The decision guide / 9 calculators
Put ad spend and revenue in the context of actual profitability.
Worksheet / 01 / 4 tools
Separate the cost of reaching people from their response. Use matching impressions, clicks, and conversions from one reporting scope.
Normalize media spending to the cost of 1,000 reported impressions for a defined campaign and placement.
Use CPM to compare exposure costs. Use CPC or CPA when your question is the cost of a click or conversion rather than an impression.
Open CPMCalculate average advertising cost for each click using a consistent click definition and reporting window.
Use CPC for the cost of generating clicks. Use CPM for exposure pricing and CPA for the cost of a completed action.
Open CPCCalculate clicks as a percentage of eligible impressions using a single consistent click event definition.
Use CTR to assess impression-to-click response. Use conversion rate to assess what visitors do after reaching the destination.
Open CTRMeasure the percentage of eligible visitors who complete one defined conversion during the selected window.
Use this for visitor-to-converter success, with each visitor counted at most once. Use CTR for impression-to-click performance.
Open Conversion RateWorksheet / 02 / 2 tools
An attributed action is not always a new paying customer. Choose the denominator first, then include the appropriate costs.
Measure advertising cost per attributed lead, signup, purchase, or other explicitly defined conversion action.
Use CPA for cost per tracked action, including actions from existing customers. Use CAC for fully scoped spending per newly acquired customer.
Open CPACalculate fully scoped acquisition spending per newly acquired paying customer, rather than cost per lead or order.
Use CAC when the denominator is new customers and costs include your chosen acquisition scope. Use CPA when the outcome is an attributed action instead.
Open CACWorksheet / 03 / 3 tools
ROAS describes advertising revenue yield; MER uses a wider business and marketing scope. Advertising profit keeps listed delivery costs visible. None of these measures proves profit or incremental demand on its own.
Measure attributed revenue per unit of advertising spend with an explicit revenue-to-spend ratio.
Use ROAS to compare attributed advertising revenue with media spend. Use MER instead for total business revenue against all marketing costs.
Open ROASCompare total business revenue with total scoped marketing spending without assigning individual sales to channels.
Use MER for a blended business-level revenue-to-marketing-cost view. Use ROAS to examine attributed revenue against media spend for one campaign.
Open MEREstimate revenue left after product, fulfillment, transaction, and advertising costs for one campaign scope.
Use this for a currency result on an attributed campaign or order cohort. It is not the same as ROAS, which reports a revenue-to-ad-spend ratio.
Open Ad ProfitFrom calculation to decision
Read the result alongside its definition, not as a standalone score.
How we document formulas and limitationsRead CPM alongside CTR and CPC before blaming one cause. Then check conversion rate on the same traffic scope. Cheap clicks are not useful if they do not lead to the intended outcome.
Use CAC for distinct new paying customers and a documented sales and marketing cost scope. Use CPA for an attributed action, and name that action when sharing the result.
Compare ROAS with contribution-based break-even economics, and review MER for a wider view. Check overlapping attribution and cash constraints separately; a strong ratio is not evidence that the next dollar will perform the same way.