KORVUS

Alert type

Zero-value checkout

A purchase event with a €0 value skews all your metrics and wrecks your Smart Bidding.

The problem

The purchase event fires correctly, but with a value of €0 or null. Every ad platform receives conversions with no revenue. The ROAS you see is wrong. Bidding algorithms optimize on corrupted data.

Financial impact

Undetected €0 purchases skew ROAS by 20 to 60%. On a €100,000/month budget, that can lead to €15,000 to €30,000 of overspend on the wrong channels or audiences.

Real-world example

An e-commerce director discovers that for 2 weeks, 35% of their purchases have been recorded at €0 following a WooCommerce update. Their reported ROAS of 4.2 is actually 2.8. They overspent €18,000 on unprofitable audiences.

How Korvus detects this problem

1

Korvus analyzes every purchase event and checks that its value is above €0

2

If the share of €0 purchases exceeds the configured threshold, a datalayer_broken alert is triggered

3

The impact is calculated: number of €0 purchases × the site's fallback average order value

4

The alert identifies the problem and suggests likely causes (dataLayer, platform integration, missing currency)

With and without Korvus

Without Korvus

  • €0 purchases go unnoticed for days or weeks
  • Reported ROAS is artificially high, so budget decisions are skewed
  • Smart Bidding optimizes on conversions with no value
  • Found late, often during a quarterly audit or when the accounting numbers don't match

With Korvus

  • Alert as soon as the share of €0 purchases exceeds its normal level
  • Impact in euros: unmeasured revenue and the effect on bidding
  • Fast fix thanks to the alert context (affected pages, browsers and platforms)
  • Reliable ROAS for better budget allocation decisions

Frequently asked questions

What is a zero-value checkout?

A zero-value checkout happens when the purchase event fires with a value of €0 or null. The tag sends a conversion but no amount. Ad platforms count the conversion but not the revenue, which skews ROAS.

What are the common causes?

The most frequent causes are: an e-commerce platform update that changes the dataLayer, a missing currency in the event, a conflict between modules/plugins, or an error in the Enhanced E-commerce setup.

What's the impact on Smart Bidding?

Smart Bidding (Google Ads, Meta) uses conversion value to optimize bids. €0 conversions make it believe some audiences convert for free, which shifts budget toward the wrong targets.

Protect your revenue now

Set up in 10 minutes. First alerts after a 7-day learning period. Impact in euros.

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