Customer Acquisition Cost CAC

Three definitions with materially different numbers. BLENDED CAC divides all sales-and-marketing spend by ALL new customers, including organic/word-of-mouth, the flattering number founders quote. PAID CAC divides only paid-acquisition spend by customers attributed to paid channels, the number that tells you whether ads work. FULLY-LOADED CAC adds S&M salaries, commissions, tooling, and overhead, not just media, the number finance and investors expect. There is also a scope fork: new-logo CAC (acquisition only) vs a CAC that includes the cost of landing expansion. Marketing prefers blended and paid; finance insists on fully-loaded; the gap between blended and fully-loaded paid CAC can be 3-5×.