ARPU
Average Revenue Per User or Account — the average monthly or annual recurring revenue generated across all active customers.
What it shows
ARPU trends reveal whether the business is moving upmarket (rising ARPU) or acquiring smaller, lower-value customers (declining ARPU). Segmenting ARPU by cohort, channel, or acquisition period identifies where the most valuable customers originate.
Formula
ARPU = Total MRR (or ARR) ÷ Total Number of Active Customers. Calculate monthly or annually and track the trend over time. Segment by plan tier, industry, or geography for strategic insight.
Tracked in these industries
SaaS B2B
Subscription-based software sold to businesses. Long sales cycles, multi-stakeholder procurement, and recurring revenue tracked through ARR, NRR, and churn.
SaaS B2C
Subscription software sold directly to individuals. Self-serve, high volume, short cycles — revenue operations focused on activation, retention, and reducing involuntary churn.
E-commerce
Transaction-based retail across digital channels. Revenue tied to conversion rates, AOV, cart abandonment, and multi-channel attribution.
Media & Publishing
Ad revenue and subscription access. Operations balance CPM yield, subscriber growth, and content performance as revenue signals.
Marketplace & Two-Sided Platforms
Marketplace companies operate dual-sided revenue models — take rates on transactions plus optional SaaS subscriptions for sellers — requiring RevOps to instrument GMV, seller acquisition, buyer activation, and cohort-based retention with attribution models standard CRMs cannot support.