Solved: Mismatched Purchase Data in Facebook Ads

Hi there,

Thanks for reaching out about your clothing brand's first ad campaign and thought I'd give you some initial thoughts and guidance. It's completely normal to be a bit confused by the metrics and tracking when you're just starting out. To be honest, most of the numbers Meta shows you are only half the story.

The key isn't just to understand what a 2.7 ROAS means, but to build a system where you can spend money on ads confidently, knowing you're actually making a profit and growing the business. Let's get into how you can do that.

Let's forget about ROAS for a minute...

Right, so first things first. Your understanding of ROAS (Return On Ad Spend) is bang on. You spent £77, and a 2.7 ROAS means you generated £207.90 in revenue (£77 * 2.7). As you correctly pointed out, this is revenue, not profit. Once you subtract the £77 ad spend, the cost of the goods you sold, shipping, payment processing fees, and all that other malarkey, your actual profit might be slim, or even negative.

And here's the brutally honest truth: ROAS, on its own, is a bit of a vanity metric. It's a number that feels good, but it doesn't tell you if you're building a sustainable business. I've seen brands with a 10x ROAS go bust because their margins were terrible, and I've seen brands with a 2x ROAS become wildly profitable because they knew their numbers inside and out.

The real question isn't "How can I get my ROAS higher?" but "How much can I actually afford to spend to get a new customer?". To answer that, you need to work out your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV). This is the metric that separates the amateurs from the pros.

Let's do a hypothetical caluclation for your clothing brand. You'll need to plug in your own numbers, of course, but this will show you the logic.

1. Average Order Value (AOV): Let's say on average, a customer spends £50 per order.
2. Gross Margin %: After the cost of the t-shirt, printing, etc., let's say you make a 60% gross margin. So on a £50 order, your gross profit is £30.
3. Purchase Frequency: How many times does an average customer buy from you in a year? For a new brand, this is a guess, but let's aim for 1.5 times a year.
4. Customer Lifetime: How many years do you expect to keep a customer? Let's be conservative and say 2 years.

So, the LTV would be: AOV * Gross Margin % * Purchase Frequency * Customer Lifetime
LTV = £50 * 0.60 * 1.5 * 2 = £90

This means, on average, each new customer you acquire is worth £90 in gross profit to your business over their lifetime. Now we're talking. This is a number you can actually work with.

A healthy business model often aims for a 3:1 LTV to Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) ratio. So, with an LTV of £90, you can afford to spend up to £30 to acquire a new customer and still have a very healthy, profitable business. Suddenly, your £77 spend to get 3 purchases (£25.66 per purchase) doesn't just look "okay" based on ROAS, it looks like a solid foundation for growth, assuming those numbers hold up.

This is the mindset shift. Stop chasing ROAS. Start understanding what a customer is worth, and then build your advertising machine to acquire customers under that cost. This gives you a clear target and frees you from worrying about daily ROAS fluctuations.

We'll need to fix your tracking (but accept it'll never be perfect)...

Now onto the discrepancy between what Meta reports and what your store says, which is a massive headache for every single advertiser on the planet. You said Meta reports 3 purchases, but you can only confirm one. Welcome to post-iOS14 advertising.

Here’s the deal: Meta's tracking is now partial at best. It's an estimate, a guess, not a hard fact. There are a few reasons for this:

• -> Apple's App Tracking Transparency (ATT): A huge chunk of users on iPhones and iPads are now telling apps like Facebook and Instagram "don't track me". When this happens, Meta loses the ability to see if that person went on to buy something on your website. They try to 'model' the data, which is a fancy word for guessing, but it's often wrong.
• -> Attribution Windows: Meta, by default, might count a purchase if someone *viewed* your ad (didn't even click it) and then bought within 24 hours, or if they *clicked* your ad and bought within 7 days. Your website analytics (like Shopify or Google Analytics) will usually only count a purchase if the person clicked a link directly before buying. This is a fundamental difference in how they measure things.
• -> Cross-Device Conversions: Someone sees your ad on their phone while on the bus, thinks "that's a cool shirt", gets home, opens their laptop, types in your website name directly, and buys. Meta might take credit for this. Your website will see it as a "direct" visit. Both are technically right, but their stories don't match.

So, what can you do? You have to accept that you'll never get 100% perfect, one-to-one tracking again. The goal is to get a 'directionally correct' picture. You want to know if things are getting better or worse, not count every single penny with perfect accuracy.

One simple thing you can do is add UTM parameters to your ad links. These are little snippets of code you add to the end of your website URL in the Facebook ad setup. They don't affect the page, but they tell Google Analytics exactly where the visitor came from. A URL might look like this: `yourbrand.com?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=winter_launch`.

