How do I set next year’s digital budget?

With the sales target: how many new customers do you want by year end? Without that number the budget is built blind; marketing is a continuation of sales, not of finance. 📊

Through the close rate: target customers ÷ close rate = enquiries required. If your sales team’s close rate is unknown, that is the first job. 🔢

Enquiries required × cost per enquiry. If both numbers are measured, the budget appears in a minute; if not, measurement comes first — the arithmetic sits in the ROI guide. 🧾

The ceiling: if a customer earns for years, even an expensive enquiry is profitable. A company looking only at the first sale cannot see the economics of loyalty. 💹

Four: media spend, production (content and technical), management and measurement, infrastructure (site, tools, licences). All four belong on separate rows. 🗂️

To measure efficiency: one goes to the platform, the other to effort. A budget that merges them hides which one is inflating; the principle sits in the ad budget guide. ⚖️

At lower levels infrastructure and production dominate; at higher levels media grows. Growing media without measurement is filling a leaking bucket; the levels sit in the maturity guide. 🪣

A small but constant share: new channel, new format, new market. A budget with no experiment line looks safe while locking the company into its current channel. 🧪

Monthly reading, quarterly decisions: the table is reviewed every month and large changes are made at quarter boundaries. Mid-month intervention breaks the learning. 🔄

While cost per enquiry sits below target: stopping when demand is cheap is leaving money on the table. The increase is controlled and measured. 📈

When cost exceeds target and does not recover for two months. A planned withdrawal, not a panic cut; the reasoning sits in the downturn guide. ✂️

By moving early: visibility is built before the demand season and harvested during it. A budget that starts when the season starts is already late; timing sits in the campaign calendar guide. 🌊

Enquiry count, cost per enquiry, earnings per customer. Side by side, those three turn the budget from an expense into an investment. 💼

By efficiency rather than spend: how many enquiries did the same money buy? If spending rose but cost per enquiry fell, the picture is healthy. 🧮

With scenarios: contraction, flat, growth — three budget tiers. A single-scenario plan is shelved entirely at the first shock; the approach sits in the uncertainty guide. 🎚️

Cut in order: experiments first, then media, measurement and maintenance last. A company that cuts measurement will build next year’s budget blind. 🩹

With your three numbers: write via the consult your expert form and we will build the budget table together. The full service sits on the digital consulting page. 🎯

Start small and measurable: a three-month test budget establishes your cost per enquiry, and the annual plan is then built on that number. A first-year budget is a measurement cost rather than an investment.

It depends on the level: where measurement and conversion are weak, content and technical work come first. Advertising is valuable when it sends traffic to a page that is ready, and wasteful when it does not.

At quarter boundaries. Read monthly but shift at quarters; a constantly changing budget never lets any channel learn.

Source: Google Ads Help — setting budgets