UX Metrics and ROI (HEART/SUS/NPS… Metric System + Methods to Convert UX Value into Monetary Terms + Reporting Talking Points)
Highlights from Will's Design Notes *UX Metrics and ROI* (based on the NN/g research report of the same name + a 5-edition case library). It focuses on the three things PMs need most: ① Metric system checklist — what each UX metric (task completion rate / time on task / success rate / conversion rate / retention / CLV / bounce rate…) looks like, how to calculate it, when to use it, and what its limitations are; how to interpret standardized questionnaires SUS (System Usability Scale, full score 100), NPS (Net Promoter Score = %Promoters − %Detractors), and CSAT; the five dimensions of Google's HEART framework (Happiness / Engagement / Adoption / Retention / Task success) as a scaffold for metric selection; what questions each of the four major data sources (surveys / quantitative usability testing / analytics tools / customer service and marketing data) answers. ② UX→ROI conversion methodology — improvement score formula (positive metric = post-change ÷ pre-change − 1; negative metric = pre-change ÷ post-change − 1), three-step method (select KPI → convert UX metrics to KPI by unit → report responsibly), how to convert to monetary value for four types of business models (e-commerce by sales volume / content sites by PV-based advertising / intranets by person-day wages / sites with clear target actions by conversion × average order value), retaining all exact figures including health insurance site saving 1.5 million yuan/year, HR tool saving $6,112 per month / 60% of work hours, financial subscription trial increasing monthly revenue by $20,000 from 76 to 187, and intranet ROI reaching 8/20/50 times the cost for companies with 1,000/10,000/100,000 employees; also presents Athenahealth's chained correlation model of "usability → satisfaction → willingness to recommend → retention and paid referrals", teaching PMs to connect soft metrics to revenue KPIs using statistical correlation. ③ Expectation management and reporting talking points — the "narrowing improvement" pattern that UX redesigns deliver an average 75% lift (95% confidence interval 8%~104%), and that this figure shrank from 247% to 75% from 2006 to 2020 (p=0.017), broken down by metric category (effectiveness 131% / efficiency 104% / adoption & retention 93% / engagement 87% / satisfaction 19%); 5 iron rules for reporting to bosses (estimates are not financial reports / compare against R&D costs / tell stories instead of piling tables / be transparent about assumptions / extend the timeline to 2–5 years) plus counterexamples. It complements *nngroup-analytics-metrics*: that piece covers NN/g's "analytics and measurement perspective" (vanity metrics / confidence intervals / statistical significance / sampling / triangulation / four-step ROI principle), while this piece is a "complete metric system checklist + improvement score math + multi-business-model ROI conversion recipes + empirical baseline magnitude data + reporting talking points"; overlapping content (four-step ROI / HEART / confidence intervals) is only cross-referenced and not rewritten. Target audience: product managers.