mediabuyer
← All terms

Metrics

CAC

Customer acquisition cost — fully-loaded CPA.

CAC (customer acquisition cost) is CPA loaded with all blended costs: ad spend + creative production + tooling + the marketer's salary. CFOs care about CAC; media buyers usually care about CPA. The ratio LTV : CAC is the single most-quoted SaaS metric (3:1 is the often-quoted target).

Example

Reported CPA: $42. Loaded CAC after creative ($6/sale), tracking ($1.20/sale), and team allocation ($8/sale): $57. LTV $190 → LTV:CAC = 3.3.

Related terms