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Most important metrics to you in 2026?

Forum|Forum|3 months ago
April 14, 2026
3 replies
60 views

Hi fellow community managers - I am wondering what your top metrics for reporting are in 2026 and how you are reporting on those to broader teams sitting in marketing or CX. My team is under marketing at a SaaS company. Our top measures of success have always been peer-to-peer answer rate and membership. Measured against the last two years, these numbers look bad because of how AI has affected us and we have shifted focus to centering value on engagement and community content, as well as prioritizing LLM visibility. For those who can relate, how are you measuring success in numbers these days and report on growth YoY or QoQ when things are always shifting?

analytics

revathimenon

Gainsight Community Manager

Hi @gabbyesposito

I can definitely relate to the AI statement.

What’s worked for us is balancing YoY and QoQ differently based on intent:

YoY → we still use this for a high-level narrative and long-term trends, especially for leadership reporting
QoQ → this is where we focus more closely to identify red flags, test changes, and drive quicker improvements

On the metrics side, we’re also evolving beyond volume and focusing more on value-driven signals, such as:

Monthly Active Customers (MAC %) for stickiness
Content creation (topics + replies) as a core health indicator
Answer rate %, but with more context (especially peer-to-peer vs employee responses)

One metric we’re starting to pay closer attention to is Time to First Response. It’s been a really useful early signal for both first-time user experience and overall perceived value. If responses are slow, engagement tends to drop off quickly.

We’re also framing metrics alongside context and narrative. For example, “If number of questions dipped, there is a possibility that this could be the result of the AI search engine surfacing answers better for repetitive questions,” which better reflects the shift in behaviour.

Curious to hear from others!

Where focus goes, energy flows.