How to manage your entire marketing budget (free budget planner templates)

The words “marketing budget” are sufficient to burden each marketing manager. Every dollar has to earn its place. That is why I get in with coffee at the budget season, dissolve my spreadsheet and is based on difficult decisions.

For every marketing manager, budgeting is not just a number game. It is a high operating balance act between ambition and resources.

In this article I will show you how to work every dollar harder, confidently defend your budget and set your team for success. To simplify the process, I have Eight current templates Ready for you.

Table of contents

What is a marketing budget?

As a marketing manager, I found that every smart marketing strategy is concerned with three key investments:

• Bring your product in front of the right people.
• Building of brand awareness.
• Set up backend systems that make scaling easier.

Nail this and you don’t just spend – you invest in growth.

For example, advertising is not just about leading advertisements. It’s about getting the best out of every dollar.

My approach? Dynamic ad content that adapts to user behavior and platform-optimized creative people who surpasses general ads. The result is a higher commitment, better conversions and more efficient advertising expenses.

Brand awareness has also developed. It is no longer just about publishing blog posts or eBooks. It’s about Spending strategically for multi-channel experiences that customers meet where they are already.

This means investing in podcasts, video content and interactive resources that not only press content, but actually build real connections.

But none of these scales without intelligent operational investments. Automation and SaaS tools Free budget and resources by optimizing everything from e -mail sequences to CRM tracking to performance analyzes.

AI leads it further, optimizes the advertising expenses, the personalization of content and the provision of real-time knowledge that helps every dollar to work harder.

At the end of the day, marketing is not just a cost center. It is a growth engine. When every investment works together, marketing no longer provides at expense and becomes a power multiplier for the company.

Marketing budgets for small businesses

I saw how small business owners with marketing budgets, narrow margins, hard calls and the ubiquitous fear of waste of money wrestled.

But keeping the costs slim is no choice. It is survival, especially if they are scaling.

The most difficult in budgeting for your small company is to reconcile the immediate needs with long -term growth.

Marketing drives growth. No marketing? No sale. No turnover? No business. Winning is not about output large competitors. It’s about outsmarting them.

The first step is to determine your most profitable customer acquisition channels. Double what works and cut off the dead weight.

Ready to continue your budget? Grab our free Marketing budget templates And start.

How much should a company spend on marketing?

While the answer depends on your industry and your audience, one thing is clear: in 2025 digital advertising will make up 62.7% of global advertising expenses.

It is the fastest growing channel in advertising and for a good reason: If consumers’ attention changes online, follow them either or risk becoming invisible. I saw how this layer accelerates and it is redesigned how companies prioritize their budget allocation on digital channels.

The digital advertising editions extend over everything, from desktop ads and search engines to video platforms, social media and mobile devices. These channels develop with new ad formats, algorithms and user behavior, which redesigns the commitment.

Mobile-first strategies are no longer optional. They are essential. Since mobile is more than half of all digital media consumption, brands that they do not prioritize are irrelevant.

How can you assign your budget? I recommend assigning at least half more digital, if not even.

Brands that win today often spend 60% or more for digital, since consumers actually spend their time.

Don’t just stick to this number. Invest where it has real effects.

See LinkedIn killer results? Lean. When your TIKTOK brand brand and lives InstagramDouble down there. First analyze where you get the best ROI and adjust it accordingly.

So where should the rest of your budget go? Let us break down the smartest movements for maximum effects.

Examples of marketing costs

After years of managing budgets (and on the way numerous mistakes) I found five core areas that really move the needle: software, freelancers, staff, advertising and creation of content.

I will guide you through everyone, which I have learned about intelligent spending decisions.

1. Software

The construction of a tech stack feels overwhelming. There is a Free tool for everything these days, and everyone promises to revolutionize their marketing.

But here is what actually works: Start with the basics that directly influence your goals. Almost Half of the companies (47%) start with Google Analytics because you cannot improve what you do not measure.

Another 43% use canva or similar design tools because good graphics are important, but not everyone needs the full adobe suite on the first day.

Since there is a marketing tool for almost every task that you can imagine, you are generally divided into the following categories:

Pro tip: I have found that the key is ruthlessly practical. What problems do your team actually slow down? First invest in these tools. The rest can wait.

2. Freelance callers

Here is a scenario that I familiarize myself: you have a big start of the campaign next week, and suddenly your designer is flooded, your copywriter is overloaded and your deadline does not move.

Then I contact freelancers, my secret weapon to quickly do high -quality work without overloading my team or crawling at the last minute.

A short tip from someone who learned on the hard tour: Set your freelance budget before you even look. Trust me, it is far too easy to fall in love with the portfolio of a freelancer just to realize that you are far outside your price range.

3 .. New staff

While the HR department takes over the recruitment, you have to think bigger about how new employees fit into your marketing vision.

Here is what is interesting: 70% of the hiring specialists Say, we are faced with a lack of talent, especially when it comes to finding this perfect mix of industry knowledge and soft skills.

I learned it Take in with three important questions:

• What specific qualification gap is holding back our marketing goals?
• How will this role develop when our marketing strategy grows?
• What is the mixture of technical expertise and emotional intelligence that we need? (Entertaining fact: 3 of 4 attitudes professionals say that EQ is now the most important ability

Pro tip: With successful attitudes, it is about finding people who can adapt when marketing develops. More than half of the companies move into the ability base and focus less on traditional requirements and more on what candidates can actually do. When budgeting new employees, think about the initial investment and consider how you can scale your marketing efforts in the long term.

