How Much Should You Spend to Acquire New Buyers?

Let’s assume your goal is to break even within a year after you acquire a new buyer (i.e., a one-year payback). In the year of your initial mailing to prospects, you acquire 1,500 new buyers from a mailing to 100,000 outside names. As you can see in the chart Cost Per Buyer, these 1,500 new buyers generated 898 orders the following year, for $60,143 in additional revenue. When you combine the initial mailing results with the repeat purchases made in the first year, you see a breakeven. In the example, the cost per new buyer was $12.14 initially.