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Conversion Funnel

The idea, in plain English

A funnel is the shrinking path users walk from 'just arrived' to 'did the thing you wanted'. Picture a real funnel: wide at the top, narrow at the bottom. Lots of people visit, fewer sign up, fewer still add a payment method, and fewer actually buy. By measuring how many survive each step, you can spot the exact stair where most people trip and fall away — and that's where fixing things pays off most.

How it works

  1. 1List the ordered steps a user takes toward your goal, from first visit to final action.
  2. 2Count how many people reach each step.
  3. 3For each step, compute what fraction of the PREVIOUS step made it through — that reveals where the big drop-offs are.
  4. 4Also compute the overall rate: how many finished versus how many started. Then attack the worst single step.

When you'd use it

Use a funnel whenever a goal takes several steps: signup flows, checkout, onboarding. It turns a vague 'not enough sales' into a precise 'we lose 60% at the payment step', which is something you can actually fix.

Common beginner mistakes

  • Only watching the final number. Overall conversion tells you something's wrong but not where — the per-step rates point at the exact leak.
  • Fixing a step that barely leaks. Improving a step where you already keep 95% of people moves far less than fixing the one where you lose half.

Try it — edit and run

Click the code to edit · press ⌘/Ctrl+↵ to run

Editable code. Tab and Shift+Tab indent. Press Escape, then Tab, to move focus out of the editor.

Expected output — hit Run to try it
Funnel step-by-step:
Visited: 1000 users
Signed up: 400 users (40% of previous)
Added payment: 200 users (50% of previous)
Purchased: 120 users (60% of previous)
Overall conversion: 12%

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