4. Advertising

Here is something that needed me for years to learn: creating great content is only half the battle – you have to put it in front of the right people.

With 5.5 billion People online (wild, right?), You have to be smart about how to advertise your content.

I use a pretty simple approach:

• Put the largest part of your budget (70%) in what is already working. If LinkedIn’s ads crush it, don’t repair what is not broken.
• Test new channels with about 20%. Maybe Tikkok is your next gold mine?
• Keep 10% for unexpected options. Trust me, you always appear.

The goal is not to be everywhere. It is where your audience actually pays attention.

5. Creation of content

Content marketing generates three times more leads than conventional methods, but let us be real: it also requires time and money to make up for it.

Budget how much money is initiated in creating this content so that they can adapt accordingly based on its return on capital.

After knowing what you want to include in your budget, let’s broke down where this money actually leads.

Reflection of the marketing budget

How do you divide your budget for maximum effects? Start with the 70-20-10 rule:

• 70% are based on proven strategies that already promote the results.
• 20% fund new strategies for fuel growth.
• 10% are reserved for brave, experimental ideas.

In this context, your marketing remains stable and is innovatively innovative.

Example of marketing costs

I have found that practical examples are often the best way to understand the budget. Let me do it by usually structuring a marketing budget of 10,000 US dollars:

• Invest $ 7,000 (70%) in your proven channels. In my experience, this means concentrating on the marketing software on which you rely on every day, the paid search campaigns that consistently cut off, and your established social media marketing efforts.
• Add the next 2,000 US dollars (20%) to growth opportunities. Here you test marketing for new products or functions. I saw how this approach helps companies to expand their reach and at the same time manage the risk.
• Finally, keep $ 1,000 (10%) to experiment. This is your chance to try out sponsored content or aspiring marketing channels that could offer you an advantage over competitors.

Allocation to channel

I love the 70-20-10 framework as a starting point, but I keep looking at wider industry patterns to check our strategy. The latest Gartner research Has some fascinating trends in the way CMOS invest their budgets from 2024.

source

Here is what I see: Digital channels are now taking 57.1% of the paid media editions, whereby the investments collapse as follows:

• Search advertising leads at 13.6% (I’m not surprised. It is still one of our most reliable channels)
• Social advertising follows 12.2% (and in my experience grows steadily)
• The digital display lasts 10.7% strong

But don’t count traditional channels. You are still power plants:

• Event marketing: 17.1% (I saw an incredible ROI of well-performed events)
• Sponsorships: 16.4%
• Television: 16%

The extent of the marketing investments continues to grow. We look at ourselves $ 1 Billion $ in 2025With 750 billion US dollars to digital ads.

But here is an interesting insight that I noticed: While CMOS call digital videos/streaming as the most effective channel, it does not receive the top budget. In my experience, this often signals an opportunity. Sometimes the highest channels are not the most obvious.

Let us go into how these trends for every large marketing channel lead to practical budget decisions. I will share what I work best in different scenarios.

Paid search advertising

I have found that successful PPC budget management goes far beyond Create and execute ads on Google and basic BID optimization. When I structure search budgets, I concentrate on the strategic assignment over the entire funnel.

While Bottom-funnel conversion campaigns often have the largest proportion, they consider 15 to 20% to be brand protection and competitive conditions. This balance has helped my customer consistently to maintain the market position and at the same time to promote growth.

The cost management when paid requires a differentiated approach. In my experience, you can get your CPC: Customer Lifestyle Life Life relationship according to campaign types about the clearest picture of scalability.

I use Google’s keyword planner For first research, but I have learned that actual performance data is your best guide for budget optimization. Even with a set budget of 2,000 US dollars, you can only generate $ 1,500 on clicks, which I have found is often a sign that you have to refine the goal instead of just increasing expenses.

This is how I approach the PPC budget:

• Card campaign types for business goals.
• Fixed performance thresholds according to campaign category.
• Monitor the imprint against budget caps.
• Adaptation based on the effects on the efficiency of quality factors.

Social media

When building social media budgets, I always start with the strategic foundations. As with PPC, social platforms use auction systems for preparation, but I have found that success depends more on the demanding target group than on the pure BID strategy.

In my experience with various team structures, I learned that there are two main options:

• Build an internal team.
• Partner with an agency.

Agency partnerships usually cost between $ 2,000 and 20,000 per monthBut I learned to look beyond the holder. The best agencies usually retain a division of 30/70 between strategy and execution, with a ratio that consistently achieves the stronger results.

Here is the framework that I use in the decision between internal and agency approaches:

• Strategic control requirements.
• Platform complexity and specialization needs.
• Creative production scale.
• Performance analysis depth.

Content marketing

I bring content marketing investments in four core areas.

1. Strategy and planning (15-20%): This is their basis. I invest in content architecture, public research and comprehensive topics. I have found that companies that split here often end with content that drive traffic but do not convert.
2. Creation and production (35-40%): This usually requires the greatest assignment. It covers development, processing, design and multimedia production. I recommend compensating for investments between Cornerstone content that build up authority and tactical content, promoting conversions.
3. Distribution and reinforcement (25-30%): Many organizations differentiate here. I am a significant budget for paid advertising, strategic partnerships and syndication. In my experience, even exceptional content needs a strategic reinforcement to achieve ROI.
4. Performance optimization (15-20%): This is crucial for sustainable success. I ensure resources for analyzes, tests and regular content refreshments. I saw twice or three times the content of strategic optimization within months.

