Ecommerce Master Playbook
In 30 days, know what every product you advertise really leaves you per order, the return on ad spend below which it loses money, what you can afford to pay for a new customer, and the month each group of customers pays you back. From your own store and ad accounts, with a spreadsheet that does the math.
What’s Inside
- The Profit Stack: 7 systems in order, each passed through the Trade Spine Test (the unit, the leak, the script)
- The stack per product, with a returns line done properly, and your break-even ROAS from your own costs
- First-order economics: new-customer CAC, the CAC ceiling and the Allowable CAC Ladder down to the cost per click
- The Cohort Grid: lifetime gross profit (not revenue) and the payback month for every monthly cohort
- The offer: the Bundle Builder, 4 front-door offers with their first-order math, and the guarantee priced as a returns policy test
- The cash conversion cycle, and what a growth step ties up in stock
- The spreadsheet: 9 working sheets with live formulas (Excel, Numbers, or import into Google Sheets)
- 28 templates: scripts, emails, the creative brief, the post-purchase survey, the supplier reorder checklist
- 3 setup guides: Quickstart, First-Order Economics, Retention and Cohorts
- A 13-week tracker with a guess-count-compare baseline and 30, 60 and 90 day look-backs
The Problem
Revenue is up and the bank balance is not. The ad platform says the ads work. Nobody has run every cost of an order, returns and shipping included, through to the end, so nobody knows what an order or a new customer really leaves.
Most stores also measure the wrong cost of a customer. Ad spend divided by all orders counts repeat orders that cost nothing in ads, so every first order looks cheaper than it is.
Revenue is the number everybody sees. This book is about the one that pays you.
The Profit Stack
Seven systems, in this order. Paid traffic is sixth, not first:
- S1: KNOW THE MARGIN. The stack per product, the returns line, break-even ROAS, winners, freeloaders and bleeders.
- S2: THE OFFER. The Bundle Builder, front-door offers with their first-order math, the guarantee as a priced decision.
- S3: CONVERT BETTER. Contribution per session, the first screen of the product page, honest testing.
- S4: RAISE THE ORDER. Gross profit per order, thresholds judged on contribution, the discount tester.
- S5: OWN THE AUDIENCE. Flows by purpose, the holdout test that shows what they really add, consent rules.
- S6: BUY TRAFFIC. New-customer CAC, the Allowable CAC Ladder, payback by cohort, blended and new-customer return, the creative brief.
- S7: MAKE THEM RETURN. The cohort forecast, subscriptions priced on purpose, returns, shipping and the 3PL decision.
What's in the Book
- Part 1, The 20-Minute Quick Win: guess, then count, what your best seller leaves you per order and your break-even ROAS.
- Part 2, Why Good Brands Go Broke Growing: 4 causes, with the cash conversion cycle worked through.
- Part 3, The Profit Stack: the 7 systems, the store money model and the Trade Spine Test.
- Systems 1 to 7: each with its formulas, worked arithmetic and a spine check naming the number, where to pull it, and the words to use.
- The Operating Rhythm: the weekly 30 minutes, the monthly hour, reorder points, the bulk-discount trap and the One-Page Store Scorecard.
- Then: 3 worked composites and 1 that went wrong, metrics, a baseline box, 15 common mistakes, a 90-day setup, the 30, 60 and 90 day look-back, and dated tool and platform notes.
A Sample: The Break-Even ROAS
A hypothetical $60 product sells for $54 after a 10% code. After product, freight, shipping, card fees, packing and returns, it leaves $18.00 before ads. $54 / $18.00 = 3.0. Any ad reporting a ROAS under 3.0 loses money on the order it brought in. Run a 25% code and the same product leaves $10.16, so break-even jumps to 4.4, and the ad platform will not tell you. Every number is a round hypothetical. The book shows you how to run it on yours.
Questions
Does it give me a target ROAS or conversion rate? No. The only ROAS it gives you is your own break-even, worked out from your own costs. There are no industry benchmarks in it, and it explains why.
I'm on WooCommerce, not Shopify. The math is the same. Report names in the book are Shopify's, dated October 2026. On any platform, an order export with customer, date and total is enough.
Is it for a big brand or a one-person store? Both. The spreadsheet works at either end. If you have a finance person, they can run the sheets and you run the decisions.
Do I need Excel? No. The spreadsheet opens in Excel and Apple Numbers and imports into Google Sheets. Every formula is also on paper in the templates.
Who This Is For
The owner of an online store selling physical goods, from a founder still packing boxes to a $10M brand with a small team, whose revenue looks fine while the bank balance does not, whose ad costs keep climbing, and who cannot say what a new customer is worth after returns and shipping.
Read it in your library.
This is included with The Standard, along with every other guide in the library. Your monthly re-audit tells you which one to open next. $497 to start, $297/mo to keep it running. Cancel any month and keep everything.
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