Free tool

Paid Media Forecast Calculator

Use this paid media forecast calculator to estimate clicks, conversions, revenue, leads, ROAS or CPL from your planned advertising budget.

Clicks

8,333

Conversions

208

Revenue

£16,667

ROAS

1.67×

Gross profit after ad spend

£0

At 60% gross margin

Forecast value

£16,667

Total revenue

Forecast funnel

£10,000
Spend
8,333
Clicks
208
Conversions
£16,667
Revenue

Around break-even on revenue

At these assumptions the plan roughly covers its spend. Improve conversion rate, order value or traffic cost to build margin, and check the figure against your break-even ROAS.

How to use this calculator

Choose whether you are forecasting ecommerce revenue or lead generation, then enter your budget and the cost of traffic — a CPC if the channel bills per click, or a CPM if it bills per thousand impressions. Add your conversion rate and the commercial value of an outcome (average order value, or value per lead). The calculator returns forecast clicks or impressions, conversions or leads, and revenue, ROAS or CPL, with a funnel showing how spend flows through to outcome.

How the calculation works

Paid media forecasting estimates likely future performance before spend is committed. The chain is simple: budget buys traffic at your CPC or CPM, a conversion rate turns that traffic into conversions or leads, and a value per outcome turns those into revenue or pipeline. ROAS is revenue divided by spend; CPL is spend divided by leads. A useful forecast connects all four so you can see whether a plan is realistic rather than hopeful.

Why forecasting matters before launch

A forecast is the cheapest experiment you can run. It surfaces unrealistic assumptions — a conversion rate the landing page has never hit, a CPC the auction will not deliver — while they are still just numbers in a box. It also sets expectations so performance can be judged against a plan rather than a hunch. For the wider picture across multiple channels, pair this with the budget allocation simulator.

How to interpret the output, and its limits

This is a flat forecast: it holds your CPC, conversion rate and value constant no matter the budget. In reality, channels saturate — costs rise and conversion rates drift as you scale — so the larger the budget change, the more cautious you should be. Read the result as a directional estimate, sanity-check the marginal pound with the marginal ROAS calculator, and consider forecast accuracy and a confidence interval rather than a single number.

How Dex expands on this

Where this calculator uses fixed assumptions, ElenIQ’s Dex learns the relationships from your own historical data and models how efficiency changes as you scale. The result is paid media forecasting grounded in real performance, complete with a confidence range — the difference described in ad spend forecasting.

Related tools & terms

Frequently asked questions

What is a paid media forecast calculator?

A paid media forecast calculator estimates the clicks or impressions, conversions or leads, and revenue, ROAS or CPL you can expect from a planned advertising budget. It connects budget, traffic cost, conversion rate and commercial value so you can judge whether a plan is realistic before campaigns launch.

How do you forecast ad spend results?

Start with the budget and the cost of traffic (CPC or CPM) to estimate clicks or impressions. Apply a conversion rate to get conversions or leads, then multiply by average order value or lead value to estimate revenue or pipeline. ROAS is revenue ÷ spend; CPL is spend ÷ leads.

Is a single-channel forecast accurate?

It is directional. A flat forecast assumes your CPC, conversion rate and value stay constant as budget changes, but in reality channels saturate — costs rise and conversion rates drift as you scale. Treat the output as a planning estimate and widen your assumptions for larger budget increases.

What is the difference between a CPC and CPM forecast?

CPC (cost per click) prices traffic per click, so the calculator estimates clicks first. CPM (cost per mille) prices it per thousand impressions, so it estimates impressions first. Pick whichever matches how the channel bills and how you hold your conversion rate.

How does ElenIQ improve forecast accuracy?

This calculator uses fixed assumptions you enter. ElenIQ’s Dex learns the relationships from your historical data and models saturation, so its forecasts account for the way efficiency changes as budget scales — and it reports a confidence range rather than a single point.

Forecast from your data, not fixed assumptions

Use Dex to model full paid media scenarios with channel-level forecasting and a confidence range, grounded in your historical performance.

Explore ad spend forecasting