The vocabulary of margin.
Plain definitions for the terms you'll meet across CM6. For how they fit together, read the CM6 Standard.
Contribution margin (contribution profit)
Net revenue minus the direct and allocated variable costs of trade for an order: the cost layers you configure in CM6. The money an order contributes before fixed overhead, and the number CM6 is built around. Not accounting net profit.
CM%
Contribution profit divided by net revenue, expressed as a percentage. Lets you compare margin quality across orders, products and channels of different sizes.
Net revenue
Revenue after discounts, refunds and tax: the genuinely earned top line, not gross sales.
Cost layers
The components of the cost of trade that CM6 stitches onto every order: COGS, fulfillment, payment fees, marketing, customer service, VAT & tax, platform fees, and returns & refunds.
Direct vs. shared costs
Direct costs attach to one order (COGS, payment fees, VAT). Shared costs are real but span many orders (customer service, platform fees, marketing) and are amortized across them.
Observed, configured, allocated, inferred
Every cost on an order is one of four kinds. Observed: read from a source system, like a refund. Configured: from your setup, like a gateway fee rate. Allocated: a share of a real shared cost, like ad spend. Inferred: estimated from your own data, like carrier rules learned from invoices. CM6 keeps the distinction rather than presenting all four as equally certain.
Marketing allocation
Real ad spend reported by each platform, shared across the orders in the same country and customer group in proportion to revenue, with safeguards for small samples. A transparent share of real spend, not a claim about which ad caused the order.
Data status
Shown on every order. Still settling: placed recently, so refunds, returns or late costs may still land. Missing inputs: a cost source is absent, so profit may be approximate. Complete: the current calculation includes every configured cost. Complete means complete for now; a later refund still updates the order.
Amortization
Spreading a shared cost across the orders that generated it, on a rolling basis calibrated to real volumes, rather than applying a flat percentage to everything.
Fallback hierarchy
When a specific cost isn't known, CM6 uses the next most specific value available (for COGS: variant, then product, then type, then brand) so coverage is complete and every fallback is visible.
Cohort
A group of customers who share a starting point, usually the month of their first order, tracked over time to see how their value and margin develop.
Customer LTV
Lifetime value: the contribution a customer generates across all their orders, not just the first. Crucial for judging whether acquisition spend pays back.
Attribution window
The period an ad platform uses to credit a sale to spend. Because windows lag, very recent ad spend and revenue can keep settling for a day or two.
Backfill vs. live sync
Backfill is the one-off load of your order history; live sync keeps new orders flowing in afterwards. Recent orders cost in minutes; full history takes longer.
“Excluding marketing” default
The dashboard shows contribution profit before marketing by default (your product economics) with a toggle to layer ad spend back in for fully loaded acquisition economics.