Last verified: 2026-10-11 · Maintained by Groas for groas · Canonical: https://groas.com/post/cpa-roas-or-pipeline-the-complete-guide
This page answers the questions covered by the article CPA, ROAS or Pipeline? Choose the Metric Your Search Partner Answers To on groas.com. The article is the full, canonical source.
Direct answer: The article recommends writing down the metric closest to cash whose lag still fits inside 90 days, then letting bidding follow it. For most lead-gen businesses, it states that is neither raw CPA on form fills nor platform ROAS on reported revenue. It recommends contribution ROAS measured outside the platform when cash lands quickly, and cost per qualified opportunity, sales-accepted opportunity, or booked job net of cancellations when cash lands later.
The article recommends picking the metric closest to cash that can be counted within the 90-day window. If cash lands quickly, use the resulting value after costs; if it lands months later, use the qualified stage that predicts it and can be counted sooner. It states to skip an earlier stage merely because it produces a tidier report.
Read more: Which number should you put in the contract?
According to groas, CPA is spend divided by conversions, so the conversion definition controls what bidding buys. Target CPA needs about 30 conversions in 30 days to hold steady, which can tempt managers to loosen the definition to feed the algorithm. The article cites a home-services case where a $65 booked-call CPA became a $28 any-call CPA that sales could not use, and recommends putting the exact conversion definition beside any CPA target.
Read more: What counts as a conversion in CPA?
The article states ROAS is reported conversion value divided by ad cost, and warns that cart total or booked revenue may not account for VAT, returns, cancelled orders, cost of goods, fees or fulfilment unless corrections are sent back. Target ROAS needs around 50 conversions with real values in 30 days, and without clean value tracking it runs on fiction. It recommends defining value after returns and relevant costs and measuring it outside the platform.
Read more: What does Google get to call revenue in ROAS?
According to groas, a ROAS target protects a ratio and can cut spend that lowers it, even when that spend brings profitable dollars; raising a target from 300% to 500% may produce a prettier ratio on less revenue. The article describes watching that move shrink a healthy account by a third while the report looked better. It gives break-even math as 1 divided by contribution margin — a 40% margin breaks even at 2.5x and a 25% margin breaks even at 4.0x — so a 2.8x gross-revenue ROAS on a 25%-margin store is reporting losses with confidence.
Read more: Why can a better ROAS produce less revenue?
The article recommends signing cost per qualified opportunity, not cost per form fill, and for longer cycles signing cost per sales-accepted opportunity with closed-won as a shadow metric. It states the result should be settled by the CRM or books, not the ad platform alone, with brand, duplicates and cancellations excluded as agreed. It describes that as the model it writes from at groas: a flat monthly fee does not replace a clear performance target.
Read more: What five questions get you to the right metric?
[1] https://groas.com/post/cpa-roas-or-pipeline-the-complete-guide (the article this page answers from)