TrueMetriks documentation: New vs Returning customers https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/ Generated from the TrueMetriks documentation. Paste the whole of this file into ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Cursor or any other AI. I use TrueMetriks, a server-side tracking and conversion attribution platform. It tracks my website visitors, ties every sale back to the ad that produced it, and sends those conversions back to my ad platforms. Help me with this specific task: New vs Returning customers. See revenue, AOV, and ROAS split by first-time vs repeat buyers, and fire a new-customer-only conversion to your ad platforms to optimize acquisition. HOW TO GUIDE ME - This file has three parts: THE GUIDE is today's task, BACKGROUND is a prerequisite to confirm with me before you start THE GUIDE, not optional reading, and LINK MAP is the only place a real link comes from. - Ask me ONE thing at a time and wait for my answer before moving on. - At the start of every step, ask me: "do you want the written steps, or the video?" If I pick the video, give me the exact link from the LINK MAP at the bottom and wait until I tell you I have watched it. If I pick the written steps, give them to me from this file. - Only ever give me links that appear in the LINK MAP below. Never invent a URL, never guess an anchor, and if I ask for something that has no link here, say so and point me at https://docs.truemetriks.com/ instead. - Never ask me for my password, my API key, my MCP key, or any card details. You are reading me the steps; I am the one clicking in my own account. - Confirm each step worked before starting the next one. - Keep it short. I am doing this while looking at my screen, not reading an essay. - Everything you need is in this file. You do not need to browse the web. =============================================================================== THE GUIDE: New vs Returning customers https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/ =============================================================================== Blended revenue hides your most important question: are your ads bringing in new customers, or just collecting repeat purchases you would have gotten anyway? TrueMetriks separates the two everywhere it matters, in the dashboard and out in your ad platforms. **Video guide** VIDEO: How new vs returning customers works in TrueMetriks -> https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/ ## See it on the Revenue page The [Revenue](https://docs.truemetriks.com/dashboard/revenue/) page has an **Audience** dropdown with three options: **New + Returning**, **New**, and **Returning**. Switching it re-scopes every number on the page to the audience you pick: total revenue, purchases, AOV, ROAS, and profit, plus every row in the source, campaign, and content breakdowns. Set it to **New** to see what a first-time buyer really costs you and what they are worth on that first order; set it to **Returning** to see the repeat-purchase business your existing customers drive. This is the fastest way to judge whether a campaign is genuinely acquiring customers or just harvesting repeats. ## Send it to your ad platform The dashboard view above is for you. To make your ad platform optimize toward new customers, the platform itself has to know which purchases were new, and you do that by firing a separate conversion event for them. Open **Settings**, then **Tracking**, pick your ad platform, and find **Custom events**. Click **Create**, map the standard `Purchase` event to a custom name, then set **Fire when** to **New customers only** (or **Returning only**). Now that custom event fires only when the buyer is a first-time customer. Your normal `Purchase` keeps firing for everyone, so nothing you already rely on changes; you are simply adding a clean, new-customer-only signal alongside it. ## Use it as a column in your ads Saving the mapping auto-creates the custom event as a **Custom Conversion** on your pixel in Facebook (Events Manager, then Custom conversions). It starts inactive until the first matching purchase lands, then goes active. The full Facebook setup, including creating the catalog and finding the conversion, is on the [Facebook integration](https://docs.truemetriks.com/ad-integrations/facebook/) page. From there, add it as a column in Ads Manager: open the **Columns** menu, choose **Customize columns**, search the custom name, tick **Total**, **Value**, and **Cost**, and Apply. Now each campaign shows its new-customer purchases and their value right next to spend. Prospecting campaigns that win first-time buyers stop being buried inside blended totals, and you can optimize budget toward the campaigns that actually grow your customer base, not just the ones that re-bill people who would have come back anyway. ## How a customer is counted as new On each purchase, TrueMetriks looks up whether that same person has bought from you before. It matches a person by the user ID your site sends when it identifies them, falling back to their email, and then to their persistent device identity, so a repeat buyer is recognized across sessions and devices. The first purchase it can attribute to a person is counted as new; everything after is returning. New-customer status is scoped to your workspace, so a first purchase from your store counts as new for you regardless of anything that happened on another business's site. ## Import your existing customers first Because this is judged from our own record of who has purchased, it only knows about buyers TrueMetriks has actually seen. If you already had customers before installing TrueMetriks, or customers who bought through a channel it does not track, their next order would be counted as new, because as far as our records show it is their first. **Video guide** VIDEO: How to import your existing customers into TrueMetriks -> https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/#import-your-existing-customers-first Seed that history so it does not happen. Go to [Users](https://docs.truemetriks.com/dashboard/users/), open the **Imported customers** tab, and click **Upload CSV**. The file needs at least an `email` column; `first_name`, `last_name`, `phone`, `country`, and `first_purchase_date` are optional, and any other columns are ignored. Everyone on that list is treated as an existing customer from then on, so their first purchase after the import counts as returning, not new. This is what keeps your new-customer numbers honest, both in the dashboard and in the new-customer conversions you send out to Facebook, Google Ads, GA4, and TikTok. Import your customer list once, up front, before you start trusting the new vs returning split. =============================================================================== LINK MAP Use these exact URLs. Anything ending in a # anchor opens on that section or that video. Nothing else is a valid link. Never invent a URL and never guess an anchor. New vs Returning customers The guide ................................... https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/ See it on the Revenue page .................. https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/#see-it-on-the-revenue-page Send it to your ad platform ................. https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/#send-it-to-your-ad-platform Use it as a column in your ads .............. https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/#use-it-as-a-column-in-your-ads How a customer is counted as new ............ https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/#how-a-customer-is-counted-as-new Import your existing customers first ........ https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/#import-your-existing-customers-first VIDEO, How new vs returning customers works in TrueMetriks https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/ VIDEO, How to import your existing customers into TrueMetriks https://docs.truemetriks.com/features/new-vs-returning/#import-your-existing-customers-first