## Does Alpha Insights Work for Past Orders?

Short answer: Yes! Alpha Insights automatically calculates profit for all your existing WooCommerce orders, not just new ones.

### How It Works

When you install and activate Alpha Insights:

1. Order Discovery: Plugin scans all existing WooCommerce orders
2. Profit Calculation: Calculates profit for each order based on current product costs
3. Background Processing: Processes historical data in background (doesn't slow your site)
4. Reporting: Historical orders immediately appear in reports

### What Gets Calculated

For historical orders, Alpha Insights calculates:

- Product costs (using current cost or cost at order date if available)
- Shipping costs (estimated if not tracked previously)
- Payment gateway fees (based on payment method)
- Allocated expenses (if you add expenses retroactively)
- Ad spend attribution (from integration sync start date)

### Processing Time

Small stores (under 1,000 orders):1-5 minutes

Medium stores (1,000 - 10,000 orders):10-30 minutes

Large stores (10,000+ orders):1-3 hours

Processing happens in background - you can use Alpha Insights immediately while it completes

#### Historical Accuracy

### If You Add Product Costs After Orders

Orders use the product cost you enter, even if sold before you added the cost.

Example:

- Product sold on Jan 1, 2023
- You install Alpha Insights on Jan 1, 2024
- You enter product cost: $25
- Jan 1, 2023 order profit is calculated using $25 cost

For more accuracy: If you know costs changed over time, you can set date-specific costs in product settings

### Ad Spend Attribution

Important: Facebook/Google Ads data can only be synced from connection date forward

- Orders before connecting ads: No ad spend attributed (still shows gross profit)
- Orders after connecting ads: Full ad spend attribution

### Viewing Historical Data

Once processing completes:

1. Go to Alpha Insights → Reports
2. Select date range including historical dates
3. All orders appear with profit calculations

### Updating Historical Costs

If you later update product costs, historical orders recalculate automatically:

1. Edit product
2. Update cost field
3. Save
4. All orders for that product recalculate (takes 1-5 minutes)

### Limitations

What can't be tracked historically:

- Exact visitor sessions before installation (can't retroactively track website visits)
- Ad spend before integration connection
- Email opens/clicks before installation

But profit calculations still work! You get gross profit (revenue - costs) even without the traffic attribution data.

### Best Practices for Historical Data

1. Add product costs ASAP: The sooner you add costs, the more accurate historical profit is
2. Connect ad accounts early: To get ad spend attribution going forward
3. Use average costs if uncertain: An estimate is better than nothing
4. Document cost changes: Note when supplier prices changed for more accurate historical view

### Common Questions

Q: Will historical processing slow down my site?

A: No, it runs in background with low priority. Your site performs normally.

Q: Can I exclude certain old orders?

A: Yes, use order status filters or date range filters in reports.

Q: What if I had different costs in the past?

A: Use date-specific cost feature to set costs that were effective during different time periods.