Units per invoice

It is an early sign of what existing customers are doing. A customer who grows from ten seats to fifty pushes the average up without any new logo being won. The change appears here before it reaches revenue, so a rising number says accounts are expanding and a falling one says they are quietly contracting towards churn.

It is also an honest test of an upsell motion. If a company runs expansion campaigns and this number stays flat, the campaigns are not working, however many conversations took place. Combined with unit price, it fixes the value of each invoice, so lifting either one grows revenue without a new customer.

• Track the trend monthly rather than reading a single snapshot.
• Break it down by segment, account age and product line to see where volume is rising.
• Set an alert for when an account nears its limit, so an expansion conversation starts before the customer asks.
• Bundle related items where it suits the customer, instead of selling every item as a separate line.
• Offer volume pricing that rewards a larger purchase.
• Read it next to Avg. Unit price. A rise in units with a fall in price can mean discounts, not growth.

Units per invoice is the total number of units billed in a period divided by the number of invoices that carried them. It tells you the average volume on each bill.

A "unit" is whatever you sell: seats, licences, hours, items or credits. Say a software company issued 40 invoices last month covering 600 seats. Units per invoice is 15.

It is a measure of account size and growth, not a goal in itself. A rising figure usually means existing customers are buying more, while a falling one can mean accounts are shrinking or that new, smaller customers are joining. Read it together with the number of invoices and the price per unit.

• Mixing different kinds of unit in one average, such as seats and hours.
• Counting one big customer's invoices so heavily that it hides the rest.