Anyone know how to calculate Return on Investment properly(ROI)

Discussion in 'General Marketing' started by harrykewell, Dec 9, 2007.

  1. #1
    Hi folks, I am new to this marketing stuff and I was wondering if someone can help me when it comes determining the ROI properly

    Basically, I have a set of figures for ad campaign which includes the cost of advertising and subsequent order details. I presume the ROI should be expressed as a percentage from which to report off. The calculation I did was Order Revenue - Shipping/taxes - cost of Radio Ad = profit / loss

    Then the ROI calculation I used is profit/loss divided by Order Revenue. So for instance:


    Cost of Ad1 $170
    Orders/Net Revenue from Ad1 $350
    Profit = 350-170=180
    ROI = 180/350= 51%

    Cost of Ad2 $500
    Orders/Net Revenue from Ad2 $210
    loss = 210-500= -290
    ROI = -290/ 210= -138%

    Cost of Ad3 $170
    Orders/Net Revenue from Ad3 $0
    ROI from Ad3 -100%

    any advice on this would be much appreciated
    Thanks for any advice you can give
     
    harrykewell, Dec 9, 2007 IP
  2. thezou

    thezou Guest

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    #2
    You are doing it the wrong way.

    Let's take Example #1: You are spending $170 to make $350, essentially doubling your investment, so %50 can't be correct. You also for some reason divide profit by revenue, where's your investment amount in all of that? ;)

    The correct calculation would be (350-170)/170 = 105%
     
    thezou, Dec 9, 2007 IP
  3. harrykewell

    harrykewell Peon

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    #3
    I came across another way to calculate the ROI and now I am getting confused:
    ROI = Profit - Cost of investment / cost of investment

    180 -170 / 170 = 5.8%

    Can someone tell me which method is right when it is used in marketing. All I am trying to do is to compare the cost of an ad campaign and the number of orders(revenue) derived from each market. Thanks for any help
     
    harrykewell, Dec 9, 2007 IP
  4. john269

    john269 Notable Member

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    #4
    Or you could do it like this.

    180 * 100 / 170 = 105.8823529%

    Round it down to 2 decimal points would give you 105.88% ROI

    How I worked it out is 180 is your profit time's by 100 and then divide that total by your advertising cost. The way I done it is really the way you normally calculate interest percentage from your initial investment like when your doing stocks & shares or something, but it seems to also work with ROI. So Thezou was correct with his/her figure, just it seems to have been rounded down further than mine.

    5.8% is no where near your return on investment. If it was then you would have only made a profit of around $9.86
     
    john269, Dec 15, 2007 IP
  5. Perry Rose

    Perry Rose Peon

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    #5
    All those numbers give me a headache. :)~

    Are you making more than you are shelling out, without hustling?

    There you go.
     
    Perry Rose, Dec 15, 2007 IP