In the hyper-competitive landscape of two-sided marketplaces, investors aren't impressed by vision alone—they demand hard numbers. The right metrics illuminate your marketplace’s health, highlight areas for improvement, and demonstrate potential for sustainable growth. Knowing exactly which KPIs investors scrutinize can accelerate funding decisions, boost your valuation, and guide strategic priorities. In this article, we'll unpack 12 critical two-sided marketplace KPIs, provide relevant benchmarks, and show how Marketplace Tycoon can help you monitor, analyze, and forecast these metrics with ease.
Definition: Total sales dollar value processed by your marketplace over a given period.
Investor Interest: Investors view GMV as the fundamental measure of market size and marketplace traction. Quickly growing GMV numbers can make up for weakness in other metrics.
Definition: Percentage of GMV captured as revenue by your marketplace.
Investor Interest: Take-rate reveals pricing power and profitability. Etsy achieved a take-rate of 16.1% in 2024. eBay has about 12%, Uber reported a 26.9% take-rate Q1 of 2025.
So, you want the take-rate to be high, right? Yes and no, if you are setting prices too high you might be foregoing some amount of GMV growth; set them too low and you don't generate enough revenues to pay the bills.
High GMV dollars and a modest take rate is the setup for a sustainable competitive advantage.
Definition: Measures the balance between listings available (supply) and customer searches or orders (demand).
Investor Interest: Healthy liquidity ratios signify efficient matching, critical to scaling marketplaces. Airbnb maintains an occupancy rate above 55%, Uber achieves an average ride match rate of over 80%, and Etsy consistently sees about 25-30% of its listed items sold within 30 days.
Definition: Time required to recoup customer acquisition costs (CAC) through generated profit.
Investor Interest: Efficient CAC payback periods indicate sustainable growth. Top marketplaces achieve CAC payback in under 12 months, significantly better than median SaaS companies at 20-30 months in 2024.
Definition: Percentage of acquired buyers returning over defined intervals.
Investor Interest: High retention rates significantly boost lifetime value (LTV) and reduce CAC pressure. Airbnb maintained approximately 40% year-over-year retention into 2025, meaning 4 in 10 users who stayed in an Airbnb property last year will stay in one this year.
Definition: Percentage of active sellers who cease listing products over a specific period.
Investor Interest: Low seller churn stabilizes supply and enhances marketplace reliability. Etsy reported an annual seller churn rate around 20% in 2024.
It is vital that your sellers stick around with you for a while. It keeps you from having to constantly source new supply for your marketplace.
Treat your sellers well, and if they stick around, you can focus on something besides finding your next listing.
Definition: Average number of completed orders per active buyer per period.
Investor Interest: Increased order frequency boosts overall revenue without additional CAC. Upwork averaged $4,815 gross services volume per active client in 2024.
High order frequency (weekly or monthly) makes it easier for your marketplace to maintain liquidity since transactions become more predictable and consistent.
Average Order Value (AOV)
Definition: Average monetary value per completed transaction.
Investor Interest: Higher AOV directly impacts profitability and revenue growth. eBay UK's AOV ranged between $95-$127 in early 2025.
Definition: Profit earned per transaction after deducting variable costs.
Investor Interest: Contribution margin provides clear insights into per-unit economics. Uber Delivery reported an 18.7% contribution margin in Q4 2024.
Every time a transaction occurs on your marketplace, a positive contribution margin means each order contributes directly to covering fixed costs and generating profit.
Definition: Revenue retained and expanded from existing customers year-over-year.
Investor Interest: Strong NDR indicates a scalable and resilient business model. Upwork’s client spend retention hovered around 102% in 2024.
Similar to seller churn, NDR is a good way to understand the long term health of your marketplace.
Are users coming back year after year? Are they spending more each time? If the answer to both is yes, then you likely have a strong marketplace cooking up.
Mastering these two-sided marketplace KPIs gives you precise insight into your operational efficiency, growth trajectory, and sustainability—exactly what investors prioritize during due diligence. Being KPI-fluent not only accelerates investor conversations but positions your marketplace for strategic, data-driven growth.
Ready to experience these powerful metrics in action? Try Marketplace Tycoon's free Scenario Engine demo today. See firsthand how easy it is to visualize and optimize the KPIs investors care about most.