Four numbers, three explanations and one decision, all on one page. Leadership doesn't need to see everything you track. They want to know if things are going well, why, and what you need from them.
The benchmark
The four numbers are revenue, revenue per visit, contribution margin and the share of revenue that comes from a first purchase.
Together, they answer the questions leadership asks anyway: How much did we sell? Does the site sell better with each visit? What's left once the order is paid? And are we still attracting new people, or living off our existing base?
Each one comes with two comparisons: the target and the same month last year. The previous month misleads you as soon as a season or a promotion falls in between.
The rule
Each number gets a one-line explanation, and the report ends with a request, whether that's a call to make or a budget to approve. If you have nothing to ask for this month, say so.
The steps
- The gaps. The four numbers open the page, each with its gap to target and to last year.
- The three events. What explains those gaps, pulled from the logbook, like a promotion moved up by a week or a stockout on the hero product.
- The measurement changes. Anything that changed how you count, written at the top of the page, before the numbers.
- The decision. What you need from them, with two or three options and the one you recommend.
- The appendix. The detail, for anyone who wants to dig in.
Step 3 looks administrative until the month it applies to you, and for many Shopify stores, that month is September 2026.
Between September 21 and 23, Shopify changed how it counts sessions (we covered it in another guide): a session no longer ends at midnight UTC, identified bots drop out of reports by default, and some visits with no page view now enter the count.
Revenue per visit is calculated on those sessions. So one of your four numbers changed definition mid-month without anyone on the team touching anything, even though orders and sales, Shopify says, are not affected.
If that line is missing at the top of the report, leadership will see a rise or a drop the site didn't produce.
A brand one of the authors works with, which also sells outside Europe, ran into the same confusion with its sales reports by country. One of its managers summed it up better than we could:
"The raw data is good, but you have to know how to display it well."
So your report needs to say which display you chose, and since when.
The template
Copy it, then rewrite it in your own words. The empty cells are for you to fill in each month. The measurement line stays until comparison with last year is possible again.
Measurement change: since September 21, Shopify counts sessions differently. Revenue per visit is not comparable with either August or September 2025.
| Metric | This month | Target | Same month, last year | Why, in one line |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | ||||
| Revenue per visit | See the measurement change | |||
| Contribution margin | ||||
| Share of revenue from first purchases |
The three events of the month: 1. … 2. … 3. …
"I need you to choose between A and B by the 15th. I recommend A, for this reason, and here's what B costs."
Appendix: link to the full dashboard.
The pitfall
Sending only good news. The day the month goes badly, you have no credibility left to explain it.
We know something about this. This year, the memo that launched the overhaul of our own leadership committee opened with "Almost all the Q1/2026 targets are in the red," and explained that projects were moving forward "without problems surfacing before it's too late."
The same memo acknowledged that the management system that could surface them didn't exist yet. We've built it since: a dashboard updated every week, visible to the whole team, where every metric has an owner and a target.
In early September, the review still flagged several metrics that hadn't been updated, which at least proves the page is useful.
A report that says "conversion dropped, here's why, here's what I propose" builds more trust than six months of green curves.
