What is ROI?
ROI, or Return on Investment, is a measure of how much revenue your SMS marketing is generating relative to what you're spending on it. In TxtCart, ROI gives you a quick, at-a-glance signal of how well your campaigns and flows are performing financially.
Where is ROI displayed?
You'll find ROI surfaced in three places across TxtCart:
Home page: Reflects your overall SMS marketing performance.
Flows screen: ROI is shown broken down by individual flow in the ROI column next to each flow.
Campaigns screen: Each campaign shows its own ROI alongside other performance metrics.
How is ROI calculated?
TxtCart calculates ROI by taking your total attributed revenue, subtracting your SMS costs, and dividing by what you spent. Here's the formula:
(Total Attributed Revenue - Total SMS Costs) / Total SMS Costs
Total Attributed Revenue is the total revenue credited to your SMS activity based on your Attribution Settings.
Total SMS Costs is the total cost of sending SMS/MMS (Campaigns & Flows).
So, for example, if you generated $5,000 in attributed revenue and spent $500 in total SMS costs, your ROI would be 9x (or 900%), meaning you earned $9 for every $1 spent.
Note: If you signed up before January 18, 2026 and are still on performance-based billing, your Total SMS Costs will also include Transaction Fees for any successfully recovered orders.
How do Attribution Settings affect your ROI?
TxtCart gives you full control over how revenue is reported. Attribution determines which orders get credited to your SMS activity, and since attributed revenue feeds directly into your ROI calculation, your Attribution Settings have a direct impact on the number you see.
For example, a broader attribution window (crediting any purchase made within 7 days of a click) will capture more revenue and produce a higher ROI. A more restrictive setting will credit less revenue and result in a lower ROI.
Neither is wrong. It comes down to how conservatively or generously you want to measure performance. What matters is keeping your settings consistent over time so your ROI trends are actually comparable.
You can update your Attribution Settings from two places:
General Settings: automatically applies to all flows. To adjust it, go to your TxtCart app and navigate to Account Details > Messaging > Attribution Settings.
Individual Flow level: lets you customize attribution per flow. To adjust it, you can follow this guide here and check the "Flow-Level Attribution Settings" section.
Are carrier fees included in my ROI?
TxtCart's ROI reflects the return on your SMS marketing, specifically how much revenue your messages drove relative to your campaign and flow investment.
Carrier fees are separate. They are transmission fees charged directly by telecom carriers (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile) per message segment. TxtCart passes these fees through to you at cost; we don't mark them up or pocket any portion of them.
Because they are a delivery cost rather than a campaign cost, they fall outside the ROI calculation.