WooCommerce sales reports: from a table of numbers to this week's decisions
You will find WooCommerce sales reports in the Analytics menu: Revenue, Orders, Products, Categories, Coupons and Stock. The best-selling products are shown in the Products report, sorted by items sold. The report itself changes nothing, though. The value only appears when you turn the numbers into three specific decisions for the coming week.
Author: The TellMyShop team. A guide for WordPress site and WooCommerce store owners: the cause, the manual fix and the same work in a chat conversation.
Last updated: · 6 min read
Where the reports are and what they show
WooCommerce has built-in Analytics, described in the Analytics and Sales Reports documentation. Three reports say the most about products.
| Report | What it shows | Which question it answers |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue | gross and net sales, refunds, coupons, shipping over time | is the store growing or shrinking |
| Products | items sold, net sales and number of orders per product | which products carry the store |
| Categories | sales broken down by category | which part of the range is working and which is standing still |
| Stock | stock level and stock status of products and variations | what is about to run out |
| Coupons | code usage and discount amounts | did the coupon promotion pay off |
The Products report, described on the Products report page, also lets you compare several products on one chart. That is useful when you want to check whether a new version of a product is eating into the old one's sales.
The numbers in Analytics may differ from Google Analytics. Google counts browser events, and these don't always arrive, as described in the help on the purchase report in GA4. Store owners also often ask about differences between the old Reports and Analytics, for example in the forum thread WooCommerce Analytics shows different data to Reports. For decisions about products, use the store's numbers.
How to read a report so it ends in a decision
A table with forty products doesn't tell you what to do. A fixed order of questions helps.
- Choose a period that makes sense. The last 30 or 90 days, compared with the previous period. A single week can be random.
- Take the top ten by net sales. These are the products the store earns on. Gaps in them cost the most.
- Check whether any of them dropped. A bestseller dropping is most often down to no stock, a price change, a disapproval in ads or a broken product page.
- Put sales next to stock. A bestseller with low stock is the first item to reorder.
- Find the products with no sales. The report doesn't show them, so compare it with the whole catalogue.
- Write down three decisions at most. You won't manage more in a week anyway.
Example: one page of the report and three decisions
Take a store selling coffee and accessories. The values are illustrative.
- Brazil coffee beans 1 kg is first in net sales, but sold less in the last 30 days than in the previous period. The Stock report shows 4 items, and for a few days it was at zero. Decision: order stock and allow backorders with a note for the customer, so the next gap doesn't stop sales.
- The hand grinder is in the top ten by items, but low in net sales, because it almost always goes with a discount code. Decision: check in the Coupons report whether the discount is eating the whole margin.
- The pour-over jug gets visits, but isn't in the report. Decision: go through its product page: images, description, price with delivery. How to do it step by step is in the post why a WooCommerce product is not selling.
Notice that none of these decisions reads “improve the SEO of the whole store”. A sales report is for choosing a small number of things that make a difference.
How often should you look at the reports?
Once a week is enough, if you ask the same questions each time. Looking at revenue daily worries you more often than it helps, because single days swing a lot. Once a quarter is too rare: a bestseller out of stock for three weeks has time to send customers to competitors.
A good habit is a fixed time, for example Monday morning, and a short note: the three decisions from last week, what came of them, three new ones. After a few weeks you will see which decisions really moved sales and which were just tidying up.
How the chat reads sales in your store
The TellMyShop plugin for WordPress and WooCommerce connects your store to your chat (Claude or ChatGPT). The sales report already works in the free TellMyShop Free: the chat shows the best- and worst-selling products in a chosen period, compares them with the previous period and finds products bought together. It works on products and orders, without customers' personal data.
You: What sold in the last 30 days and what does it mean for this week?
Your chat: The top five by net sales are Brazil coffee 1 kg, Ethiopia coffee 250 g, the hand grinder, paper filters and the 600 ml jug. Brazil coffee dropped compared with the previous 30 days, and it has only 4 items in stock. 14 products didn't sell once, 6 of them have no description. For this week I suggest:
1. Restock Brazil coffee.
2. Write descriptions for the 6 products with no sales and no description.
3. Add the filters as a linked product on the jug, because they are bought together.
You: Do point 3.
Your chat: Preview for the 600 ml jug:
Save? (yes / no)
Card status: waiting for your “yes”old version: Linked products: none
new version: Linked products: Paper filters, 100 pcs
The values in the conversation are illustrative. In TellMyShop Free the conversation ends with the list and the plan. In TellMyShop Pro the chat can carry out the decisions straight away with a preview and your agreement: it changes descriptions, content and linked products straight after licence activation, and stock and prices once the Sales switch is on in the plugin panel. Every change shows in the history and you can undo most of them. In Pro the conversation also has guidance from the TellMyShop Consultant, which starts with what is blocking sales and leaves cosmetic touches until last.
To be honest about the limits: the chat does not replace Google Analytics or attribution tools. It won't tell you which ad an order came from, and it doesn't promise more sales. It shows what is happening with your products and helps you choose what to deal with first.
Start with the free TellMyShop Free, which reads your store's sales. More about the plugin is on the TellMyShop for WordPress and WooCommerce page, and Pro prices on the pricing page. When the report shows a bestseller out of stock, see the post on bulk updating stock in WooCommerce.
Questions and answers
Where are the sales reports in WooCommerce?
In the Analytics menu in the WordPress admin. The Revenue report shows sales over time, the Products report the sales of individual products, and the Stock report the quantities in stock. The old WooCommerce Reports are being phased out and no longer get new features.
How do I see the best-selling products in WooCommerce?
Open Analytics > Products and choose a period. By default the report sorts products by the number of items sold. Switch the sorting to net sales if you are more interested in revenue than items.
Why does WooCommerce Analytics show different numbers from Google Analytics?
They count different things. WooCommerce counts orders saved in the store, while Google Analytics counts browser events, which can be blocked by missing cookie consent or ad blockers. For decisions about products, the store's data is better.
Will the sales report show products that don't sell at all?
The Products report only shows products that had sales in the chosen period. Products with no sales have to be found by comparing this report with the full catalogue list, for example from an export or with the chat's help.
Does TellMyShop see my customers' data with sales reports?
Not by default. The TellMyShop sales report works on products and orders without customers' personal data. Access to customer data is a separate level in the plugin panel, off by default.
WordPress is a trademark of the WordPress Foundation. WooCommerce is a trademark of Automattic Inc. Claude is a trademark of Anthropic PBC. ChatGPT and OpenAI are trademarks of OpenAI. TellMyShop is not affiliated with these companies.