Marketing & Sales Metrics

Churn

% of customers who cancel or stop subscribing in a period — one of the most important SaaS health metrics.

Two types: customer churn (% of customers who left) and revenue churn (% of revenue lost). Net revenue churn includes expansion (existing customers upgrading) — negative net churn means expansion exceeds churn.

Indian SaaS churn benchmarks: SMB-targeting SaaS 5-12% monthly. Mid-market 2-5%. Enterprise 0.5-2%. High churn signals product-market-fit or onboarding issues.

Churn is calculated: Customers lost in period / Customers at start of period. Annual churn = monthly churn × 12 (approximately). Cohort churn (per acquisition month) gives more accurate signal than blended.

India context

Indian SMB-targeting SaaS has high churn because SMBs themselves churn (close, scale down, change). Tracking SMB-causation churn (customer closed) vs product-causation churn (customer switched tools) separates the two narratives.

Examples

  • 100 customers, 5 leave in a month = 5% monthly churn = ~46% annual churn.
  • If 5 leave but 8 upgrade by ₹500 each = +₹4,000 expansion - ₹X churned MRR = potentially negative net churn.

FAQ

What's a good monthly churn rate?

SaaS targeting SMB: under 5% is good, 8-12% acceptable, above 15% problematic. Enterprise: under 1% is healthy.

Should I track churn by customer or by revenue?

Both. Customer churn reveals product issues. Revenue churn reveals account-management issues (high-MRR accounts leaving).

How do I reduce churn?

Onboarding (most impact), customer success outreach to at-risk accounts, in-product engagement loops, annual contracts with discount.

Related concepts

MRRLTVretentionexpansion revenuecohort

Doggu handles Churn compliance for you.

Whether it's automating the workflow above, Doggu was built specifically for the Indian SMB regulatory environment. One platform, all the requirements.

Try Doggu free for 14 days

Related glossary entries

PAN — Permanent Account Number — 10-character alphanumeric ID issued by Income Tax Department, used as universal taxpayer ID.LTV (Lifetime Value) — Total revenue (or profit) one customer generates over their entire relationship with the business.MRR (Monthly Recurring Revenue) — Predictable monthly revenue from subscriptions — the foundational metric for SaaS and any subscription business.

More in Marketing & Sales Metrics

CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost)LTV (Lifetime Value)ROAS (Return on Ad Spend)MRR (Monthly Recurring Revenue)AOV (Average Order Value)RTO (Return to Origin)GMV (Gross Merchandise Value)MQL (Marketing Qualified Lead)
← All glossary entriesBlogWhatsApp TemplatesFree tools