Goal setting
How to set a success criterion with a customer, encode it in the product, and track both outcomes and usage so the renewal conversation has evidence behind it.
A pilot without a written goal is a demo that lasts 90 days. This page is the checklist of what to track, module by module.
No platform access before a written success criterion. It goes in the POC order, not in someone's notes. Every stalled pilot in the pipeline has the same root cause: nobody wrote down what it was supposed to prove.
What makes a usable goal
We know the current number. If we do not, capturing it is week one of the pilot, not an afterthought.
The change can plausibly be caused by us. "Revenue up 20%" fails. "Hours to produce the weekly report" passes.
One named person on the customer side agrees it is their number.
Measured at a specific date, not eventually.
Write it in one line:
"By [date], [metric] moves from [baseline] to [target], measured in [where], owned by [name]."
Pick one primary goal per module and at most two secondary. More than three and nothing gets attention. The ★ rows below are the usual primary candidates.
The checklists
Track everything in the module you sold. Ignore the modules you did not.
AI Designer
- Adaptations delivered per month against the agreed capprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Agency volume today
- Source:
- Library + delivery log
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Cycle time from brief to approved assetprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Agency turnaround, usually about a week
- Source:
- Activity screen
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Average iterations to approval
- Baseline:
- Capture in week 1
- Source:
- Activity screen, tracked automatically
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Time to approve, and count of delayed assets
- Baseline:
- Capture in week 1
- Source:
- Activity screen
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Share of campaigns localised in-platform rather than outsourced
- Baseline:
- 0% at start
- Source:
- Campaign list, manual tally
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Compliance flags caught before human review
- Baseline:
- n/a, new capability
- Source:
- Compliance Checker
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Assets pulled from Library by other teams or agencies
- Baseline:
- 0 at start
- Source:
- Library
- Cadence:
- Monthly
It is real but unmeasurable in 90 days, and it invites subjective argument at exactly the wrong moment. Measure throughput and cycle time; let quality show up in the approval-without-edit rate.
Brand Moderator
- Median response time from inbound to replyprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Their own SLA, and what they actually hit
- Source:
- Action History
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Coverage: share of inbound that gets any replyprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Usually well under half. Ask, do not assume
- Source:
- Review Queue vs total mentions
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Approval rate without edit on AI-drafted replies
- Baseline:
- Week 1 of shadow mode
- Source:
- Review Queue
- Cadence:
- Weekly, should climb
- Escalation accuracy: false positives such as appreciation creating tickets
- Baseline:
- Shadow-mode week
- Source:
- Action History + client feedback
- Cadence:
- Weekly in month 1
- Tickets created and correctly routed by category
- Baseline:
- Current ticket volume
- Source:
- Rules Engine + CRM
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Channels live vs channels in scope
- Baseline:
- Agreed channel list
- Source:
- Connectors
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Queue backlog at end of day
- Baseline:
- Week 1
- Source:
- Review Queue
- Cadence:
- Daily in month 1
Consumer Insights
- Share of category voice and category rankprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Captured at kickoff
- Source:
- Social, Share of Voice tab
- Cadence:
- Weekly, report monthly
- Net sentiment, overall and per channelprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Captured at kickoff
- Source:
- Social, Sentiment tab
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Time to answer a brand-health question
- Baseline:
- Often "we commission a study" or "wait for the monthly deck"
- Source:
- Ask the brand lead directly
- Cadence:
- At 30 / 60 / 90
- Sentiment on a named problem theme the brand is actively fixing
- Baseline:
- Kickoff
- Source:
- Social, Topics tab
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Topic spikes detected and explained before the brand noticed elsewhere
- Baseline:
- 0 at start
- Source:
- Social, Topics tab
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Sub-brand sentiment spread, best versus worst line
- Baseline:
- Kickoff
- Source:
- Sub-Brands
- Cadence:
- Monthly
AI Paid Media
Use the product's own Goals object for the first four. It supports CPA, CPC, cost per purchase, CTR, ROAS and purchase or lead volume, scoped to account, platform or campaign, and tracks each as on track, at risk or breached.
