TACOS vs ACoS
ACoS
spend ÷ ad-attributed sales
Campaign efficiency: how much of the revenue ads produced was handed back as fees. The right metric for bid-level and campaign-level decisions.
TACOS
spend ÷ total sales (organic + ad)
Business-level ad load: what share of the whole shop’s revenue you are spending on ads. The right metric for budget, pricing and “is this product healthy” decisions.
The pattern that matters
| ACoS | TACOS | Reading |
|---|---|---|
| Stable | Falling | Organic rank growing — ads paid their tuition, hold course |
| Rising | Rising | Ads propping up a listing that is losing organic strength — fix the listing |
| Falling | Stable | Campaigns optimizing — scale spend carefully |
| Below break-even | Any | Ads adding pure profit — the only unambiguously green light |
The calculator shows both at once: enter total sales for the TACOS line, and the break-even card keeps either metric honest.