Breadth and Depth in Adoption

Adoption. 

The metric CS departments of all shapes and sizes prioritize.

In fact, in a recent poll of Customer Success teams, adoption was listed as a primary KPI right behind dollar based net retention, and gross retention.

Makes sense. 

If users don't use the licenses they purchased, why should they renew those same licenses 12, 24, or 36 months later? 

But, not all adoption is equal.

Adoption comes in two flavors: Breadth and Depth. And ideally, your CS department is focusing on increasing both. 

Let’s dive in.

Breadth of adoption speaks to how widely your platform is adopted across the user base of your customer. In other words, of the licenses purchased, how many of those licenses are assigned and actively using. The breadth measure of success may be something like Monthly Active Users (MAUs), Weekly Active Users (WAUs), or Daily Active Users (DAUs) depending on your platform. For customer success teams that are consumption based, that measure of success might look like # API calls (Twilio), # emails sent (Sendgrid), or Compute Time (Snowflake). Across the industry, when we reference 'adoption' the breadth measure is typically what’s referenced. Adoption breadth is absolutely critical as a value-proxy for customers. If users aren't using your software - are they receiving any value? 

Let’s dive into breadth in more detail.

Consider the following scenario: 

Takeaways from Customer A: 

MAUs for Company A have increased month over month for 6 straight months. And in 6 months alone, the customer is nearly at their licensed user total (25 MAUs / 30 Licensed). At first glance, based on MAUs alone, this customer's adoption is strong. But let's dig into other usage metrics (Minutes in application and Integrations). You'll notice that the minutes spent in Company A’s application have dropped considerably after the first month. The Minutes per MAU Ratio (Minutes / MAUs) has dropped from 60 Mins per MAU to 6.4 mins per MAU. Further, only one integration has been added over the course of 6 months. 

Breadth adoption is strong with MAUs growing Month over Month (MoM) and the customer has added one integration to the application. The customer has 83% license utilization (25 MAUs / 30 Licensed Users) -- brilliant! Focusing on the breadth of adoption alone, this customer is progressing well. They've brought on new users showcasing your team's ability to onboard new users to the platform. However, consider the minutes in application measure, and number of integrations. While breadth is growing with new users MoM, the depth of usage is extremely weak. 

This is where the depth measure of adoption comes in. Depth measures sticky components of your platform. In tandem with the breadth measure of success, the two can work together to give a holistic view of your customer's use and stickiness of your platform.  

Now let's consider Customer B: 

Takeaways from Customer B: 

MAUs have increased, albeit much more modestly. In 6 months, the customer is far from their licensed user total (9 MAUs / 30 Licensed). At first glance on MAUs alone, this customer's adoption is poor. But digging into other usage metrics (Minutes in application and integrations). You'll notice that the minutes spent in Company B’s application are nearly 19x higher in June than Customer A. The Minutes per MAU Ratio (Minutes / MAUs) is 55x higher in June. Further, 6 integrations have been added to the platform over the course of 6 months. 

Breadth adoption is growing slowly. The customer only has 30% license utilization (9 MAUs / 30 Licensed Users) in 6 months. Focusing on the breadth of adoption alone, this customer is increasing, though slowly. However, consider the depth metrics: minutes in application and number of integrations. Each are increasing month over month with measurably higher engagement from the 9 MAUs relative to Customer A. This customer's adoption depth is quite strong. This is a sticky use-case of Company B’s application. 

If I were to put my money on which customer would renew. My money is on Customer B. 

While adoption Breadth is instituted as a common metric across Customer Success, Depth of usage can't be overlooked. Having a large number of fringe users who rarely login is a much weaker renewal position than customers that are deeply integrated into your customer's workflows. 

How are you helping your customers and your CSMs drive both Breadth and Depth of adoption?

If you want to play around with the spreadsheet where this model was created, take a look right here, and as always, if you have feedback, we’d love to hear from you.

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