This allows you to log into Google Analytics and see how many sales the campaign named "winter_launch" from Facebook ads drove. It's still not perfect (it can't track view-throughs), but it gives you a much more reliable source of truth for click-based conversions than Meta's own dashboard. It's definitly a step in the right direction.

Ultimately, you'll be looking at a blend of data. Meta's data tells you what the algorithm *thinks* is working. Google Analytics gives you a more grounded view of clicks. And your overall sales and profit numbers are the ultimate source of truth. If ad spend is going up and total sales are going up by a profitable amount, the system is working, even if the reporting is a bit of a mess.

I'd say your targeting is probably the real issue...

A 2.7 ROAS on £11 a day is a start, but it's not going to set the world on fire. And it's often a symptom of the biggest mistake new advertisers make: the targeting is too vague. You're likely showing your ads to a huge group of people, hoping a few of them will be interested. This is like firing a shotgun in the dark. We need to give you a rifle.

For eCommerce, and especially for a new brand, you need a proper campaign structure that guides people from not knowing who you are, to becoming loyal customers. I usually structure this in three parts: Top of Funnel (ToFu), Middle of Funnel (MoFu), and Bottom of Funnel (BoFu).

With a small budget of £11/day, you can't run all of this at once. I'd priotise it. Start with ONE ToFu campaign with a few different interest-based ad sets inside it. Spend maybe £7-8 a day here. Then, create ONE BoFu retargeting campaign for website visitors and Add to Carts. Spend the remaining £3-4 a day there. This simple two-campaign setup is vastly superior to just boosting a post or running one broad campaign.

The logic is simple: you use the ToFu campaign to fill the bucket with new, interested people. You use the BoFu campaign to convert the people who are already in the bucket and leaking out. Without the BoFu part, you're just hoping people buy on their very first visit, which is very rare for a clothing brand people don't know or trust yet.

You'll need ads that don't look like ads...

The next piece of the puzzle is your creative - the actual images or videos in your ads. For a clothing brand, this is everything. You're not just selling a piece of cotton with a design on it; you're selling an identity, a feeling, a vibe. If your ads just show a flat-lay of a t-shirt on a white background, you're going to fail. That's a product listing, not an advertisement.

People scroll through their feeds to be entertained, not to be sold to. Your ad needs to earn their attention. Some thoughts:

• -> Ditch the Mockups: If you're using digital mockups of your designs on generic t-shirt photos, stop immediately. It screams "low quality dropshipper". You need to invest in getting your actual products photographed.
• -> Lifestyle over Product: Show people wearing your clothes in a real-world setting that matches your brand's aesthetic. Are you a skate brand? Show someone at a skate park. Are you about outdoor adventure? Show someone on a hike. People need to be able to picture themselves in your clothes.
• -> UGC is Gold: User-Generated Content is the most powerful creative you can have. Once you get a few sales, encourage your customers to post photos of them wearing your gear. You can even offer a small discount on their next order for a good photo. An authentic photo from a real customer is a thousand times more trustworthy than a polished studio shot.
• -> Video is King: A simple video of someone wearing and moving in the clothes can make a huge difference. It shows the fit, the fabric, the way it hangs. It doesn't need to be a Hollywood production. A well-lit video shot on a modern smartphone can work wonders. I remember one client selling women's apparel who saw a huge jump in returns (691% ROAS) by optimizing their creative approach.

Your ad copy needs to connect too. Don't just say "New T-Shirt - £25". Use a framework like Before-After-Bridge.

Before: "Tired of the same old high street brands? Your wardrobe is full but you have nothing unique to wear."
After: "Imagine opening your wardrobe and grabbing a piece that actually says something about you. A design that starts conversations."
Bridge: "Our latest collection is for those who... [talk about your ideal customer]. Limited run. Shop now."

This approach speaks to a problem, paints a picture of a better future, and positions your product as the way to get there. It's much more compelling.

This is the main advice I have for you:

This is a lot to take in, I know. It's a shift from just "running an ad" to building a proper marketing system. It takes more work up front, but it's the only way to build a brand that lasts. To get you started, here is a summary of the steps I'd recommend you take, in order.

I know this can seem like a mountain to climb, especially when you're also trying to design products, manage stock, and handle shipping. Trying to become an expert in paid advertising on top of all that is a huge ask. It's a full-time job in itself, and the landscape is constantly changing. We've worked with numerous eCommerce brands, from subscription boxes that hit a 1000% return to apparel stores achieving nearly 700% ROAS, and the one thing they all had in common was a systematic, data-driven approach. They didn't just get lucky with an ad.

If you'd like to get some more specific advice on your account, we offer a free, no-obligation strategy session where we can have a proper look at your setup and give you a clear, actionable plan. It might be helpful to have a second pair of expert eyes on it.

Either way, I hope this detailed breakdown has been useful and gives you a much clearer path forward than just staring at a ROAS number.

Regards,

Team @ Lukas Holschuh