of the continuous improvement cycle, which includes measurement, comparing results to competition, and identifying opportunities for improvement. Before a company can reap the benefits of product benchmarks, the product organization needs to ensure it’s effectively capturing product data and measuring the right things.

Which metrics matter for product performance benchmarks?

Product performance benchmarks can be used for a variety of different metrics, but four of the most common are:

• Stickiness: an engagement metric that measures how many users return to the product on a regular basis
• Feature adoption: a measurement of usage for a product’s particular features
• App retention: the number of users who continue using a product during a given period of time
• Account-level NPS: a measurement of how likely customers are to recommend a product or service at the account level (rather than the individual user level)

Where can I find product performance benchmarks?

Pendo established product performance benchmarks for low (25th percentile), average (50th percentile), good (75 percentile), and best-in-class (90th percentile) performance, with three different segments based on company size. You can also download a set of custom slides, which can be used to showcase your own product’s performance against the benchmarks.