Q: I have a question regarding the calculation of repeat rate. If I want to compare our repeat rate to LERN’s benchmark for repeat rate, should it be calculated on a term by term basis or year to year or longer?
A: You can actually do it both ways. If you want to know what a repeat rate is for a particular term, then definitely do the comparison by term. If, for example, you want to know which people repeat during the same term every year, then this would be the analysis to do.
However, the best overall measure of repeat rate is year to year comparison. If someone, for example, signs up for a class for your spring term, and then the next year signs up for your fall term, you would miss them as a repeat customer if you only did term to term. So doing a year to year analysis will give you a better picture of actual repeaters from one year to the next.