Creating a layer cake cohort analysis
A layer cake cohort analysis in ChartMogul lets you visualize subscriber acquisition and retention by stacking monthly cohorts on top of each other over time. It's a useful way to spot trends in cohort strength. For example, whether certain months consistently produce more subscribers, or whether early cohorts are being retained as new ones are added. This tutorial walks through how to build one using the Subscribers report and ChartMogul's segmentation tools.
Before you begin
- Get familiar with ChartMogul’s reports.
- Learn how to work with filters and segmentation.
- Read about cohort analysis.
Comparing customer cohorts by month
Create a cohort analysis — a view that groups customers by when they subscribed — for all of 2023, broken down by month:
- Go to Subscribers.
- Create a segment for January 2023 using the filter Customer since - is within - 2023-01-01 to 2023-01-31.
- Click :save-report~gray: Save segment and name it January 2023.
- Repeat step 2 for each remaining month of 2023.
- Click the :stack~gray: Stack button, then the LINE button, to display the cohorts as a layer cake report.
The result should look like this.
How to read your layer cake report
In this example, we can observe:
- Variance in cohort strength: Some cohorts show a stronger initial acquisition volume — meaning more subscribers joined in that month than in others. This could be due to successful marketing campaigns, seasonality, or a changing product-market fit.
- Sustained acquisition and retention: All cohorts contribute consistently to subscriber growth and retention. This means the company keeps attracting new subscribers and holding on to them over time.
Next Steps
- Apply the same segments to the MRR report to check MRR retention for each cohort. Also review the account size of customers who cancel to narrow down churn causes.
- Compare the same cohorts by plan to see if a particular plan drives higher acquisition or churn. Use this to focus your sales and marketing efforts on your best-performing plan.
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