The costs for content marketing vary greatly from your goals and your focus area. The setting of external consultants or agencies to process content marketing for you 2,000 to 10,000 US dollars per month for small to medium -sized companies.

When advising the resource assignment between internal teams and agencies, I rate several factors:

• Required content speed and complexity.
• Specialized expertise needs.
• Distribution channel mix.
• Measurement capabilities.

For ROI tracking, I recommend concentrating on three important dimensions:

• Direct revenue effects through the generation of leads and conversions.
• Fire authority structured through a share of language and audience growth.
• Expert level improvements in sales and support.

Here is the most important insight from my experience: Most of the fighting content programs do not fail due to content quality – they fail due to improper resource assignment in these areas.

Pro tip: I pursue these metrics with hub spots Campaign budget management systemWhich helps me to monitor the performance across channels and at the same time to keep a clear view of our general distribution of the marketing output.

E -mail marketing

While I analyzed the canal performance, I found that the call of email marketing is deserved for a high ROI.

But there is a catch.

While it gives the acquisition rates around 40 times higher than Facebook and X, this performance depends exclusively on strategic investments in the right areas.

Let me tell how I structured e -mail marketing budgets to achieve maximum effects. I neglect it in these four core components:

1. First, there is your technology pile (15-25% of the budget). This is not just your ESP. I recommend taking automation tools, test platforms and critical integrations with me. I have seen too many companies here and restricted the potential of their program.
2. Next comes strategy and planning (20-30%). This includes the development of segmentation, travel mapping and integration planning. When I Prune’s E -Mail programs, a weak strategy is often the guilty.
3. The creation of content usually requires the largest allocation (30-40%). This includes campaigns, nursing flows and transaction -e emails. The success correlates directly with the personalization functions of the content.
4. After all, they never save on analytics and optimization (15-25%). In my experience, robust test and optimization processes double or triple in the first year.

For companies that weigh partnerships with agencies compared to in-house development, I rate three factors:

• Technical complexity of the necessary automation.
• Volume and sophistication of the required content.
• Internal resource availability and expertise.

The right choice depends on your specific situation. For example, I often recommend agencies for complex automation requirements, but I recommend creating internal teams if the content volume is the main driver.

Search engine optimization

An effective SEO investment depends heavily on your SEO -maturity phase. I categorize this on three levels: foundation (technical optimization), growth (structure of content authority) and competitive advantage (market leadership).

This is how I structure SEO budgets for maximum effects in these phases:

1. Technical infrastructure (20-30%): I start with the foundation. This includes the location architecture, speed optimization and indexing management. I have underpinned too many companies here, only to confront costly corrections later. When I Prune to fight SEO programs, technical debt is often the hidden performance murderer.
2. Content development (30-40%): This usually requires the greatest allocation. It includes strategic content creating, on-page optimization and regular content. I have found that sustainable SEO success correlates directly with consistent, high-quality content investments.
3. Authority building (20-25%): Here I focus on digital PR, strategic partnerships and targeted reach. The key here is quality via quantity. I have better results from five relevant, relevant links than fifty mediocre.
4. Analytics and strategy (15-20%): Never underestimate the value of robust persecution and analysis. I always make sure that the budgets contain resources for advanced analyzes, competitive analyzes and opportunities identification. This often shows high opportunities that others miss.

When advising customers in agency partnerships compared to internal teams, I rate several factors:

• Existing technical debt and solution complexity.
• Required content volume and expertise.
• Competition landscape intensity.
• Internal team functions.

For the measurement, I recommend looking beyond basic traffic metrics. Focus on:

• Sales contribution according to the content type.
• Customer acquisition costs compared to other channels.
• Brand search volume trends.
• Market share of the search metrics.

How to create a marketing budget

1. Know your buyer’s journey.
2. Align your budget for your marketing goals.
3. Pay attention to hidden marketing costs.
4. Remember where your priorities are.
5. Spend your budget intelligently.
6. Prepare for the measurement of ROI.

Spreadsheet alone Do not help you understand how to spend your marketing money this year. Create a sound Marketing budget It starts to know what purpose this budget will meet and which marketing teams it will be represented.

Here you can find out how I can create a marketing budget.

1. Know your buyer’s journey.

Your buyer’s trip consists of the steps that your audience from Prospect makes to the paying customer.

By mapping your buyer’s journey, you can see how your audience interacts with your marketing in every phase. This helps you to sharpen your goals and spend your budget where it is most important.

I always ask myself these questions as I define my buyer’s journey:

• How do leads and customers usually discover my products?
• What information do you need before you make a purchase?
• How many site visits get my website every month?
• How many leads do we generate per month and how many percentage convert in paying customers?
• How much does it cost to acquire and convert new leads?
• What is the average sales per lead?

Defining my buyer’s journey helps me identify what works, fix what is not, and focus my budget where it counts.

2. Align your budget to your marketing goals.

Your marketing editions – how much and where – depends entirely on your goals.

When creating your marketing budget, make sure that you only finance initiatives that correspond to your current goals and are based on your audience’s journey from the prospect to the customer.

This can include:

• Show Show to apply for a new product that will bring you onto the market this year.
• Sponsored social media contributions to expand the following supporters of their new Facebook page.
• Paid search engine advertisements to control the traffic (and purchases) into a certain product page.
• Set contract blogger to increase organic search traffic on your company’s website.

I saw how to stretch budgets (and break), depending on whether the focus is the lead generation or the lead conversion.

