Retention
Winning an account is only the start. Retention shows how well your book holds on to accounts over time. It also shows which groups of accounts, by when they started, are still ordering.
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The Retention screen
| Part | What it shows / does |
|---|---|
| Repeat rate tile | The share of your accounts that have ordered more than once, with the count (for example, 5 of 6 ordered again). |
| Active last 90d tile | The share of your accounts that ordered in the last 90 days, with the count (for example, 4 of 6 accounts). |
| Avg orders / account tile | The average number of orders per account, over each account's lifetime. |
| Cohorts tile | How many cohorts there are, by first-order quarter. |
| Do they come back table | One row per cohort, oldest first: Cohort (a quarter, such as 2025 Q3), Accounts, Ordered again, Active last 90d and Lifetime spend. Ordered again and Active last 90d show a share and a bar. |
| Online orders only | A reminder that the figures only include storefront orders. Hover over it for details. |
| Download CSV | Saves the cohorts, with the counts and shares. |
The table shows 20 cohorts a page.
Check how well you keep accounts
- In Pulse, click Retention in the sidebar.
- Check Repeat rate and Active last 90d for your book as a whole.
- In Do they come back, compare Ordered again and Active last 90d across cohorts.
More detail
A recent cohort with a low Ordered again share is normal: those accounts haven't had time to reorder. An older cohort with a low Active last 90d share has accounts that have drifted away. To find them, go to Customers and filter by the Dormant or At risk segment, or check Reorder radar for accounts that have gone quiet.
How the figures are worked out
| Figure | How it's worked out |
|---|---|
| Cohort | The calendar quarter of the account's first order. |
| Repeat rate and Ordered again | Accounts with 2 or more orders, as a share of all accounts (in the cohort, for the table). |
| Active last 90d | Accounts whose last order was 90 days ago or less, as a share of all accounts (in the cohort, for the table). |
| Avg orders / account | All orders divided by the number of accounts, to 1 decimal place. |
| Lifetime spend | Everything the cohort's accounts have ordered, ever. |
Retention ignores the date range: it always uses every account's whole order history, as of today. The tiles count every account in your book, including accounts you've invited that haven't ordered yet. Those accounts have no first order, so they're in no cohort. Retention only uses orders placed through your storefront: see Where the figures come from.
FAQs
The tiles count every account in your book, including invited accounts that haven't ordered yet. Cohorts only include accounts that have ordered, because a cohort is the quarter of the first order.
Retention is about whether accounts come back over time, so it always uses each account's whole history, as of today. To see orders in a period, use Orders.
Inviting accounts lowers it until they order, because they count in the total but haven't ordered again. Orders taken by phone or email, or keyed into your ERP, aren't counted either.
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