The hidden waste in performance marketing
At SEK 1M/month in spend, even 15 percent of misaligned signals quietly costs SEK 1.8M a year. It rarely shows in ROAS. It shows in margin.
Sophia Båge · Cut Waste
If you invest SEK 1 million per month in performance marketing, and let's say 15 percent isn't driving the right business impact, that's SEK 150,000 per month, or SEK 1.8 million per year, in what we call hidden waste.
It's a consequence of how advertising systems work.
- Algorithms optimize toward the goals we set.
- They scale the signals we send back.
- They prioritize the data available to them.
They do exactly what we tell them to do. That's why we need to translate business strategy into the right signals, not optimize for what's easiest to measure.
Hidden waste rarely shows up in ROAS. But it shows up in margin.
Do you know how much is leaking in your business?
About the author
Sophia Båge
Co-Founder, Untangle Collective
Sophia Båge is Co-Founder of Untangle Collective. She works with ecommerce leaders to reconnect performance marketing with profitable growth. Identifying where revenue and margin become disconnected, and what should scale instead.
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