Jessica Webb KennedyFormerly a marketer of the demand for demand at Drift Kings Media, now product marketing manager at Jasper, does this.

“Most of the money that you spend on paid efforts is usually calculated based on the volume of the clicks or impressions. For this reason, you often want to award more budget for campaigns with a broad audience and high -managers, ”says Kennedy.

For example, she explains that a tweet or a Facebook ad that advertises top-of-fun-lead generation offer is probably attracting more clicks than a campaign with medium or lower funnel.

Your paid advertising costs will also be shifted depending on a target group.

“You can see yourself as an example of Twitter advertising,” says Webb.

“You have the option of focusing your campaigns based on the interests or keywords of the users based on the keywords you are looking for. The interests are a much wider category, while smaller user bags are looking for a certain keyword. Your interest -based audience will therefore be much larger and require a larger budget, ”she adds.

I saw this game first -hand. It requires a larger budget because it reaches more people, a broad target group such as B. to request interest -based segments. In contrast, the keyword-based targeting focuses on a smaller, highly specific group and possibly offers greater relevance with a lower reach.

Ultimately, your marketing dollars should work for your goals. Spend with carefully.

3 .. Beware of hidden marketing costs.

A well-maintained budget table prevents them Quarters end Or freak-outs at the end of the year when you recognize: “Whoa … What did I spend all the money for?”

I saw that it happened. Overlooked expenses sneak up and suddenly marketers strive to cover unexpected costs. Product marketing in particular is one of the areas in which budgeting can lead to serious surprises.

Meghan Keaney AndersonThe former Drift Kings Media Vice President for Marketing, now head of product marketing at Watershed, indicates that marketers often forget the key costs beyond just advertising.

“People often budget product marketing with only ideas and advertising campaigns,” explains Anderson.

Successful product marketing is not just about the big splash. Before the start, research and message tests must be invested.

“When you talk to customers about your pain points at an early stage, the news sharpens and paves your way for a powerful start,” says Anderson.

4. Remember where your priorities are.

Marketing is full of add -ons, uppsells and “premium” versions, but how many are the price actually worth? The best way to find out is to pursue any costs.

I carefully monitor my budget and agree every dollar with the results I get. If you know exactly where your money is going, it is easier to concentrate on what works and lower the rest without receiving the second attention.

For example, take public relations work. It is a field with budget mining tools, which makes intelligent editions even more critical. Perhaps you are blowing striking distribution software while underlining media relationships that move the needle.

There are many tools to “help create and distribute the PR professionals, to measure important stakeholders for targets and reach and effectiveness,” says Nathaniel EberleFormer PR director at Drift Kings Media and now VP of Global Brand at Goto.

Before you spend money on PR tools, the teams have to determine which journalists, influencers or decision-makers have to achieve, and then a budget.

“While the media and the digital landscape develop at an exciting speed, it is the key to understanding the real-time roi of their expenses. Today’s must-have tool can be worthless tomorrow, ”adds Eberle.

The PR landscape moves quickly. If you do not constantly re -rate your tools and expenses, you will probably waste money.

5. Provide your budget clever.

If you open them Marketing budget templates And take a look at all the different details in them, do not annoy yourself if you cannot tick every field.

I do not campaign for a “more and more” approach for marketing. I campaign for an “always intelligent” approach. The costs listed are not mandatory.

They should only lead their thinking and make sure that they have not overlooked hidden costs.

6. Prepare to measure the ROI.

If I put a certain amount of money in a certain area, I would like to determine whether my budgeting helps me or injured while planning future budgets. The best way to do this is to measure the ROI.

If the money I spent on an article leads to my company achieving more than in return, I would like to increase the budget next year. If my money does not end in a positive ROI, I check my budget again.

Marketing budget templates

It can feel overwhelming if you are not sure how to share or follow your expenses. I was there. But here are the good news: this Marketing budget templates Can help guess the assumption from the budgeting. I know how much easier the budgeting will be when you have the right tools.

Regardless of whether I pursue content expenditure, paid advertisements or event costs, these templates – available in both Excel and Googe leaves – give me clarity and control over my marketing budget so that I can manage everything at a monthly and quarterly level.

Let us immerse yourself and see how these templates can simplify your planning and persecution.

1. Master marketing budget template

Free download: Master Marketing Budget Template

It is helpful to have individual budget templates for certain marketing departments and activities, but it is also nice to take a step back and see the overall picture.

With the master marketing budget, you can do exactly that: This is the place where you can collect the sums from the other seven templates in the bundle and see all your expenses in one place.

• Budget overview of all departments: In the first table you can see both your budget and your actual editions of all marketing departments, including product marketing, content marketing, paid advertising, PR, branding and creative as well as events.
• Month-month-month expenditure overview: For a better bird’s eye view of all editions, take a look at this table, where you can see the aggregated budget and the actual editions for all marketing activities.
• Marketing budget compared to the actual output card: With this diagram you can determine trends for editions and budgeting – where you are on the go and where you are excessive.

2. Product marketing budget template

Free download: product marketing budget template

This template leads you step by step through the budgeting process for a product introduction.

From determining product/market adjustments to the execution of user tests to the promotion of your finished product, our product marketing budget template will ensure that you do not overlook any important editions.

• Budget and expenditure per product marketing activity: With this table you can set a budget and track your expenses for product marketing activities such as the implementation of focus groups, the hosting of starting events and the creation of White Papers.
• Year-to-time summary of the categorical expenditure: Here you can see an aggregated summary of all editions divided by categories, such as B. Product exposure expenses and product tests. The amount of money that you have left is also automatically calculated.
• Year-to-year-together diagram: With this diagram you can see a visual breakdown of where most of your funds go, which is immensely helpful to find out where you can drive back and where you can invest more.

