There is a moment on your journey as entrepreneur that intuition is not enough anymore. You need to follow methods and track metrics to help you realize some pitfalls you are not able to see with your feelings.

According to recent research made by Business Wire with SMBs, 70 percent the respondents stated that they don’t have insight into their company’s performance daily.

“Most companies aren’t defining their most important metrics and even if they are, they’re not monitoring them in real-time. However, the data clearly shows that companies who measure and monitor their performance against goals can improve performance and grow more quickly. Sharing key metrics in real-time with all employees ensures everyone is focused on working towards the same goals.” said Geckoboard CEO and Co-founder Paul Joyce.

The reason why keep metrics on track is so important for your business is because the world moves way faster than 10 years ago, which requires us to have faster and more assertive decisions. Without fresh and clear information, the chances to make the right decision is not high.

Antoine Colaço, the founder of Google’s office in Latin America once told on an interview: “One of the reasons that made Google a successful company was because we were very metrics-based”.

According to the Geckoboard survey, while tracking metrics is crucial, it is not enough on its own. Business leaders must also make that information available to the entire team to motivate them towards achieving goals. Six percent of companies never share KPIs with their employees, despite citing that the most important factor contributing to business growth is every team member having clear objectives and the number two most important factor is every employee being aware of the key metrics which help the company grow.

To help you track the right metrics on your business, we’ve selected 3 tips for you:

• Set your KPIs

If you are a SMB, you need to map what are the KPIs of your organization. Conversions? Monthly or Annual Growth? Churn? The smaller is your company, the less are the amount of KPIs you need to set. Remember, in the beginning of the KPI journey, less is always more!

• Follow your metrics weekly

For many pragmatical entrepreneurs, track monthly KPIs is ok. But not for the ones who are beginning the KPI journey. In most cases, one month is too far to see what is going on with your organization. Here, discipline is the key word.

• Don’t forget the action plan

In the PDCA model created by William Edwards Deming there is a cycle with 4 steps: Plan-Do-Check-Act. Considering that you are going to plan, set your KPIs and review them weekly, you need to follow this review with an action plan, which will be extremely important to adjust the route and keep your business growing. And don’t forget to share if not build the action plan with your team.