Free acquisition calculator

A cheap lead can be an expensive customer.

Cost per lead is not cost per customer. Change the qualification, close rate and margin assumptions below to see the economics behind the dashboard. The examples are illustrative and your inputs stay in this page.

Calculated scenario · not a forecast

Qualified leads

50.0

Expected customers

10.0

Ad-only customer acquisition cost

$500

Acquisition cost including sales/ops

$620

Break-even cost per lead*

$88

First-purchase net contribution

$3,800

*Break-even CPL assumes qualified and close rates remain constant, and subtracts sales/ops costs before allocating contribution to leads. Negative values are displayed as $0. This is a scenario model, not a prediction. Use one currency consistently.

What the numbers mean

Customer acquisition cost (CAC) is total acquisition expenditure divided by new customers. Ad-only CAC misses sales staff, CRM and execution costs. A campaign can generate more leads while acquiring fewer customers.

The calculator uses expected customers = leads × qualification rate × close rate. It then subtracts ad and sales/ops costs from first-purchase contribution. It does not model repeat purchases, churn, tax, working capital or attribution uncertainty.

A worked example

Campaign A spends $5,000 for 100 leads. If 50 qualify and 20% of those become customers, it acquires 10 customers at $500 ad-only CAC.

Campaign B spends the same $5,000 for 200 leads. If only 40 qualify and 20% convert, it acquires 8 customers at $625 ad-only CAC, despite half the cost per lead. Neither example is a claim about real campaign performance.

Three checks before you increase spend

  1. Verify how many leads are actually qualified and where they stop moving.
  2. Measure cash contribution and sales costs, not just closed-won counts.
  3. Compare payback timing against your available working capital.

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