ADSSystem

CRM and Lifecycle glossary

In one line

106 terms from CRM and Lifecycle, each defined in a sentence or two, with a link to the calculator that works the number out where one exists.

A4
Abandoned Cart

Items left unpaid. The highest-return automated flow in most stores.

Acquisition Cohort

Everyone who arrived in the same period. The base unit of honest retention analysis.

Activation Rate

The share of new customers who reached first value.

Advocacy Rate

The share of customers who refer someone else.

B4
Back-in-Stock Flow

A message when a wanted item returns. Very high intent, very little effort.

Behavioral Segmentation

Grouping by what people did rather than who they are.

Behavioral Trigger

The specific action that fires it.

Browse Abandonment

Someone viewed products and left without adding anything.

C25
Campaign Cohort

Customers grouped by the campaign that won them.

Channel Cohort

Customers grouped by where they came from. Reveals which channel buys worse customers.

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Checkout Abandonment

Someone started paying and stopped.

Churn Prediction

Forecasting who is about to leave, usually from falling usage.

Churn Propensity

Likelihood of leaving.

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Churn Risk

How likely a given account is to go. Useful only if someone acts on it.

Click-to-Open Rate

Clicks divided by opens. More reliable than open rate, because it measures what happened after.

Cohort Segment

A group defined by when they joined.

Contact Policy

The rules governing how often and through which channels you may reach someone.

CRM

The system holding your customer records and the history of every interaction.

Cross-Sell Flow

A sequence offering adjacent products.

Cross-Sell Propensity

Likelihood of buying an adjacent product.

CTOR

Short for click-to-open rate.

Customer Activation

The moment they get that result. Weak activation shows up as churn months later.

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Customer Advocacy

Customers bringing other customers. The cheapest acquisition that exists.

Customer Churn

Customers leaving in a period.

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Customer Expansion

Growing revenue from an existing account.

Customer Health Score

A composite read on how likely an account is to stay and grow.

Customer Lifecycle

The whole arc from first contact to churn or advocacy.

Customer Lifecycle Value

Total gross profit across the whole relationship.

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Customer Onboarding

Getting a new customer to their first real result.

Customer Reactivation

Waking up someone dormant but not formally gone.

Customer Relationship Management

The full term, and the discipline as much as the software.

Customer Retention

Keeping customers rather than replacing them.

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Customer Win-Back

Bringing back someone who already left.

D1
Delivery Rate

The share of sends that reached a mailbox at all.

E3
Email Click Rate

Clicks divided by delivered.

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Email Open Rate

Opens divided by delivered. Badly inflated since privacy protection started prefetching images.

Engagement Score

How actively someone uses or interacts with you.

F4
First Purchase

The opening order. Usually the least profitable one after acquisition cost.

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First Value Event

The specific action that counts as having got value.

Frequency Optimization

Deciding how often to contact someone before it costs more than it earns.

Frequency Segment

A group defined by how often they buy.

G3
Global Suppression

A suppression list applied across every campaign, no exceptions.

Gross Retention

Retention before any expansion revenue is counted. Cannot exceed one hundred percent.

Gross Revenue Retention

Revenue kept from existing customers, ignoring expansion.

H1
Hard Bounce Rate

Permanent failures, usually dead addresses.

I2
Inbox Placement Rate

The share that landed in the inbox rather than spam. Different from delivery rate, and far more useful.

Intent Score

A read on how close someone is to a purchase decision.

L6
Lead Lifecycle

The path from raw contact to qualified opportunity.

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Lead Score

A ranking of how likely a lead is to buy.

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Lifecycle Segment

A group defined by which stage they are in.

Lifecycle Stage

Where someone sits in that arc right now.

Lifecycle Trigger

A trigger tied to a stage change rather than a single action.

Logo Retention

Retention counted in customers rather than money.

M1
Monetary Segment

A group defined by total spend.

N3
Net Retention

Retention including upgrades. Can exceed one hundred percent even while customers leave.

Next Best Action

The single most valuable thing to do with this customer right now.

Next Best Offer

The same idea applied to what to sell them.

O1
Onboarding Completion

The share who finished setup. Drop-off here predicts churn better than most health scores.

P12
Personalization

Changing content by who is looking. Effective when it uses real signals, irritating when it just inserts a first name.

Post-Purchase Flow

Messages after an order, covering delivery, use and the next purchase.

Price-Drop Flow

A message when a watched item gets cheaper.

Product Cohort

Customers grouped by what they first bought. Often the strongest predictor of lifetime value.

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Promotional Message

A message trying to sell something.

Propensity Score

A modelled probability of any given behaviour.

Prospect Lifecycle

The same, viewed from the sales side.

Purchase Interval

The typical gap between orders. Once you know it, you know when someone is late.

Purchase Propensity

Likelihood of buying in a defined window.

Push Click Rate

The share that produced a tap through to content.

Push Conversion Rate

The share that ended in the action you wanted.

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Push Open Rate

The share of push notifications opened.

R16
Reactivation Window

How long after the usual interval you treat someone as lapsed.

Recency Segment

A group defined by how long since they last acted.

Recommendation Engine

The system choosing what to show each person.

Referral Flow

Asking a customer to bring someone else.

Renewal Forecast

Projected renewal revenue for a period.

Renewal Probability

The odds a given contract renews, usually from health scoring.

Renewal Rate

The share of contracts up for renewal that renewed.

Renewal Revenue

Money from renewals rather than new business.

Repeat Purchase

Any order after the first.

Repeat Purchase Window

The period within which a repeat counts as normal rather than a reactivation.

Retention Cohort

The same group tracked forward to see who stayed.

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Retention Rate

The share still with you at the end of the period.

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Revenue Cohort

A cohort tracked by money rather than headcount.

Revenue Retention

Retention counted in money. Different answer whenever your largest accounts behave differently from your smallest.

Review Request Flow

Asking for a review at the point the customer is happiest.

RFM Segmentation

Grouping by recency, frequency and monetary value. Simple, and it beats most complicated models.

S7
Send Time Optimization

Choosing when to send per person rather than per campaign.

SMS Click Rate

Clicks divided by messages delivered.

SMS Opt-Out Rate

The share who stopped messages. Higher tolerance than email, and higher cost per lost contact.

Soft Bounce Rate

Temporary failures such as a full inbox.

Spam Complaint Rate

The share who marked it as spam. Above a fraction of a percent and deliverability starts falling.

Subscriber Lifecycle

The stages of an email or SMS subscriber, from signup to fatigue.

Suppression List

Contacts excluded from sending, whether opted out or already customers.

T5
Time to First Purchase

How long from signup or first visit to buying.

Time to Second Purchase

The gap that matters most, because the second order is where lifetime value starts.

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Time to Value

How long before a new customer gets something useful. Shorter is worth real money.

Transactional Message

A message triggered by an action such as an order confirmation. Different consent rules, and much higher engagement.

Triggered Message

Any message fired by behaviour rather than by schedule.

U4
Unique Open Rate

Opens counted once per person.

Unsubscribe Rate

The share who opted out. A cost of every send, and worth pricing.

Upsell Flow

A sequence offering a higher tier.

Upsell Propensity

Likelihood of taking a higher tier.

V1
Value Segmentation

Grouping by how much they are worth.

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W3
Welcome Flow

The first sequence after signup. Usually earns more per recipient than anything else you send.

Win-Back Flow

A sequence aimed at lapsed customers.

Win-Back Rate

The share of lapsed customers a campaign brought back.