Part 1: Why Do You Even Need A Marketing Budget?
Every business that wants to be a healthy business needs a marketing budget. Especially as a small business. In a time where entrepreneurship is on the up, understanding your marketing budget can make operating a business a lot easier. If you seek to improve your business, making use of this info can start to expand the possibilities of what your business can really accomplish.
Let’s look at 3 reasons you should have a marketing budget.
3 Reasons You Need A Marketing Budget
1. You’ll Know Where To Spend
A marketing budget will give you a better understanding of where money should be spent. To do that, you’ll need to start by looking at your business’ goals.
Follow these steps below:
Understand your business goals.
Calculate your previous year’s revenue.
Figure out your marketing budget (4-8% of your revenue).
Decide which avenue/s will help you achieve your goals.
“If you want your business to be more successful you need a plan for how to get there.”
— Susan Ward, from The Balance Small Business
With constant needs having to be met, business owners can struggle to clearly identify where to grow their business. By aligning with your goals first, then setting a budget based on your goals, you’ll be able to spend the right amount of money in the right places. A marketing budget will give you better insight into how to accomplish your goals.
2. You’ll Know Where To Start
Not only will you know where your money should be spent but you’ll also be able to make a more informed decision on how you’ll use your budget. This is amazing because you can save so much time. As every business owner knows, time is money, and more time wasted means more money lost.
Let’s say you want to get more customers through your doors. How will you know how much time to dedicate to achieving this? A marketing budget will give you a clear picture of what’s possible with what you have.
For instance, maybe you don’t have the money to build a website right now – that’s okay. Start smaller and instead try to boost your posts on Facebook.
Having a budget will clarify where to start from. As long as you understand what’s available to you then it’s alright to take things one step at a time. Progress comes in small steps, and that starts by understanding where to begin.
3. You’ll Get Closer To Achieving Your Goals
Tracking your progress can help you reach your goals. The guarantee of being on the right track comes from the planning you did when you calculated your marketing budget.
Budgets are a great place to start for any business looking to improve. By checking off tasks and working toward a healthier business you can start to see a clearer path to achieving your goals.
As an owner, having a firm understanding of where to go next could ensure that you will accomplish your goals. Start by hitting the ground running and trusting your plan. If things arise, you can adjust your plan without having to start all over. You’ll start to see progress and stay on target to grow your business.
“… Oracle and Johnson & Johnson all had marketing and sales budgets that were greater than 20% of revenue, some spending close to 50%! All of these companies also grew year-over-year.”
— Vital Design
Outro
If you’re really serious about maintaining a healthy business and want to understand your goals a lot better, you should have a marketing budget. A marketing budget is more than just planning money, it’s more about your business and it’s growth.
Your Turn
Have you considered using a marketing budget in the past? What did you get accomplished? How has your business changed since then? Let us know in the comments below.