CPL
Cost per lead
What you pay to get one prospect — their details or their message — not one paying customer.
Formula
CPL = ad spend ÷ number of leads
A worked example (hypothetical numbers)
Say you spend 900 EGP and collect 30 leads. CPL = 900 ÷ 30 = 30 EGP. But if only 6 of them become customers, the real cost of a customer is 900 ÷ 6 = 150 EGP, and that is the number your account lives on.
The numbers are illustrative, only to show the arithmetic. They are not real results or market averages.
How to read it
- A lead is not a customer. Divide by your close rate to get the cost of an actual customer, which is the figure that compares against customer value.
- In clinics and services, the difference between a cheap lead and a useful one is reply speed: a lead called back two days later has usually gone elsewhere.
- Follow the number through to the booking or the signed deal — ranking two campaigns at the lead stage alone often reverses the real order.
The common mistake
Celebrating cheap leads that never close. A campaign at half the cost per lead that closes one in twenty is worse than a dearer one that closes one in four, and the only figure that reveals it is cost per customer.