How We Diagnose Every Ecommerce Problem (The Hierarchy of Metrics)
Episode description
Tony Chopp, walks through the Hierarchy of Metrics — the framework our Prophit Engineers use to diagnose problems and take action for 170+ ecommerce brands.
In this episode, Tony and Richard break down a real brand example in Statlas, showing how you go from a contribution margin miss all the way down to a specific campaign adjustment in Google Ads.
The hierarchy:
Business-level metrics (revenue, contribution margin, ad spend)
Customer-level metrics (new vs. returning, paid vs. organic)
Channel-level metrics (Google, Meta, email — iROAS by channel)
Campaign-level actions (bids, budgets, new creative)
Key takeaways:
Your ROAS target should be backed into through incrementality math and unit economics — not vibes
"4 is not necessarily better than 3" — if 3 is the right number based on your COGS and incrementality, targeting 4 leaves volume on the table
Over-efficiency is a symptom of underspend, not a badge of honor
Good data in = good decisions out. The system is only as strong as your cost data, audience segmentation, and incrementality testing
Show Notes:
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Explore the Prophit Engine: https://commonthreadco.com/pages/prophit-engine
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