3 .. Temporary Budget template

Free download: content budget template

The budget, which is necessary for the creation and promotion of content, can vary greatly from organization to organization.

For example, while some organizations keep the most of their content, others rely more on freelancers and contractors.

And while many different software products, publishing tools and services use, others follow a much simpler approach.

• Budget and expenditure per content marketing activity: With this table you can define a budget and track expenditure for content marketing activities such as purchase design software, create the target pages and setting freelance authors and set freelance authors
• Year-to-time summary of the categorical expenditure: Here you will see an aggregated summary of all editions shared by category, e.g. B. software purchases and freelance costs. The amount of money that you have left is also automatically calculated.
• Year-to-year-together diagram: With this diagram you can see a visual breakdown of where most of your funds go, which is immensely helpful to find out where you can drive back and where you can invest more.

This should cover as many content bases as possible. So if you see the costs listed that do not apply to your organization, delete them. (This is the beauty of Excel table calculations: you can adapt them to your specific needs.)

4. Paid advertising budget template

Free download: paid advertising budget template

Paid advertising: Is it really qualified as an inbound marketing tactics/channel? This is a invited question, my friends and one that I cannot answer in detail in this post.

What I can tell you for sure is that You can make paid advertising on “inbound” – ie by targeting certain buyers and using paid advertising as a supplement to their organic efforts to promote awareness and opportunities for the conversion.

The measurement of the effectiveness of your paid advertising campaigns is also of the utmost importance to do things in a detail.

With our paid advertising budget template, you can keep an eye on your monthly (and quarterly) advertising expenses and then exceed the amounts with your metrics of the lead generation to determine your costs per lead.

• Budget and expenses per paid advertising activity: With this table you can set a budget and track the expenses for paid advertising activities, e.g. B. starting CPC campaigns, creating social media ads and investing in a content recognition platform.
• Year-to-time summary of the categorical expenditure: Here you can see an aggregated summary of all editions divided by categories, such as B. Search advertising and lead generation. The amount of money that you have left is also automatically calculated.
• Year-to-year-together diagram: With this diagram you can see a visual breakdown of where most of your funds go, which is immensely helpful to find out where you can drive back and where you can invest more.

5. PR budget template for public relations

Free download: PR template for public relations

The expenditure of public relations is more than just the payment of press releases. From the reputation monitoring software to travel (e.g. events and trading shows) to the application for awards, there are many PR costs that can be overlooked too easily.

To ensure that you make up all PR-related expenses of your company, visit our PR template for public relations.

• Budget and expenditure per public relations: activity: With this table you can set a budget and follow the expenses for PR activities, e.g. B. the purchase of a subscription for press releases, the creation of PR content and the hosting of PR evening dinner.
• Year-to-time summary of the categorical expenditure: Here you will see an aggregated summary of all editions divided by categories, e.g. B. subscriptions, content, trade fairs and media relationships. The amount of money that you have left is also automatically calculated.
• Year-to-year-together diagram: With this diagram you can see a visual breakdown of where most of your funds go, which is immensely helpful to find out where you can drive back and where you can invest more.

6. Branding And Creative budget template

Free download: branding and creative budget template

In order to produce high-quality, innovative graphics, videos and other content, the branding and creative team from today need more than just Photoshop … much more.

One of the greatest – and most frequently overlooked – is: storage.

If your organization produces a lot of video, memory is particularly important. Because, as it turns out, you should not think of a megabyte (MB) or even a gigabyte (GB) scale (gigabytes (GB), but on a terabyte (TB) scale. For your information: 1 terabyte = 1 trillion bytes.

With our free template you can keep an eye on all your storage costs (and other brand and creative costs).

• Budget and expenses per branding and creative activity: With this table you can define a budget and track expenses for branding and creative activities, e.g. B. the purchase of creative software, investing in hardware and renting devices.
• Year-to-time summary of the categorical expenditure: Here you will see an aggregated summary of all editions shared by categories, e.g. B. Software subscriptions, equipment rents and outsourcing costs. The amount of money that you have left is also automatically calculated.
• Year-to-year-together diagram: With this diagram you can see a visual breakdown of where most of your funds go, which is immensely helpful to find out where you can drive back and where you can invest more.

7. Website -new design of the budget template

Free download: Website -new design of the budget template

Budgeting for a website new design can be seriously difficult. With so many moving parts, there is plenty of space for the underestimation or miscalculation of costs.

We have created our budget template for the redesign budget for website so that you can keep all of your redesign editions in a comfortable place. (You are not sure whether your current website is suitable for redesign? Rate your website with this tool.))

• Budget and expenses per website redesign activities: With this table you can set a budget and follow the expenses for website new design activities, e.g. B. buying a domain name, investing in CMS software and creating wireframes.
• Year-to-time summary of the categorical expenditure: Here you will see an aggregated summary of all editions divided by categories such as software, content and design and content migration. The amount of money that you have left is also automatically calculated.
• Website -new design “Actual costs according to category” card diagram: With this diagram you can see a percentage breakdown of where most of your funds are available, which is immensely helpful to find out where you can school back and where you can invest more.

8. Event budget template

Free download: event budget template

When planning an event, the associated costs can initially appear obviously. Of course there is to take into account the venue. And the PA system and the microphones. And then the costs associated with the booking and the introduction of moderators/actors.

