DTC - Acquisition

Find below a KPI Glossary to fully understand the DTC - Acquisition Tab. Simply click into one of the expandable blocks to learn more👇

Blended Paid Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) - Orders

Calculation: Direct Advertising Spend divided by First Time Customer Orders

Description: This represents the blended (average) cost to acquire a First Time Order into the business. This is used to gauge advertising spend efficiency and profitability on a more granular level. We can use this to view the cost of bringing on an “average order” during a specific time period. We can then track additional lifetime purchases of a cohort against this metric to determine if and when this cohort of orders are net profitable to the business (meaning they have paid back these direct advertising costs).

First-Time Customer Orders

Calculation: n/a

Description: First-Time Customer Orders here means all Shopify orders that are the first order for the customer regardless of their Shopify segment (Subscription, One-Time Purchase etc.) during the defined period (usually Month).

  • First time represents that this is the first month the customer has purchased an order

  • Note: if a customer purchases two orders in that same month they both will be considered first time as they are grouped within that first month.

First-Time Customers

Calculation: n/a

Definition: Similar to First-Time Customer Orders, First-Time Customers represent the number of unique customers that purchased an order in a given segment for the first time (regardless of Shopify segment such as subscription or one-time purchase) during the defined time period (usually Month).

  • This will often be lower than First-Time Customer Orders as customers can order more than one order during the time period (either within the same segment or amongst multiple segments).

  • Note: these customers may have ordered previously in other non-Shopify segments (such as Amazon or Wholesale) but for simplicity of attribution, those are excluded here.

First-Time Order to Customer Ratio

Calculation: First Time Customer Orders divided by First-Time Customers

Definition: This represents the ratio of first time customer orders to first time unique customers. This ratio can tend to be around a 1.0 but will vary based on frequency of ordering.

  • For example, if customers tend to order more frequently than one per month, such as bi-weekly, this number will trend notably higher than 1.0.

Blended Paid CAC (Customers)

Calculation: Direct Advertising Spend Divided by First-Time Customers

Definition: Similar to the Blended CAC - Orders, this represents the blended (average) cost to acquire a First Time Customer into the business. This is used to gauge advertising spend efficiency and profitability on more of a customer basis. We can use this to view the cost of bringing on an “average customer” during a specific time period. We can then track the lifetime purchases of this cohort against this metric to determine if and when they are net profitable to the business after including those direct advertising expenses.

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