A Repeat Customer Insights customers was asking about how the cumulative orders in the Cohorts Report work:
Why doesn't the sum of month 1 to n on the cohort customers % match the nth month for the cumulative cohort %?
The percentages are based on how many unique customers have bought out of the whole cohort. It's like a tallying system. They are great to see how active customers are after their first purchase.
An example can make it easier:
Cohort 2021-03 has Jim, Michael, and Pam who first purchased in that month (March 2021).
- In April 2021, Jim and Michael bought again.
- In May, Jim bought again.
Percentage-wise each month would look like this (non-cumulative):
- April 66% of customers purchased (Jim and Michael)
- May 33% (only Jim)
Cumulative it would be:
- April 66% (so far Jim and Michael)
- May 66% (still only Jim and Michael. Even though Jim has bought again)
Pam has never bought again so that cohort won't reach 100% until she does. Once she does, it'll be 100% for the rest of time.
Another way of reading the Cohort percentage data is: "what percentage of customers have reordered in this month?"
The cumulative would then be read as: "what percentage of customers have reordered at least once by this month?"
Strategy-wise, a cohort with a 66% ordering rate means you should copy whatever you did to attract those customers. Re-run those ads, send those emails again, etc, do whatever you did so that new and existing customers get similar messages.
Eric Davis
Refine your automated marketing campaigns with better timing
When building any automated marketing campaign that sends messages over time, you need to know how long the campaign should be and how long to delay the messages. The Customer Purchase Latency metrics calculated by Repeat Customer Insights can help you figure out that timing.