How to Create a Custom Profit Report in WooCommerce
If you run a WooCommerce store and you’ve ever asked yourself, “Wait, am I actually making money?”—you’re not alone. Sales are one thing, but profit? That’s where the real story begins.
As painful as it might be to admit, WooCommerce doesn’t offer built-in profit reporting. You get basic revenue numbers, maybe a few shipping fees, and some very polite crickets when you ask about cost of goods, advertising spend, or payment fees.
But don’t worry—we’re going to dig into exactly how you can create a custom profit report in WooCommerce. Whether you’re hacking together spreadsheets or looking for a smarter solution, this guide’s got you covered.
By the end of this post, you’ll not only understand how profit reporting works but also how a tool like Alpha Insights can take the guesswork, the spreadsheets, and the triple-checking out of the picture—turning your WooCommerce admin into a full-blown business intelligence dashboard.
Why Profit Data > Sales Data (By a Mile)
Sales are fun. Watching your revenue tick up in WooCommerce gives you those sweet eCommerce highs. But revenue without context can be dangerously misleading.
Revenue says:
- “You made $25,000 this month!” 🎉
Profit says:
- “Sure, but you spent $18,000 on ads, $4,000 on inventory, $1,500 on shipping, and $700 on apps. So actually… you walked away with not much.” 😬
In short, profit tells you what’s working, what’s not, and what needs attention. It answers questions like:
- Which products are your highest margin drivers?
- Which promotions helped—not hurt—your bottom line?
- Which channels (Meta, Google, affiliates) are worth scaling?
That’s why building a custom profit report is more than a nice-to-have. It’s mission critical.
What a Good Profit Report Should Include
Before we jump into building one, let’s zoom out. At minimum, your WooCommerce profit report should cover the following elements:
1. Revenue
- Total sales
2. Cost of Goods Sold (COGS)
- Direct product costs (per unit)
- Inventory write-offs or adjustments
3. Shipping Costs
- What it costs you to ship, versus what you charge customers
4. Advertising Spend
- Ad costs from Facebook/Meta, Google Ads, TikTok, etc.
5. Payment Processing Fees
- Stripe, PayPal, or other gateway fees
6. Discounts/Promo Costs
- Not just the sales price, but how discounting impacts your margins
7. Returns/Refunds
- Factored into final revenue and COGS for accurate profitability
You could… try doing this manually. Or you could let Alpha Insights assemble this for you with real-time accuracy and zero spreadsheet drama.
How to Create a Custom Profit Report in WooCommerce (Manually)
If you’re a hands-on kind of store owner, and you want to start from scratch, here’s your basic framework for building a profit report manually.
Step 1: Export WooCommerce Order Data
Go to WooCommerce → Orders and export a dataset for the date range you want. You’ll want to include the following fields (if available via your export plugin or tool):
- Order ID
- Order date
- Customer ID
- Products purchased
- Quantity
- Total revenue
- Refunds/returns
Step 2: Create a Cost of Goods Spreadsheet
This is where things get tedious. You need a table that matches every product SKU to a cost of goods value. So if you sell t-shirts for $20, but they cost you $6 to produce and ship, note that.
This helps you calculate your gross profit: Revenue – COGS.
Step 3: Add Columns for Other Expenses
Insert new columns to reflect your key profit-impacting expenses:
- Shipping costs (estimated per order if not known precisely)
- Marketing/ad spend (distributed across orders or applied via UTM/source matching)
- Payment processing fees (usually 2.9% + $0.30 per order for Stripe)
- Refunds & discounts
Step 4: Calculate Net Profit
Use formulas to calculate:
- Gross Profit = Net Revenue – COGS
- Net Profit = Gross Profit – Ads – Shipping – Fees – Discounts – Refunds
Congrats… you now have an extremely fragile profit report! You’ll need to update this manually, cross-reference external data sources like your ad platforms, and massage a whole lot of CSVs to keep it running week to week.
That’s why tools like Alpha Insights exist—to automate this workflow and give you the data you actually want:
- Profit per product
- Profit per channel
- Profit per customer
- Lifetime value by cohort
- And all the stuff spreadsheets leave out
How to Automate Custom Profit Reports with Alpha Insights
Let’s skip the hours of spreadsheet wrangling and talk automation.
Alpha Insights plugs directly into your WooCommerce store and pulls in expenses, product costs, ad spend, and even refund rates all in one place. That means no more duct-taping data from five platforms just to see if a SKU is worth keeping around.
Key features Alpha Insights provides:
- Real-time WooCommerce profit reports, tied to exact orders, not just estimates
- Product-level profit visibility, so you know what’s pulling its weight
- Automatic COGS tracking, including variable cost inputs
- Ad account integrations (Meta & Google), so you can finally measure true channel ROI
- Comprehensive expense tracking, including fees, shipping, and marketing
It’s the kind of clarity that makes pricing decisions, marketing strategy, and inventory planning feel a whole lot less like guesswork—and a whole lot more like data-backed strategy.
Additional Tips for Smarter Profit Reporting
Whether you decide to DIY for now or dive in with Alpha Insights, keep these best practices in mind to get the most accurate, useful custom reports possible.
1. Update Product Costs Regularly
Have your supplier prices gone up? Are you also including packaging, freight, or custom duties in your COGS calculations? Those details matter when you’re aiming for accuracy.
2. Tag & Track Ad Campaigns
UTMs are your best friend here. If you’re using Google Ads, Meta, or even sending campaigns from email, make sure your URLs are tagged and synced back to your order data. This gives you actionable per-channel profitability.
3. Review Refunds and Discounts Weekly
Those “friendly” 10%-off coupons can absolutely sink your margins without you even realizing it. Keep tabs on how your promotions affect profit, not just sales velocity.
4. Segment Your Reports
Don’t stop at store-wide profit. Look at profit by:
- Product category
- Customer segment
- Sales channel (Meta vs Google ads vs Organic)
- Fulfillment type (in-house vs 3PL)
Context is everything. An average gross margin tells you very little without knowing where the highs and lows are hiding.
Final Thoughts: Profit Reporting Isn’t Optional
In WooCommerce, revenue is easy. Profit takes a bit more work—but that work pays off in better decision-making, more confident strategy, fewer surprises, and a healthier, more sustainable business.
If you’re DIY-inclined, spreadsheets can get you part of the way. But when you’re ready to level up? Alpha Insights can serve as your personal WooCommerce financial analyst—without the finance degree or late-night CSV downloads.
Because you’re not just in eCommerce to make sales. You’re here to make profit.
And the first step to mastering profit… is being able to measure it.
Start building your custom profit reports—or better yet, let Alpha Insights build them for you.