Who does L&Y Decision work with?

L&Y Decision works with e-commerce brands, DTC companies, and retail businesses, typically with revenues between $500K and $50M, who are serious about making evidence-based marketing decisions. They specialise in small and medium businesses ready to graduate from gut feeling.

What data access does L&Y Decision need to get started?

Read-only access to ad platforms (Meta Ads, Google Ads), analytics (GA4 or equivalent), and commerce data (Shopify, WooCommerce, etc.). L&Y Decision never touches campaign settings, budgets, or creative.

How quickly will e-commerce brands see results from decision science?

Most engagements deliver initial insights and recommendations within 2–4 weeks. Implementation of those recommendations typically produces measurable impact within 60–90 days. Causal inference and attribution model projects take 4–8 weeks by design.

Do you need an in-house data team for marketing attribution modeling?

No. L&Y Decision handles data extraction, transformation, and modeling entirely. If you can grant read access to your platforms, they do the rest. Many clients have no dedicated data function at all.

What is causal inference in marketing?

Causal inference in marketing is a statistical method that isolates the true incremental impact of advertising: measuring what would have happened without the ads (the counterfactual). Unlike correlation-based attribution, causal methods such as geo-holdout experiments, difference-in-differences, and Bayesian structural time-series prove that ads caused revenue, not merely correlated with it.

What is marketing mix modeling (MMM)?

Marketing mix modeling (MMM) is a statistical technique that quantifies how each marketing channel, paid search, social, email, TV, out-of-home, contributes to sales. Unlike last-click attribution, MMM uses aggregate time-series data to measure true channel contribution, accounting for external factors like seasonality and price changes.

How do CMOs and founders justify marketing analytics investment to their CFO or board?

L&Y Decision builds board-ready marketing ROI models that CFOs and investors can audit. Platform-reported attribution overclaims by 30–200% due to cross-channel double-counting. Causal models, using geo-holdout experiments and difference-in-differences analysis, isolate true incremental revenue. Clients typically discover they can reallocate 20–35% of ad spend to higher-performing channels, reducing customer acquisition cost by 25–35% on average.

Is L&Y Decision suitable for small and medium-sized businesses or small-cap public companies?

Yes. L&Y Decision was built specifically for brands that want enterprise-grade measurement without an in-house data science team. Typical clients are e-commerce, DTC, or retail brands with revenues between $500K and $50M, spending $10K–$100K per month on paid advertising. L&Y Decision handles all data extraction, modeling, and interpretation. No data engineering resources required.

Free tool · Unit economics

Break-Even ROAS Calculator for E-Commerce

Most DTC brands set a ROAS target once, from a rule of thumb, and never revisit it as shipping costs, discounting and returns change underneath it. Put in your real unit economics and see the floor your paid media has to clear.

Break-even ROAS

3.17x

Break-even CPA

$20.51

Contribution / order

$20.51

Target ROAS

4.64x

Target CPA

$14.01

Judge this against incremental ROAS, not the platform dashboard.

Talk to us about your measurement

Worked example

A $65 order at 55% gross margin with $9 shipping, 3% payment fees and 12% returns leaves about $20.51 per order before ads. Break-even ROAS is about 3.17x. Hold back 10% of each order as profit and the target becomes roughly 4.64x.

What goes into the number

Contribution per order is what an order leaves you after returns, product cost, shipping and payment fees: AOV × (1 − return rate) × gross margin − shipping − fees. Break-even CPA is that contribution. Break-even ROAS is AOV divided by it.

Discounts belong inside AOV. If a 20% welcome offer drives most first orders, use the discounted AOV, not list price. That single correction moves many brands' break-even ROAS by half a point or more.

The trap: judging against platform ROAS

Meta and Google report the conversions they can claim, including buyers who would have purchased anyway. Your break-even ROAS is a floor for incremental return, the revenue your ads actually caused. If the dashboard shows 3.4x against a 3.2x break-even, you are likely losing money on the margin.

The fix is a holdout: switch spend off in a set of matched regions and measure the gap. Our guide to geo holdout testing walks through it step by step.

When repeat purchase changes the answer

Brands with strong retention can pay more than first-order contribution to acquire a customer. The calculator shows that ceiling, but use it only with measured repeat rates by acquisition cohort and the cash to carry the payback period. Bidding to a lifetime value you have assumed rather than observed is how acquisition budgets quietly go underwater.

Frequently asked questions

What is a good ROAS for e-commerce?

There is no universal benchmark. A brand with 70% gross margin and free digital fulfilment can profit near 1.6x; a low-margin brand with heavy shipping and returns may need 4x or more. The only meaningful target is your own break-even ROAS, judged against incremental results.

How do returns affect break-even ROAS?

Returns reduce the revenue you keep, so they raise the ROAS you need. At 55% gross margin, moving from 5% to 20% returns can push break-even ROAS up by close to a full point (about 2.8x to 3.7x on a $65 order), depending on shipping costs.

Should I set ROAS targets on first order or lifetime value?

First order, unless you have cohort data proving repeat purchase and the cash to fund the wait. LTV-based bidding on assumed retention is one of the most common causes of runaway CAC in DTC.

What is the difference between break-even CPA and CAC?

Break-even CPA is the maximum you can pay per order before losing money on it. CAC is what you actually pay to acquire a new customer, fully loaded with all marketing costs. Healthy acquisition keeps blended CAC well below break-even CPA.

More free tools

Currently accepting new clients

Ready to prove your marketing ROI?

Book a free 30-minute consultation. Bring your ad account numbers; leave knowing which channels earn their budget.

Review your current attribution and measurement setup

Identify the highest-priority evidence gaps

Leave knowing which channels earn their budget

Free. No commitment.