Two numbers get checked every week, per product, and in this order: **TACOS first, then ACOS.**

**TACOS is the one that guarantees your profit.** It is the share of total sales you are spending on advertising, and holding it inside a range you chose is how a monthly profit target actually gets hit rather than hoped for.

**ACOS tells you whether the advertising itself is efficient.** Which matters, because 75–100% of most Amazon businesses' marketing spend goes through it.

[Watch the walkthrough](https://kb.trackiq.com/kb-assets/kbvideo-ranges-explainer-835d3b0a.mp4)

*Prefer to watch? One hundred and eighty-two seconds on why TACOS is a range and gets checked first, the arithmetic for correcting a week, and the bleeder sweep when both numbers fail.*

## **TACOS: hold it in a range, not at a number**

**Set a monthly target TACOS per product** from your profitability review, based on the product's profit and the stage it is at — aggressive for growth, tight for profit. See [**Setting Target TACOS per Product**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/setting-target-tacos-per-product).

**Express it as a range of two or three points**, not a single figure. **7–9%. 10–12%. 12–15%** if you are pushing.

**Then each week, check last week's TACOS against that range.**

**In range → do nothing. Move to the next product.**

**Above range → reduce spend.**

**Below range → increase spend.**

**That last case is the one people ignore**, and it is a real miss. Target 10–12% and spending 7.8% means you have profit budget you are not using — see [**Optimisation as a Calculated Bet**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/optimisation-as-a-calculated-bet).

**Correcting weekly is what makes the month land where you planned.** Check monthly and you find out afterwards.

### **The arithmetic, worked**

**Target 12–14%. Last week: 16%. Sales $7,000. Spend $1,100.**

**Aim for 13.5%, just inside the range** — 13.5% of $7,000 = **$945**.

**$1,100 − $945 = $155 to remove from the week.**

**Divide by seven: about $22 a day.**

**Now decide where it comes from** — the campaigns with the worst ACOS, or the outside traffic, promotion or deal spend that is performing worst. **Whichever is returning least.**

**Going the other way, if you are under range, you have options beyond bids:** raise budgets on campaigns hitting their cap, raise bids or placement adjustments on your best targets, test new targets, campaigns or ad types, or add a deal, promotion or outside traffic.

![Spend against sales, per product, week by week](/kb-assets/shot-prod-table-6c206b.png)

**Doing this per product every week means holding target range, actual TACOS, spend and sales side by side for the whole catalogue** — see [**Understanding Business Reports**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/understanding-business-reports). Rebuilding that from an ads export and a sales report each Monday is most of why the check gets skipped.

## **ACOS: then check efficiency**

**Once TACOS is handled, look at PPC ACOS per product against its target.**

**A common general target is 30–35%**, but higher-priced products legitimately run higher. **Use your own number.**

**Within ±5% of target is fine.** It will never sit still, and chasing normal variation wastes the week.

**More than 5% above target is worth addressing.** Target 30% and running 37–40% means recovering five points would be a substantial win.

**Mark the one, two or three products where that is true, and work on those.**

## **When both are wrong at once**

**High TACOS and high ACOS together is the situation that justifies aggressive action.**

**Because both of the main advertising metrics are failing, and the cause is usually the same: spend landing on targets that do not convert.**

**Run the full bleeder sweep** — high-click zero-sale targets, targets converting above your threshold, and the lifetime pass. See [**The Bleeder Reports**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/the-bleeder-reports) and [**Lifetime Bleeder Targets**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/lifetime-bleeder-targets).

**That attacks both numbers from the same side:** cutting the waste lowers spend, which lowers TACOS, and removing poor targets lowers ACOS.

## **Why TACOS comes first**

**ACOS measures the advertising. TACOS measures the business.**

**A campaign at a beautiful ACOS on a product whose TACOS is 20% is not saving you** — you are still spending a fifth of revenue on advertising.

**And the reverse: a product comfortably inside its TACOS range does not need its campaigns interfered with**, however imperfect they look.

**So TACOS decides whether to act. ACOS decides what to do.**

## **Common mistakes**

**Setting a single target rather than a range**, and correcting constantly against noise.

**Only acting when TACOS is too high**, and leaving profit budget unspent when it is low.

**Checking monthly**, so the month is over before you can influence it.

**Chasing ACOS variation** inside the ±5% band.

**Using one ACOS target across a catalogue** with very different price points.

**Cutting spend without deciding where from**, and taking it off the campaigns that were working.

## **Related**

- [**The Weekly Meeting**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/the-weekly-meeting) — the meeting these two checks sit inside.
- [**Setting Target TACOS per Product**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/setting-target-tacos-per-product) — where the range comes from.
- [**The Bleeder Reports**](https://kb.trackiq.com/hc/knowledge-base/articles/the-bleeder-reports) — what to run when both numbers are wrong.