What KPIs should track intangible asset health?

Short Answer

Key intangible asset KPIs include net revenue retention, brand NPS, patent portfolio strength, employee retention, R&D intensity, customer concentration, and data asset growth rate.

Full Explanation

Tracking intangible asset health requires metrics that serve as leading indicators of future financial performance. The most important KPIs by asset category are as follows. Customer capital: net revenue retention (NRR) measures whether existing customers grow or shrink — above 100% indicates expansion without new sales. Customer lifetime value to acquisition cost ratio (LTV:CAC) should exceed 3:1 for healthy unit economics. Logo churn rate tracks customer loss at the account level. Brand capital: Net Promoter Score (NPS) measures customer willingness to recommend, correlating with organic growth. Brand search volume (the number of people searching for your brand name) indicates awareness trajectory. Share of voice measures your brand mentions relative to competitors. Technology capital: R&D intensity (R&D spend as % of revenue) indicates investment in future capability. Patent grant rate and citation index measure IP portfolio quality. Technology debt ratio (time spent on maintenance vs new development) signals platform health. Human capital: voluntary turnover rate (especially for key roles) predicts capability loss. Revenue per employee measures workforce productivity. Time to full productivity for new hires indicates organisational capital quality. Data capital: proprietary data volume growth rate, data freshness (% of data less than 12 months old), and AI model accuracy trends. Companies should select 10-15 KPIs from these categories based on their business model and review them quarterly alongside financial metrics.

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