A one-page dashboard with nine KPIs is all a fractional CMO needs to brief the board, steer weekly sprints, and prove impact. Pair each leading signal with a lagging result, wire alerts to Slack, and you will spot problems before they cost pipeline.
1.Why Weekly Beats Monthly
- Speed – Early-stage bets live or die within two to four weeks.
- Signal control – Clean numbers each Monday calm investors and end Friday fire drills.
- Focus – A short list forces the team to chase outcomes, not vanity stats.
2.The Core Nine
| Growth Pillar | Leading Indicator (Weekly) | Lagging Indicator (Quarterly) | Why the Board Cares |
| Demand Gen | MQL growth % | Pipeline source mix | Shows top-funnel momentum and channel balance |
| Pipeline | New SQLs vs. target | SQL-to-close rate | Flags cracks before revenue slips |
| Revenue Efficiency | CAC payback trend | Gross margin % | Tests if spend scales profitably |
| Retention | 30-day churn warnings | Net revenue retention | Protects ARR from leaks |
| Expansion | Product-qualified leads | Expansion ARR closed | Ties PLG motion to upsell dollars |
| Velocity | Rolling sales-cycle days | Average contract value | Confirms cycle compression pays off |
| Brand Reach | Branded search sessions | Share of voice | Connects awareness to moat building |
| Ops Hygiene | CRM error rate | Forecast accuracy | Gives the board confidence in data |
| Cash Stewardship | Spend vs. plan % | ROMI | Proves capital efficiency |
Rule: If a metric cannot trigger an action this week, drop it.
3.Thresholds & Alerts
| Status | Threshold | Automatic Action |
| Green | Within ±5 % of plan | Stay the course |
| Yellow | 6–15 % off plan | Slack alert, discuss in stand-up |
| Red | >15 % off plan | Pause experiment, shift resources |
Objective bands build trust faster than optimistic narratives.
4.Building the One-Pager
- Data pipes – Push HubSpot, Salesforce, and product analytics to BigQuery or Snowflake.
- Visualization – Free Looker Studio works; upgrade to Tableau or Grafana for deep slicing.
- Layout
- Top row: four leading indicators as sparklines.
- Middle row: four lagging indicators with MoM deltas.
- Bottom row: cash panel plus 100-character notes column.
- Distribution – Auto-export PDF every Monday 08:00 Israel time to the board alias.
- Top row: four leading indicators as sparklines.
5.Automation Quick-Start
| Need | Low-Lift | Pro |
| ETL | Google Sheets AppScript pulls | Fivetran + dbt |
| Alerts | Slack webhook | PagerDuty for red metrics |
| Versioning | Weekly Drive snapshot | Git-based Cube.js models |
Automate first mile (collection) and last mile (alerting); manual effort stays under four hours a week.
6.Five Common Pitfalls
- Metric creep – Keep it to nine.
- Stale formulas – Review definitions each quarter.
- Tool hopping – Own the end-to-end pipeline to cut errors.
- Narrative gaps – Add one-line context per KPI. Numbers alone do not persuade.
- Vanity greenwalls – Celebrate red flags; they save quarters.
7.14-Day Roll-Out Plan
| Day | Task |
| 1 | Finalize KPI list and formulas with CEO and CFO |
| 2-5 | Connect CRM, MA, and product data sources |
| 6-10 | Build Looker Studio template |
| 11 | Backfill four weeks for baseline lines |
| 12 | Test Slack triggers in sandbox |
| 13 | Dry-run board brief with dummy data |
| 14 | Go live and send first Monday PDF |
Key Takeaways
- Nine metrics tell the full story without drowning busy directors.
- Weekly leading data lets you fix issues before they surface in revenue.
- Automate collection and alerts so your time goes to actions, not spreadsheets.
Ready to deploy? Talk to us!
