Essay

What Contribution Margin by SKU Reveals That ROAS Hides

Jordan Glickman Free Advanced

A sharp, practitioner-written essay that takes the margin argument a level deeper than most agency blog posts: down to the SKU.

  • A blended, account-level ROAS can look healthy while individual SKUs are quietly unprofitable.
  • Breaking contribution margin down by SKU exposes which products can actually absorb ad spend at scale.
  • Media buying decisions should follow margin by product, not a single overall ROAS number.

The question it answers

  1. What ROAS should I realistically expect from Meta ads for my D2C brand?

Read with it

  1. An Indian agency playbook that puts numbers on the UGC-first approach: a 70/30 prospecting-retargeting split and 10-15 UGC... Sociolabs Article How D2C Brands in India Can Achieve 3x-4x ROAS with Meta Ads Sociolabs
  2. Zooms out to the profitability-over-growth shift defining Indian D2C, the mindset you need to evaluate whether a hot channel... Forbes India Article India's D2C Journey: After Rapid Scale-Up, Why It's Now All About Discipline Forbes India
  3. Resets unrealistic expectations with real 2025 benchmark data by vertical, useful for checking your ROAS against your actual... Triple Whale Article What Is a Good ROAS? 2025 Industry Benchmarks and Strategies Triple Whale
  4. Razorpay processes payments for thousands of Indian D2C brands, and this piece gives category wise CAC benchmarks in rupees,... Razorpay Learn Article Customer Acquisition Cost: A D2C Guide to Profitability Razorpay Learn
  5. Walks through the exact formula a founder needs to compute their own break-even number before comparing it to anyone else's... Triple Whale Article Breakeven ROAS: Definition, Formula & Why It's Essential Triple Whale
  6. Taylor Holiday's agency is the most quoted voice in DTC for reframing ROAS around profit, useful pushback against chasing a... Common Thread Collective Article Why ROAS Is a Terrible Ecommerce Metric + 3 That Actually Matter Common Thread Collective
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