- Cost per qualified lead, or ROAS at the scope that mattersprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Their own reporting, reconciled first
- Source:
- Goals object
- Cadence:
- Continuous, reviewed weekly
- Hours per week the team spends assembling reportsprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Ask in discovery. Often the whole business case
- Source:
- Customer self-report
- Cadence:
- At 30 / 60 / 90
- Detection speed: days from a problem starting to someone noticing
- Baseline:
- Often around two weeks. Nobody is embarrassed, everyone is slow
- Source:
- Signals timestamps vs customer awareness
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Goal achievement rate month over month
- Baseline:
- Month 1
- Source:
- Goals screen, computed automatically
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Signals actioned versus signals raised
- Baseline:
- 0 at start
- Source:
- Signals + Tasks
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Spend reconciliation variance against their platform
- Baseline:
- Must be near zero before anything is shown to a stakeholder
- Source:
- Manual check
- Cadence:
- Weekly in month 1
5paisa found a material spend discrepancy against Google Ads for the same period. Until variance is near zero, no goal number from this module is safe to put in front of a stakeholder.
Reporting
- Manual reports eliminatedprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Count the decks rebuilt by hand today
- Source:
- Customer confirmation
- Cadence:
- At 30 / 60 / 90
- Scheduled alerts active versus reports savedprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- 0 active at start
- Source:
- Reports screen, "without alert" counter
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Deliveries confirmed as received, not just sent
- Baseline:
- First send
- Source:
- Alerts run history plus ask a recipient
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Recipients per report, and whether leadership is on it
- Baseline:
- Agreed distribution list
- Source:
- Alerts
- Cadence:
- Monthly
- Dashboards opened per week
- Baseline:
- Week 1
- Source:
- Usage
- Cadence:
- Weekly
Brand Brain (foundation, every deal)
- Graph built and signed off by the clientprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- n/a, binary
- Source:
- Sign-off record
- Cadence:
- Once, by end of week 2
- Sources connected and fresh, no stale feeds
- Baseline:
- Agreed source list
- Source:
- Sources screen freshness timestamps
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Calibration outputs accepted by the client against their own rulebook
- Baseline:
- First calibration run
- Source:
- Client review
- Cadence:
- Once, then on drift
- Skills created for rules the defaults keep missing
- Baseline:
- 0
- Source:
- Brand Brain, Skills
- Cadence:
- Monthly
Tasks (adoption signal, not a goal)
- Suggestions converted into owned tasks
- Baseline:
- 0 at start
- Source:
- Tasks
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Overdue count
- Baseline:
- Week 2
- Source:
- Tasks counters
- Cadence:
- Weekly, it is the standup number
Track usage, not just outcomes
Every usage metric below sits on the product analytics dashboard that PM and SA build by the end of month 1. CS reads it before the weekly call so the conversation starts from evidence rather than from asking the customer how it is going. See Process & Timeline.
Outcome goals tell you whether the pilot worked. Usage tells you whether it is going to. Usage moves first, so it is the earlier warning.
- Weekly active users against seats issuedprimary candidate
- Baseline:
- Seats issued in week 1
- Source:
- Admin
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Which surfaces get opened
- Baseline:
- Week 2
- Source:
- Usage
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Work created: briefs run, replies approved, dashboards built, reports saved
- Baseline:
- 0
- Source:
- Per module
- Cadence:
- Weekly
- Credit or usage consumption against the estimate
- Baseline:
- Estimate at kickoff
- Source:
- Credit balance and usage chart
- Cadence:
- Monthly
Goal metrics flat and usage falling. That is not a product problem yet, it is an adoption problem, and it is fixable in week three in a way it is not in week eleven.
Cadence
- Week 1Baselines captured and goals enteredSolution Architect
SA captures and encodes them in the product. CS agrees them with the customer in writing.
- WeeklyGoal status at the top of the callCustomer Success
CS runs the call, Product brings the numbers. Goals before features. A call that opens with the roadmap and runs out of time is how an account drifts.
- Day 30 / 60 / 90Formal checkpointCustomer Success
CS runs the room against the pilot plan. The economic buyer joins at day 90.
- OngoingAdoption watchedProduct
Product reads the analytics dashboard weekly and flags decline to CS. SA owns getting them enabled; Product owns whether it sticks.
Setting the goal on the sales call
Do not wait for onboarding. Ask in discovery: "What would you need to see to call a pilot successful?" and write the answer verbatim. Then reflect it back with structure:
"So the pilot succeeds if [their words], measured as [metric], moving from [baseline] to [target] by [date]. Is that fair, and is that the number your leadership will judge it on?"
That last clause matters. The metric the champion cares about and the metric their boss judges it on are frequently different, and finding that out at day 85 is too late.
See the pilot plan for what happens next, and Never Commit before agreeing to any goal that anchors commercials to a specific uplift.