Seller and business calculators: guides

216 guides in this section. Pick the question closest to yours, or browse by tool. Page 6 of 9

• Why does a 20% White Friday discount double the number of units I need to cover my costs?A discount comes out of your contribution, not the whole price. Worked example: 20% off moved break-even from 500 units to 1,000, and 40% off removed it entirely.
• I paid an influencer 3,000 for one campaign: how many units must that campaign sell to pay for itself?Make the influencer fee the fixed cost of the campaign and enter the promoted product's price and cost. Worked example: 75 units at full price, 97 with a discount code.
• Some of my costs are annual, like a licence renewal and a yearly website plan: should I calculate break-even monthly or yearly?Both work, as long as costs and sales cover the same period. A worked example shows how dropping a yearly cost into one month's figures inflates break-even.
• I put the cost of the stock I bought from my supplier into fixed costs and the break-even came out huge: what went wrong?Stock you buy to resell is already in your unit cost; adding the invoice to fixed costs counts it twice. Example: 667 units by mistake against 167 done right.
• I cannot decide between pricing at 79 or 99: how do I compare the sales each price needs to break even?Run break-even for each price with the same costs, then ask whether the lower price really sells the extra units it needs. Worked example: 177 units against 112.
• What does the contribution margin ratio mean, and how does it give my break-even revenue directly?The contribution margin ratio is the share of every sale left to cover fixed costs. Divide fixed costs by it to get break-even revenue directly. Two worked examples.
• I want a monthly profit of 5,000, not just to break even: how many units does that take?Add the profit you want to your fixed costs in the break-even calculator and the result becomes the units that profit needs. Worked example: 750 units instead of 500.
• Are my cost and price figures sent to a server when I use the break-even calculator?No. The calculation runs in your browser, and the figures you type are neither uploaded nor saved. What that means for confidential supplier costs and shared computers.
• My payment gateway charges a percentage plus a fixed amount per transaction: how do I turn that into a variable cost per unit?The variable cost field takes an amount, not a percent, so work the fee out on your selling price and add it to unit cost. Example: 2.5% plus 1 on a price of 200 is 6.
• I sell a three-piece bundle at one price: how do I calculate break-even for the bundle rather than per piece?Treat the bundle as the unit: its price is the unit price and the three pieces plus packaging are the variable cost. Worked example: 110 bundles, or 330 pieces of stock.
• My shop sells dozens of products at different prices: can a single-product break-even calculator still help?The calculator does not model a product mix, but two honest workarounds do: an average order as the unit, or each product line with its share of fixed costs.
• How do I include the cost of cash-on-delivery orders that customers refuse in my break-even?The calculator does not model returns, but you can spread refused orders' cost over paid ones. Example: a 10% refusal rate moves break-even from 91 paid orders to 97.
• Why does the calculator say I am at break-even with zero sales when my dropshipping store has no fixed costs?With no fixed costs there is nothing to cover, so the calculator shows 0 units. Most stores have forgotten fixed costs, and a worked example shows them appear once added.
• If I hire my first employee at 4,000 a month, how many extra units must I sell each month to cover the salary?Enter the new salary alone as fixed costs, with your usual price and cost, to see the extra sales the hire has to support. Example: 115 units, 132 with the extras.
• Snapchat Ads says my ROAS is 4x but my store orders do not back that up: which revenue figure should I enter?Ad platforms credit sales your store cannot always trace. Run ROAS twice, with the platform figure and with tracked store revenue, and read the gap.
• One report shows ROAS as 250% and my agency says 2.5: are they the same number?2.5x, 250% and 2.5:1 all mean each unit of ad spend brought 2.5 in sales. Learn the three formats and the figure people confuse with them: the ad share of revenue.
• The calculator asks for my margin before ads: how do I work it out from price, product cost, shipping and fees?Take everything you pay per order except ads off the price, then divide by the price. Price 200 with 130 in costs gives a 35% margin and a 2.86x break-even ROAS.
• Amazon Ads reports ACoS instead of ROAS: how do I convert between the two?ACoS is spend divided by sales and ROAS is the exact inverse. A 25% ACoS is a 4x ROAS, and the ads pay off while ACoS stays below your margin before ads.
• Covering the ad cost is not enough: what ROAS do I need to keep 10% of revenue as profit after ads?Break-even ROAS is the floor, not the goal. At a 40% margin with a 10% profit target, ads may take only 30% of revenue, which means a ROAS of 3.33x.
• I ran one campaign on TikTok and one on Snapchat with different budgets: how do I compare their returns fairly?ROAS is a ratio, so it can compare campaigns with different budgets, on two conditions: revenue counted the same way, and profit after ads read alongside ROAS.
• I paused my ads but sales kept coming in: why does the ROAS calculator show undefined instead of an infinite return?Dividing by zero spend has no answer, so the calculator shows Undefined, not an infinite return. Sales that continue without ads also hint at what your ads really add.
• How do I calculate a blended ROAS for the whole store across Meta, Google and TikTok?Divide total store revenue by combined spend on every ad platform. Blended ROAS cannot count one order twice, so it is often lower than the sum of platform claims.
• I sell electronics on a 10% margin: why does the calculator say I need a 10x ROAS just to break even?Break-even ROAS is 1 ÷ margin, so a 10% margin needs 10x. Worked example: an 8x ROAS looks great but loses 500 at that margin, and makes 2,500 at a 25% margin.
• I typed my net margin after ads into the margin field and now every campaign looks unprofitable: what did I do wrong?The margin field wants profit before ad cost. Entering net margin after ads subtracts spend twice, so a campaign making 1,500 shows a loss of 500.