Vanity Metrics vs. Actionable Metrics

Reading up on what makes useful metrics, I ran across this quote:

“There’s nothing wrong with [tracking hits, unique visits, etc] per se, but at the end of the day, there are really only 2 measurements worth knowing:

• Did your prospects activate?
• Did your new users come back?”

(http://blog.500startups.com/2011/02/08/build-a-killer-product-faster-the…)

Some other useful articles on collecting actionable metrics:

• http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/05/19/vanity-metrics-vs-action…
• http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/12/why-vanity-metrics-are-dang…
• http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2010/02/entrepreneurs_beware_of_vanity_metrics.html