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Documentation Index

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Linking items is how you turn a journey from a collection of notes into a decision system. Without links, teams can still capture useful information. What they lose is traceability. The opportunity exists, but nobody can tell which evidence revealed it. The solution ships, but nobody can see which problem it was meant to solve. A metric moves, but the team cannot tell whether it measures the right thing.

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Why linking matters

Linking keeps the chain of reasoning visible:
  • Which touchpoint exposed the friction
  • Which insight captured what the team learned
  • Which opportunity framed the problem worth acting on
  • Which solution was proposed or shipped
  • Which metric tells you whether it worked
For founder-led teams, this is one of the fastest ways to reduce “why are we doing this again?” drift.

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The item relationship model

Custory supports a deliberate relationship model inside a single journey. Allowed relationships:
  • Touchpoint -> Insight
  • Insight -> Opportunity
  • Opportunity -> Solution
  • Opportunity -> Metric
  • Solution -> Metric
This is intentional. The product is helping you preserve causality, not create an unrestricted network graph.

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Touchpoint -> Insight

Use this when a customer-facing moment revealed something worth learning. Example:
  • Touchpoint: Trial signup form
  • Insight: Non-technical admins do not understand what data is required
This tells the team where the learning came from.

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Insight -> Opportunity

Use this when a learning becomes a problem worth prioritizing. Example:
  • Insight: Teams abandon after the first invite step
  • Opportunity: Reduce collaborator invite friction before first value
This separates evidence from action framing.

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Opportunity -> Solution

Use this when you are proposing or shipping a response to the problem. Example:
  • Opportunity: Clarify first-run setup
  • Solution: Add a guided setup checklist
This keeps the solution tied to the actual opportunity instead of floating as a disconnected feature idea.

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Opportunity -> Metric

Use this when a metric helps define whether the opportunity is real or improving. Example:
  • Opportunity: Shorten time to first value
  • Metric: Median time to first successful integration
This is useful when you want a problem statement to stay measurable.

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Solution -> Metric

Use this when a shipped or proposed solution should be judged by a specific outcome. Example:
  • Solution: Rewrite the empty state
  • Metric: Invite completion rate
This prevents success from being defined only by release completion. Open an item and use its link tabs to connect it to valid related items in the same journey. Custory lets you:
  • Search for eligible items
  • Create links from the item itself
  • Review linked items later as part of the item’s working context
Only valid group-to-group relationships inside the same journey can be linked. The cleanest operating pattern is:
  1. Capture the touchpoint or insight first
  2. Link the learning to the opportunity it creates
  3. Link the opportunity to one or more possible solutions
  4. Link the opportunity or solution to the metric that defines success
That keeps the customer story readable even months later.

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Good linking habits

Not every item needs several links. Create a link when the relationship helps the team reason better, prioritize better, or review outcomes better. If every item links to everything else, traceability becomes noise. Link only where the connection is meaningful. If a solution turns out to solve a different opportunity than expected, relink it. The value is in keeping the model current, not in preserving the first guess forever.

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Common startup use cases

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Founder support loop

  • Touchpoint: support thread
  • Insight: recurring confusion
  • Opportunity: reduce support-heavy friction
  • Solution: improve copy or flow
  • Metric: support volume or completion rate

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Activation cleanup

  • Touchpoint: onboarding step
  • Insight: user stalls before first value
  • Opportunity: reduce setup burden
  • Solution: guided setup or default template
  • Metric: activation rate or time to first value

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Pricing and conversion

  • Touchpoint: checkout page
  • Insight: pricing language creates doubt
  • Opportunity: improve conversion clarity
  • Solution: rewrite pricing explanation
  • Metric: trial-to-paid conversion

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Common mistakes

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Linking only after shipping

If links are added only after implementation, the chain from evidence to decision is already weaker. Link earlier while the reasoning is fresh.

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Using opportunities as raw note buckets

If every observation becomes an opportunity directly, you lose the step where the team distinguishes learning from prioritization. Keep insights and opportunities separate.

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Linking metrics with no decision role

A metric should help validate a problem or outcome. If it is only there because it exists in another dashboard, it probably should not be linked.