POAS & commercial bidding
What's a good POAS for ecommerce?
Why this matters
The question 'what is a good POAS?' is the wrong question. The right question is 'what is a good POAS for this SKU's role in my catalogue?'. A first-purchase Scale SKU acquiring a customer with three-year LTV is doing its job at POAS 1.0. A Profit SKU sustaining the business needs to clear 1.5–2.0× because it has no LTV story.
Rough working bands we see across ecommerce catalogues: Scale (acquisition) 0.9–1.3× POAS depending on LTV confidence; Profit (margin-strong, repeat-friendly) 1.5–2.5×; Protect (brand defence) often run separately and judged on share-of-voice rather than POAS; Recovery (clearance) 1.0–1.2× to move stock; Gateway (low-AOV first purchase) 0.8–1.2× with LTV-justified pursuit.
These are benchmarks, not rules. A subscription brand with 80% retention can run Scale at POAS 0.6 and still print money. A one-time-purchase niche with no repeat needs Scale above 1.5 or it is just a slow leak. The LTV honesty matters more than the headline number.
Beware brands quoting a single 'we run at 3× POAS': usually that is gross-margin POAS at account level, which can hide that the actual contribution profit is flat or negative once full costs are loaded.
How JudeLuxe approaches this
JudeLuxe sets per-role POAS targets during onboarding using your real margin and return data, then revisits them quarterly as the catalogue shifts. The Q1 2026 benchmarks page has cross-account numbers from 75+ ecommerce accounts for orientation.
If you want a like-for-like read on what 'good' looks like for your category and AOV, the Profit Audit produces it in five to seven working days.
Related reading: POAS vs MER vs ROAS: pillar guide.
Related questions
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