That’s pretty much that, isn’t it? Incorrect.

Is the event location delivered with tables/chairs, for example, or do you have to rent it separately? Do you want your participants to wear name signs, and if so, will you print out the name tags in advance or the participants write their own names on empty tags?

If the latter, have you taken into account in the pens or markers that you have to record? As you can see, the planning for an event can lead you down many rabbit holes.

Use our Event budget template to stay organized.

• Budget and expenses per event hosting activity: With this table you can set a budget and track expenses for event hosting activities, e.g. B. the rental of an event hall, the purchase of food and drinks and the attitude of moderators.
• Year-to-time summary of the categorical expenditure: Here you will see an aggregated summary of all editions divided by categories such as income, refreshments and promotion. The amount of money that you have left is also automatically calculated.
• Event “Actual costs according to category” district diagram: In this diagram shows a percentage breakdown where most of their funds are available. This is immensely helpful to determine where you are scaling back and where you can invest more.

Example marketing budgets

How much should you actually spend on marketing in 2025? With the average of the marketing budgets 7.7% of sales Every dollar has to work hard in 2024. But what is the best way to assign it?

Based on the downward trend of the post -pandemical marketing budget, I broke down how different industries could structure their marketing editions and what this means for their strategy. Every budget reflects how any kind of company earns money and what priorities it needs for growth.

Early phase-saas startup

• Annual turnover: 2 million US dollars
• Marketing budget (7.7%): $ 154,000

Quarterly discussion

• Digital advertising (35%): USD 13,475

• Search ads: $ 7,000 (focuses on high-quality keywords)
• Social media ads: 4,475 US dollars (mainly LinkedIn and Meta)
• Ads from ads: $ 2,000 (retargeting campaigns)

• Content marketing (25%): 9,625 USD
• Sales activity (20%): 7,700 USD (tools, collateral and training to convert sales teams efficiently – crucial for SaaS companies with long sales cycles).
• Events/PR (15%): $ 5,775
• Test new channels (5%): USD 1,925 (research into emerging platforms and new acquisition strategies)

What I like

I like how this budget prioritizes the demand for demand, what exactly is what a SaaS startup needs in the early stages.

35% of the budget go to digital displays because the quick takeover of customers is crucial. The search ads of $ 7,000 make sense because Saas lives from high-quality keywords that are aimed at buyers who are actively looking for solutions.

I also appreciate the 25% for content marketing, since Saas has long sales cycles and help to educate and maintain the leads over time.

The 20% for sales activity is also an intelligent step, since Saa’s sales require strong security and training to support the repetitions to close business.

After all, I think it’s great that 5% are put aside for testing new channels. Startups don’t always know which platform is best scaled. Therefore, it is a smart way to be ahead of the trend.

Established E -Commerce business

Annual turnover: 10 million US dollars

Marketing budget (7.7%): 770,000 USD

Quarterly discussion

• Performance marketing (40%): 77,000 US dollars

• Looking for advertising: 25,000 US dollars
• Social media ads: 30,000 US dollars
• Shopping ads: 22,000 US dollars

• E -mail marketing (25%): 48,125 US dollars (storage, recovery of abandoning and life cycle automation)
• Content and SEO (20%): $ 38,500
• Brand awareness (10%): $ 19,250 $
• Experimental channels (5%): 9,625 USD

What I like

I like how this budget refers to performance marketing (40%), since E -Commerce is only about scaling and conversion of traffic. The division between search, social and purchasing advertising ensures a diversified AD strategy that reduces the risk.

The 25% for e -mail marketing is something I really appreciate. Too many E -Commerce brands admit and forget that e -mail marketing delivers one of the highest ROI. A strong investment here ensures that brands can maximize the lifespan, restore abandoned carts and create repeated buyers.

I also like the 20% for content and SEO. It tells me that the brand is not only dependent on ads, but also builds up sustainable and long -term traffic through organic search. This is a critical step because the advertising costs continue to increase.

Specialist service companies

Annual turnover: USD 5 million

Marketing budget (7.7%): USD 385,000

Quarterly discussion

• Lead generation (30%): $ 28,875 (targeted public relations, inbound strategies and conversion -optimization)
• Content marketing (25%): USD 24,062
• Event Marketing (20%): $ 19,250 $
• Digital presence (15%): $ 14,437
• Brand building (10%): USD 9,625

What I like

I like how the LEAD generation receives the largest proportion (30%), since they do not gain customers through impulse purchases in professional services. The focus on targeted public relations and inbound strategies shows me that this budget is structured for high-quality lead conversion and not only for the volume.

I also appreciate the 25% investment in content marketing because the specialist knowledge in this industry is sold. White papers, webinars and thought leaders perform trust and authority.

The 20% for the event marketing also makes sense. This industry is still heavily based on networks and personal relationships.

At events, companies can contact high -quality customers and close offers. Therefore, this budget reflects how sales actually happen in professional services.

Brand Direct-to Consumer (D2C)

Annual turnover: 20 million US dollars

Marketing budget (7.7%): USD 1.54 million

Quarterly discussion

• Social -Media advertising (35%): $ 134,750
• Influencer marketing (25%): 96,250 USD
• Content creation (20%): 77,000 USD
• E -mail marketing (15%): 57,750 USD
• Customer research (5%): $ 19,250

What I like

I like how 35% of the budget of social media advertising go, as this is the backbone of the D2C growth. Social advertisements enable precise targeting, quick examination and scalable acquisition.

