Messaging vs paid

What is the messaging vs paid comparison?

It puts your messaging channels (email and SMS through Klaviyo) and your paid ad channels (Meta, Google, TikTok, …) in one table, with the same three figures for each: what the channel cost in the period, the contribution margin your attribution model credits it with, and the margin earned per unit of cost. Messaging rows carry one extra column: the margin your email platform reports for itself.

Formula

cost             = paid: ad spend in the period
                   messaging: send cost in the period (SMS credits; email is
                   often zero)
attributed margin = contribution margin of orders in the period, credited to
                   the channel by your attribution model
margin per cost  = attributed margin ÷ cost   (from the period's sums)

Worked example

Over 90 days Meta costs €12,000 and is credited €18,000 of margin: 1.5× margin per euro. Klaviyo's SMS credits cost €400 and email is free; your model credits Klaviyo €6,800 of margin, so its margin per euro is 17×. Klaviyo's own dashboard claims €11,500 for the same period. The 17× and the 1.5× are comparable because both come from the same journeys and the same model; the €11,500 is not, because Klaviyo credits any order placed within its window after an open or a click, whatever else the customer clicked.

How Saldo Metrics computes it

v_messaging_vs_paid_comparison holds one row per channel per day. Cost comes from the source facts: ad spend for paid channels, the dual-stored send cost for messaging. Attributed revenue and margin come from the attribution engine's output under your organisation's working model, dated by order date, for both kinds. The engine credits an email or SMS click to the messaging channel when its UTM source names the platform (utm_source=klaviyo, also klaviyo_email, klaviyo-sms, …) or its medium is email or SMS and exactly one messaging channel sends that medium. The table sums the days in the selected period and divides the sums; it never averages daily ratios. Only channels that sell on your own store appear; marketplace ad spend and organic traffic do not.

Why it matters

Messaging looks cheap next to ads, and its own dashboards make it look even better. Measured with the model you already use for ads, you can see whether the email programme really earns more per euro than the next euro of ad spend, and whether an SMS programme covers its credits at all.

Common mistakes

• Comparing the ESP column with the paid rows. It uses the platform's own matching, which usually runs higher. Compare attributed margin with attributed margin.
• Reading a missing ratio as zero. A channel with no cost in the period has no margin per cost; it shows a dash, not zero or infinity.
• Forgetting the tagging. Email and SMS clicks count only when the links carry UTM parameters. An untagged campaign's orders stay organic.

Where you see this in the app

Marketing → Email & SMS, in the "Messaging vs paid" section, which follows the period selected in the filter bar. The Attribution tab lists the messaging channel too, with no spend and no true ROAS.