Features of Wildberries promotion sources

WB promotion data appears in several sources at once, and each one shows expenses differently. This often causes confusion: amounts differ between reports, data appears with delays in some places, and in others there is no breakdown by item.

This guide will help you understand the key differences between the main promotion data sources — Weekly Reports, Ad Statistics, and Ad Finances. We’ll explain how amounts are calculated in each source, along with their advantages and limitations.

Weekly Reports

Weekly reports do not show promotion data on a day-by-day basis, like purchase, return, or logistics transactions. Instead, promotion is displayed as a single amount in the “Other deductions” column.

Where does this amount come from? When you run an ad campaign, WB accumulates expense data over several days and then issues a UPD (universal transfer document).

If the last day included in the UPD is Monday, the entire amount from that UPD will appear in that week’s report, even if most of the expenses actually relate to the previous week.

Example

Week from 01.01 to 07.01

UPD No. 1:

Wednesday = 100 RUB

Thursday = 200 RUB

UPD No. 2:

Friday = 100 RUB

Saturday = 200 RUB

Sunday = 150 RUB

Week from 08.01 to 14.01

UPD No. 2:

Monday = 30 RUB

Result

UPD No. 1 with a total of 300 RUB will appear in the report for the first week.

UPD No. 2 with a total of 480 RUB will appear in the report for the week from 08.01 to 14.01, even though only 30 RUB was actually spent on it that week.

Therefore, this data source is primarily useful for calculating total profit for a period, as it directly affects the weekly report.

However, for analyzing promotion by product over an arbitrary period, a more precise source is needed.

Ad Statistics

In ad statistics, WB provides an accurate breakdown of expenses by item, but typically 10–12% more is spent. This is due to a technical feature of stopping ad campaigns: there is a delay between when the budget runs out or the “Stop” button is clicked and when the campaign actually stops, during which spending continues.

You still receive impressions, clicks, and orders for this additional spend, so it would be incorrect to completely exclude these amounts from calculations. Moreover, statistics is the most up-to-date source of expense information, convenient for tracking sharp changes in ACoS.

However, there is a downside — it is unclear from which source the deduction came: bonuses or real money.

There is a common belief that ad statistics cannot be obtained for a long period. In fact, for all clients, when connecting via API, we load data for the last 3 months immediately, and upon request, we can load data for a longer period.

Ad Finances

This is the only way to get expenses in “real money” based on deductions from the Balance or Account.

Let’s recap the terminology:

Balance — advertising expenses via netting, where WB provides funds on credit against future sales. The amount of expenses from the Balance appears in the “Other deductions” section.

Account — what you top up manually. These deductions do not appear in Weekly Reports, but we include them when calculating profit.

However, there is an important point — expenses in finances are tied to the ad campaign, not to the item.

If you have multiple items in one campaign, we will distribute the expenses evenly among them. Therefore, we strongly recommend using no more than one item per ad campaign if you need the most accurate data.

What to use in the end?

It depends on your task.

On the Summary Dashboard, we provide the option to select promotion sources:

Weekly Reports

Ad Finances (All), including bonuses

Ad Finances (Balance + Account)

In Product Economics:

Exclude promotion from calculations entirely

Ad Statistics

Ad Finances (All), including bonuses

Ad Finances (Balance + Account)

In Financial Reports:

Ad Finances (All), including bonuses

Ad Finances (Balance + Account)

Weekly Reports

If you are reconciling the “amount payable,” make sure the promotion source “Weekly Reports” is selected.