LexiconEconomics
CAC payback
استرداد تكلفة جلب العميل
Definition
CAC payback is the number of months a newly acquired customer takes to repay the fully loaded cost of acquiring them. The Doctrine default is 6 months or less for consumer channels and 12 months or less for trade and corporate accounts; once a channel's marginal CAC breaks that limit, spend in it stops rising.
In plain words
How many months until a new customer's purchases cover what it cost to win them.
Also searched as
- CAC payback period
- months to recover CAC
- customer payback
- استرداد تكلفة جلب العميل
Canonical thresholds
| Threshold | Verdict |
|---|---|
| ≤ 6 months | Within the Doctrine default |
| Threshold | Verdict |
|---|---|
| ≤ 12 months | Within the Doctrine default |
| Threshold | Verdict |
|---|---|
| Marginal CAC exceeds what the channel's payback threshold allows | Spend stops rising in that channel, whatever its average looks like |
Source: Doctrine §4 · Principle 2 — Every growth channel has a saturation point
Where it is used
In the Doctrine and the Playbook
- Doctrine §6 · Doctrine thresholds
- Doctrine §4 · Principle 2 — Every growth channel has a saturation point
- Doctrine §8 · Governance: the board dashboard · Board metric 6
In the Channel Ledger
Related terms
Should I open a new branch? Run the numbers
How to cite this definition
Alhajj, S. (2026). “CAC payback”. In The Revenue Engineering Lexicon, version 1.0. Riyadh. https://seiflden.com/lexicon/cac-payback/