The 25% for influencer marketing is also an intelligent investment. D2C buyers rely on trustworthy voices and social evidence. This ensures a mixture of organic trust formation and paid reinforcements.

I also love the 20% for creating content. With social platforms that prioritize appealing content, a D2C brand cannot be a weak creative. This budget ensures high quality images, UGC and video production.

B2B Manufacturing Company

Annual turnover: $ 50 million

Marketing budget (7.7%): USD 3.85 million

Quarterly discussion

• Mass and events (30%): $ 288,750
• Digital marketing (25%): 240,625 USD
• Sales support (20%): $ 192,500
• Accounto -based marketing (15%): $ 144,375
• Market research (10%): 96,250 USD

What I like

I like how trading shows and events take 30% of the budget because such large B2B deals are made. The personal network is still essential in this industry, and this budget reflects this.

The 25% for digital marketing are also an intelligent step. Historically, production companies have interrupted in digitally. This ensures the paid search, SEO and content marketing that generate incoming leads.

I also appreciate the 15% investment in the account-based marketing (ABM). B2B sales require the alignment to certain high-quality accounts, so that this assignment ensures that marketing efforts match the sales in order to achieve large offers.

Marketing budget vs. advertising budget

In my experience, one of the most common confusion points that I can encounter is the difference between marketing and advertising budgets. While both aim to attract the consumer’s interest and increase sales, they serve different purposes in their overall strategy.

Marketing budgets Cover the entire customer trip. When I create a marketing budget, I plan everything, from market research and brand development to customer loyalty and analysis tools.

It is like planning an entire house, including the basis, rooms and all furnishings that make it functional.

Advertising budgetsOn the other hand, focus specifically on the creation of consciousness and the inclusion of customers via paid channels.

Consider it as your megaphone: the tools and platforms with which you will strengthen your message. In my budget planning, advertising usually falls under the larger roof of marketing, similar to your living room furniture under your budget for improving the house at home.

While advertising budgets often represent most of the marketing budgets (I usually see 40-60% of the total marketing editions), I have learned that advertisements are only effective if they are integrated with larger marketing efforts.

Pro tip: When I carry out a paid social campaign, I have to make sure that we have the right content strategy, target pages and subsequent sequences in order to convert this paid data traffic into actual customers.

For this reason, I always emphasize my team that successful marketing not only has a large advertising budget, but a comprehensive marketing budget that supports every contact point in the customer trip.

What is an advertising budget?

Your advertising budget is a subset of your marketing budget. An advertising budget is the total amount that you expect to create, test and execute advertising, include consumers. The advertising budgets also cover the costs for the evaluation of the advertising performance and the processes of the necessary changes if the ads do not meet expectations.

Example of advertising budget

Here is a small sample budget for the expenses of a quarter by a hypothetical company that has decided to invest heavily in video marketing. This template was created with the Master budget template, the first template listed in the above section.

Based on the above figures, the total costs of video advertising for the quarter exceeded the budget by $ 20, while the total costs of full -time valuations exceeded the budget by $ 2,400. This means that the company tends to the budget in the first three months of the year.

Why could that happen? Perhaps a pay-per-click campaign (PPC) received more clicks from spectators on YouTube, and a sharp, video-sized job candidate has negotiated a higher salary.

Based on the difference between the planned expenses of this company and the actual expenditure, your budget template created the following diagram:

What should be included in an advertising budget

Six costs form the core of effective advertising budgets. Let me collapse like I think about everyone.

1. Internal resources

When I plan for internal resources, I think about only the employees. I look at both the people and the tools they need to be successful.

For example, the time of my team for advertising campaigns is not just about your salaries. It is about investing in your special training for new advertising platforms, ensuring that you have the right tools to work efficiently and build up in good time for creative cooperation.

I have learned that the underestimation of these support costs can seriously affect campaign effectiveness.

2. Market research

Market research has developed far beyond simple surveys and focus groups. I invest both in current customer feedback loops and in a wider market analysis.

This can mean that A/B tests carry out ad-creatives, competitor strategies are analyzed or tools are driven with AI in order to recognize emerging trends. I have found that solid market research often pays for yourself by preventing costly campaign errors.

3. Provider of third -party providers

I strategically go to the agency and freelance partnerships to the agency and freelancers. Instead of seeing them as just additional hands, I see them as a specialist who can fill certain specialist gaps.

For example, I could bring in a specialized agency for a product introduction and at the same time keep daily ad management in my own house. This flexible approach helps me to scale the efforts up or down as required without maintaining a larger permanent team.

4. Fund creation

The days of uniform creativity are long gone. I budget to create several versions of assets that are tailored to various platforms and audiences.

This includes variations for different screen sizes, platform -specific formats (think of TikTok against LinkedIn) and different phases of customer trip.

I have learned that high -quality, platform -optimized creatives often deliver a better ROI than generic assets everywhere.

5. Advertising area expenditure

Advertising space is no longer just about buying impressions. I distributed budget based on platform performance and behavior patterns of the audience.

This can mean that you invest a lot in search ads in top purchases or assign more social platforms in certain public engagement times. The key is to maintain the flexibility in postponing expenses based on real-time performance data.

6. Performance evaluation

I have learned that the performance assessment requires its own budget. This not only covers analysis tools, but also the resources with which data must be converted into implementable knowledge.

I invest in tools that follow the cross-channel attribution, measure brand lift and calculate real roas (return on advertising expenses). This helps me to make data -controlled decisions about where I invest more and where I can withdraw.

