Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)
The total cost of acquiring a new customer, including sales and marketing expenses divided by the number of new customers acquired.
CAC = Total Sales & Marketing Spend / Number of New Customers Acquired in the Period. It is one of the two most important SaaS metrics alongside customer lifetime value. A business with high CAC can still be viable if its customers stay for many years and generate significant revenue; a business with low CAC but high churn rapidly destroys value.
CAC payback period — how many months of gross profit from a new customer are needed to recover the acquisition cost — is a key capital efficiency metric. Best-in-class SaaS companies achieve CAC payback under 12 months. Document intelligence applied to investor presentations, S-1 filings, and earnings call transcripts can surface CAC and payback period disclosures, compare them against peers, and track trends across reporting periods.
More financial Terms
10-K Filing
An annual report filed with the SEC that provides a comprehensive overview of a public company's financial performance.
Balance Sheet
A financial statement that reports a company's assets, liabilities, and shareholders' equity at a specific point in time.
EBITDA
Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization — a measure of a company's operating profitability.
Amortization
The gradual reduction of an intangible asset's value or a loan balance through scheduled periodic payments.
Revenue Recognition
The accounting principle that determines when and how revenue is recorded in financial statements.
Cash Flow Statement
A financial statement that tracks the movement of cash in and out of a business across operating, investing, and financing activities.
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