Goals are a way to track the progress of your individual accounts or your whole book of business against target metrics for a period of time using the available data in Vitally. The success or failure of the Goal will be measured for the timeframe you've set up. For example, create a Goal to increase your NPS for a particular account to 10 by the end of the month, or if you'd like its health score to be above 7, or both!

Goals help you standardize Goal-setting across your teams and customers to accurately measure the effectiveness of your processes. Additionally, Goals+ unlocks advanced functionality to further enrich reporting and customer experiences. Leverage the insights of Goals to measure ROI, business impact, and more.

Goal templates are created and managed by admins in Settings. This section covers template setup. To view or set Goals for a specific account or organization, see Setting Goals and Goal Tracking below, or navigate directly to the Account or Organization 360 and select Goals from the left panel under Related Objects.

The Goals templates page in Settings includes a search bar. Type a template name to filter the list and find a specific template without scrolling.

Create a Goal template to easily set Goals for Accounts or Organizations without having to define each one from scratch.

These two settings behave differently when a metric crosses its threshold and then drops back before the end date:

While a Goal is In progress, individual conditions are not latched: a condition that was met can be marked unmet at a later evaluation. The Goal slideout’s Achieved when field shows which setting a Goal uses.

What properties are supported?

You can create conditions based on absolute or relative dates, allowing you to analyze time-based events and traits by how soon a date value is or how recent a date value was.

Is increased by and Is increased by (percent) measure against a baseline rather than an absolute target. Vitally captures the property’s current value the first time the condition is evaluated, which happens as soon as the Goal is created, and measures later values against that captured Start value. A value that is already high does not satisfy the increase on day one. The Goal shows the Start value, the current value and the calculated target, so a Start value of 100 with Is increased by 20 shows a target of 120. A condition added to a Goal that already exists takes its baseline at that point rather than from the Goal’s start date. Manually measured conditions do not offer these operators.

If the Start value is empty or 0, a percentage increase has no meaning, so Vitally treats Is increased by (percent) as “becomes greater than 0” and the configured percentage is not applied. The Goal shows the target as greater than 0, so any positive value meets the condition and a value that stays empty or 0 does not.

You can set a Goal manually, via automated Playbooks, or by asking Quin. Below, we go through steps on how to manually set Goals (whether for one customer or in bulk), how to set them via automated Playbooks, and how to have Quin draft one for you.

Each selected Account or Organization gets its own Goal, and a baseline condition such as Is increased by (percent) captures that record’s own Start value when its Goal is first evaluated. There is no single shared baseline taken from the template. Bulk creation is processed in batches, so each baseline is captured at its own Goal’s creation rather than at one identical moment for every record.

The key role is resolved when the Playbook creates the Goal, and the teammate holding it at that moment is saved as the Goal’s owner. Changing the key role on the Account afterwards does not reassign Goals that already exist; it only affects Goals the Playbook creates from that point on.

You can set, view, filter, and manage goals from Table Views in hubs, from the Account and Organization 360 pages, or from the Goal Template pages in settings.

Watch the video below to understand how to track goal performance with Views & Dashboards. Below this video, we go over all these a bit further:

This feature will allow you to collaborate more closely via docs, displaying goal progress along with any other relevant embeds. These docs can also be shared to external users, allowing them to also view goal progress!

Automate customer and team activities off Goal-based events via Automated Playbooks. For example, if a Goal's status is failed, you can trigger a Playbook to create a Project, Indicator, or even another Goal (more actions available). Check out our Automated Playbook documentation

Goal rules in a Playbook work at the level of the whole Goal. The available fields are Status (In progress, Achieved or Failed) and Goal Progress, which is the average of the current completion percentages of every condition. There is no rule for a single named condition, and because Goal Progress is an aggregate, a progress threshold cannot tell which condition moved it: any combination of conditions reaching the threshold matches. To trigger a Playbook off one specific condition, put that condition in a Goal of its own and trigger on that Goal’s status or progress.

Watch the video below to better understand how to assign goals via playbooks and how to create goal-triggered playbooks:

Goals+ is a set of premium features to take your Goals to the next level and showcase ROI to your business stakeholders and your customers.

Q: Can I set a goal based on Project or Task Status?

A: No. Goals are tied to Accounts & Organizations. You can, however, create a formula trait that filters for Status is Complete and Project/Task is X, then use that calculated trait in your Goal. Or use the project end date in your Goal!

Q: I don't see ARR increase or decrease as a possible parameter when creating a goal?

A: Once you select ARR, you can then select "increase by percent" in the second dropdown.

Q: Can I select a date rather than X number of days for a goal to be completed?

A: Not at this time. This is feedback we've heard and is on our Product Team's radar!

Q: Who can edit Goals (permission-wise)?

A: Admins and Leaders can create and edit Goal Templates or Goals set for Accounts/Organizations. Team members can only edit a Goal that they are setting for an Account (they can not edit Goals they did not set/do not own).

Q: Can I make Slack alerts for Goals?

A: Not at this time. Please see Slack documentation for all available alerts.

Q: What happens if I edit a goal template?

A: Those edits will not retroactively update already set Goals and only impact new Goals you set for Accounts or Organizations. Additionally, this won't change already captured data (i.e., if a Goal changes from increase to 10% to increase to 15% previous Goal instances* would still be considered achieved at 10%).

Q: Can I edit a Goal instance* that is in progress?

A: Once a Goal is set, you can edit the conditions of the Goal instance*. Reporting for any new metrics added will begin on the date they were added, but the start date of the goal will remain the same.

Additionally, the changes you've made will only apply to this goal instance and not the template it's based on (if applicable). By doing this, you may potentially impact the reporting of the template.

Q: Can I edit a Goal that's been achieved?

A: An achieved Goal is read only. Its conditions, its fields and its manually measured values cannot be edited, so to change what it measures you need to set a new Goal.

There is one exception. A Goal set to be achieved when all metrics are met on the end date can have its deadline extended to a later date by a teammate with permission to manage it. The Goal is recalculated and returns to In progress, even when its conditions are still met, because it is now waiting for the new end date. It can be achieved or failed again after that date. Extend deadline is not offered for a Goal set to be achieved as soon as all metrics are met before the end date.

Changing an underlying trait or metric does not reopen an achieved Goal on its own, and editing the Goal template it was created from does not change it either.

Q: Do Goals stop running if a customer churns?

A: No. Goals will continue to be calculated, even for churned customers. This can be helpful in a 'win-back' situation!

Q: Can a manually measured condition require a note or attachment before it is marked complete?

A: No. A manually measured condition takes a value only: a number, a true or false selection, or a configured single select value. Saving that value re-evaluates the Goal straight away, so it counts towards Goal Progress immediately. Vitally records the value, when it was set and who set it, but there is no field for a note or an attachment and nothing can be required before the value is saved.

*Goal Instance: the record created when the user sets a particular goal for a specific object (an account or organization) at a point in time.

*Condition: a definition of a measurement and a desired value (absolute or relative); individual measurements that make up the desired state defined by the goal