In my experience The success of an advertising budget often depends on how well these six components work together Instead of how much is output for each one.

In total, the costs of these six components to obtain their potential advertising budget. If this is your first year that creates an advertising budget, set the budget caps a little higher than you can expect. If you have the data for advertisements in the previous years, use this information to determine the expected costs.

It is also worth noting that the advertising budgets are rarely on the finish when the costs for digital advertising space increase and the customer expectations develop.

As a result, it is worth building up in an additional household area if advertisements cannot meet expectations or benefit powerful campaigns by increasing their reach.

How to set and monitor your advertising budget

Advertising budgets are not static. Instead, they change over time in response to business goals and consumer expectations.

In order to use the best of your advertising budget, it is important to determine both a baseline and monitoring of key figures over time. This is what it looks like in practice.

Setting an advertising budget

Follow three steps to set your basic advertising budget.

Step 1: choose a strategy.

I always recommend starting with strategy before numbers. Too many teams jump directly to the channel selection without taking into account their overall goals.

Before we assign a single dollar, I ask: Do we try to enter a new market, defend our current position or start a new product? Each scenario requires a different approach to budget.

For example, if I am planning a new product introduction, I am usually more budget for consciousness and educational channels. However, if I concentrate on the growth of the market share, I can shift more resources to conversion -oriented campaigns.

Pro tip: Meet customers where you are, not where you want you to have you. If current strategies do not work and data tell you that customers have moved on, pack your bags and carry out the change.

Step 2: Select measurable goals.

Vage targets lead to vague results. Make them specific and measurable when determining goals.

Instead of saying that “the brand awareness increases”, they aim at certain goals such as “achieve an increase in the search volume by 25%” or “cost per qualified lead of $ 50 or less”.

It is crucial to combine these goals with the actual business results. I make sure that every metric that I pursue traces back to income or strategic business objectives. This makes it much easier to justify budget adjustments if necessary.

Pro tip: Just choose a few metrics to start. While more data provides more insights, it can lead to overloading information too quickly, which increases the risk that implementable data is lost in the shuffle.

Step 3: research your research.

Research is not just a one -off activity before campaigning is started. I entertain the ongoing research in three key areas:

• Competition analysis. Understanding competitors and channel preferences
• Customer behavior. Follow changes in the way our audience consumes media.
• Channel performance. Monitoring which platforms provide the best results for our industry.

Pro tip: Throw a wide network. Combine personal interactions, online reviews, digital surveys and customer service stories to better understand what customers want and whether you offer them. Equipped with strategies, goals and data, you are better positioned to create a realistic advertising budget with which you can address the ideal target group and arouse your interest.

Monitoring of your budget

Keep your budget on the right track by monitoring three important metrics:

1. Return -on -AD editions (Roas)

Roas helps to determine whether your advertisements generate sales or lose money.

To find Roas, share sales with the costs of these ads to advertisements.

For example, if your ads produced sales of USD 1,000 and cost 200 US dollars, share $ 200 for $ 200 to get a Roas of 5.

Higher Roas values ​​mean more power for the costs. Values ​​under 1 mean that advertisements cost more than the income they achieve.

Pro tip: Roas is not enough. While it shows the total value of ads compared to expenses, it says nothing about customers themselves. If your goal is to promote repeated purchases, Roas can show you that advertisements work, but it cannot tell you whether the same customers return or whether purchases have been arrested.

2. Conversion rate

The conversion rate measures how often customers take a specific measure when you look at an advertisement.

This campaign may click on the display to visit your website, download a free E -book or another resource or register for e -mail newsletter.

To determine the conversion rate of your ads (measured in a percentage), divide the total number of conversions by the total number of the advertising views and multiply them by 100.

Pro tip: The conversion rate is often the first metric to drop because the advertising loses effectiveness. As a result, it is worth measuring the conversions weekly or two weeks in order to make the necessary advertising changes.

3. Cost per lead (CPL)

The costs per lead offer a look at the advertising expenses per person.

This value is calculated by shared the total amount of advertising by the total number of leads attributed to it.

While metrics such as Roas show sales in connection with advertisements, CPL shows the number of leads.

Consider a company that measures the turnover of ad-intended sales for $ 10,000, and the advertising expenses for an outstanding Roas of $ 10 the following month, however, sales fell. What’s up?

CPL now only shows 20 leads for the advertisement, which means that every LEAD cost 50 US dollars. Without repeat expenses in the following months, the display remained below average. As a result, it is important to measure both Roas and CPL to take the big picture.

Pro tip: Companies can reduce their CPL by testing A/B ads before campaigns go live. The concept is simple: test two (or more) ads in a limited distribution to determine that generates most of the interest and leads.

Smart Marketing Budgets: Concentrate your expenses, fuel your growth

An intelligent marketing budget is the roadmap of your team to be measurable. Without a clear strategy, it is easy to hand over striking campaigns that do not move the needle or, worse, underline in the areas that really drive growth.

So I always return to the basics:

• Visit the buyer’s journey.
• Sharp my goals.
• Eliminate distractions so that every dollar has a real influence.

I focus on high-roi initiatives, double what works and oppose the urge to pursue trends that do not match my strategy.

Her budget is not just about numbers. It’s about where your brand leads. Plan carefully, intentionally invest and observe how your marketing efforts lead to real, sustainable growth. The success of your team depends on it.

Note from the publisher: This blog post was originally published in March 2014 and was updated for completeness.