For two years our marketing targeted the profile of customers who signed up most frequently. Made intuitive sense. Who's converting? More of those people please.
The problem was that our highest-converting segment also had our highest churn. They signed up easily because the product looked relevant to their needs, but the actual fit wasn't deep enough to retain them beyond a few months. We were efficiently acquiring customers who would leave.
The shift was analyzing retention instead of conversion. Which customers stayed longest? Which expanded their usage over time? Which referred others? A different profile emerged entirely. Smaller companies in a specific niche with a specific use case that we served exceptionally well. They signed up less frequently because our marketing wasn't speaking directly to them but when they did find us they almost never left.
Repositioned everything around this retained segment. Changed the messaging, the landing page, the onboarding flow, all optimized for the customer who stays rather than the customer who converts. Short-term signups declined because we narrowed the funnel. Medium-term revenue grew because the people coming through were fundamentally better fits who stayed longer and paid more over time.
The customer who signs up isn't necessarily your customer. The customer who stays is. Optimizing for conversion without looking at what happens after conversion is a great way to build an expensive treadmill.