Amazon CPC and target CPC calculator

Your target cost per click is calculated by first figuring out your revenue per click. This can be calculated by multiplying your conversion rate by your average order value.

Once you have your revenue per click, you want to multiply that by your target ACoS.

As an example, if you have a 10% conversion rate and a $19 average order value, then your revenue per click will be $1.90 (multiplying your $19 average order value by your 10% conversion rate = $19 * 0.10 = $1.90).

If you have a 19% target ACoS and you know your revenue per click is $1.90, then you will multiply those together to get your target CPC. In this case that would be $0.36 ($1.90 revenue per click * 0.19 target ACoS).

CPC = ad spend ÷ clicks

Take spend and clicks from the same date range. $450 of spend on 300 clicks is $1.50 a click. If that sits above your target CPC, clicks are costing more than your target ACoS allows at your current conversion rate and order value.

Before you cut the bid, check which side moved. A drop in conversion rate pushes ACoS up even when the CPC holds still, and what does ACoS mean walks through how the pieces fit together.

One your target ACoS can pay for. CPCs swing by category, keyword, placement and season, so a figure from someone else’s account won’t tell you whether yours works.

Say a keyword turns 10% of its clicks into orders and the average order is $30. Each click brings in $3.00 of sales, so at a 25% target ACoS it can cost up to $0.75. At $1.00 a click, the same keyword runs at about a 33% ACoS.

A cheap click that rarely converts can cost more per order than a pricier one that converts well. Our keyword bidding walkthrough sets opening bids from this math and adjusts them on conversion data.

A placement adjustment raises your bid for one placement by a percentage. With a $1.00 bid and a 50% top of search adjustment, your top of search bid is $1.50. Rest of search and product pages work the same way with their own percentages.

It also works backward. If your target CPC for top of search is $1.20 and the adjustment is 50%, a bid of about $0.80 gets you there, since $0.80 x 1.5 is $1.20.

Your bidding strategy can move the bid again at auction time. Fixed bids use it as set. Dynamic bids - down only can lower it when a click looks less likely to convert, and dynamic bids - up and down can raise it as well, so a click can cost more than the adjusted bid the calculator shows.

To see what each placement earns per click in your own account, and which adjustments to lower, drop your Placement report into the placement report analyzer.

Whenever the inputs move. Conversion rate and order value drift with price changes, reviews and season, so a target CPC worked out last month can be off today. Checking your biggest keywords every week or two keeps their bids close to your target ACoS.

By hand, across hundreds of keywords, that adds up. In Merch Jar, the Dynamic Bid Management template moves each bid toward your target ACoS in small steps, with a cooldown between changes. It's saved switched off, you preview the bids it would set, and it only changes them after you turn it on.