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Lookback window

A lookback window is the stretch of past data you look at, such as the last month or the last year, when you judge how products and campaigns perform.

How it works

Every verdict on a product rests on a window of history: its clicks, orders and ROAS over that period. A short window reacts fast but holds few clicks, so one order or one quiet month can move a product between groups. A long window is steadier and covers a whole season, but mixes old behaviour with new.

A 30-day window is common: Producthero’s Labelizer guide says most businesses use it and suggests 60 days for long conversion paths. In our study of 1.4 million products over 13 months, 64.7% of winners were one-offs, with one conversion in one month. For how the window reshuffles labels, see choosing the data window for performance labels.

Example

Example store, not client data.

The tableware shop sells a teapot for 1,200. Over 12 months it got 300 clicks at 5 each, 1,500 of spend, and 6 orders worth 7,200: ROAS = 7,200 ÷ 1,500 = 4.8. Over the last 30 days it got 40 clicks, 200 of spend and no orders. The 30-day window shows a product that spends without selling. The 12-month window shows one above the shop’s ROAS of 4.5.

How GetProfit reads it

In Products and labels, the portal labels every product by how it behaved in ads over the last 12 months. Its campaign structure adds two more windows. Among the strongest products, conversions over 90 days decide which go into the core campaign. A product with 50 or more clicks and no conversions over 360 days is left out of all campaigns.

Not to be confused with

  • Conversion window — how many days after a click an order can still be credited to the ad. GA4 calls this setting a lookback window: 30 days by default for acquisition conversion events and 90 for all others.

Right and wrong readings

  • Wrong: “The teapot spent 200 in a month with no orders, so it loses money.” Right: at its usual 6 orders per 300 clicks, 40 clicks bring 0.8 of an order on average, so a month without one says little.
  • Wrong: “A 12-month window is always the safe choice.” Right: it averages the year, so a product that stopped selling three months ago can still show a high ROAS.

Sources