Where Should You Promote Your Brand? The Channel Map and Budget Split
The material is ready, the budget is in hand. Now the real question: where does the money go? Social, search, signage, trade fairs?
The wrong answer costs twice: the money spent and the time lost. The right answer differs from brand to brand — but the map that finds it is the same for everyone.
This article draws that map: what each channel does, the selection compass, and the budget split rule.
The Channel Map: Four Regions
All media gather into four regions: search, social, field, and partnership.
Each region does a different job; expecting one region to do another’s job is the most common disappointment.
The Compass: Where Does Your Customer Spend the Day?
Channel choice has one compass: the customer’s daily route.
Not the platform you enjoy — the one they inhabit.
The Budget Split: The 60-30-10 Rule
Map drawn, route known. Last comes the division.
A practical rule — the percentages are a compass, not stone.
Sample Splits: Three Brands, Three Maps
The rule is clear, but its application varies by trade. Let’s watch 60-30-10 take shape across three example brands.
Take the one closest to you as a draft.
Signals for Changing Channels
The map is not drawn once and framed; it updates when one of three signals arrives.
The signals are clear and need no interpretation.
Field Note
The assumption we correct most in channel meetings: “Everyone is on social media, so we must be too.” When the ten-customer survey runs, the table usually flips — customers arrive from search or referral. Assumptions spend budgets; surveys rescue them.
Quick Summary
All media reduce to four regions: search, social, field, partnership. The compass is one: the customer’s daily route, found by the ten-customer survey. The budget splits by 60-30-10 and is measured in cost per customer. When one of three signals arrives, the map updates.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Google — and now the AI tools. Here the customer looks for you; you simply become findable. The ripest intent lives here — the need exists, the wallet is open. The new layer of findability, AI recommendations, gets its own treatment in the GEO article.
Here the customer does not look for you; you appear before them. Its job is acquaintance, not closing. Strong for visually told products: food, decor, clothing, craft.
Signage, fairs and local events are the field region — useful for brands whose customers physically roam. Partnership is the art of borrowing trust: joint campaigns with complementary brands, visibility in sector associations. It is the region small budgets use least and earn most from.
Ask your last ten customers one question: “Where did you hear about us?” The distribution of answers is the draft of your budget split. This tiny survey beats guessing; ten answers are worth a hundred assumptions.
The B2C route runs through social and search. The B2B route runs through search, trade publications and fairs. Forcing corporate sales through social media is entering the market by the wrong door.
60 to the proven main channel, 30 to the strong second, 10 to experiments. The experiment share is sacred: today’s main channel was yesterday’s experiment. Review quarterly, shift the shares.
One question per channel: what did a customer from here cost? Not likes, not impressions — cost per customer. An unmeasured budget is not allocated; it is spilled.
To make channel decisions with data, we build your channel cost table together in the diagnosis call. The material side of promotion lives in the corporate presentation article.
Main channel: field and map — business profile, signage, window. Second: social — daily product photos, neighborhood groups. Experiment: a small search ad before holidays. The bakery’s customer arrives on foot; the budget’s weight goes where the feet go.
Main channel: search — visibility on product queries, content, review accumulation. Second: social — usage videos. Experiment: partnership posts. With no physical contact, the field region leaves the map; its share moves to search.
Main channel: search and trade visibility — technical content, catalog pages. Second: fairs and associations. Experiment: email bulletins. Social here is not a shop window but an employer showcase — kept for hiring, not expected to sell.
Cost per customer rising two periods in a row: the main channel is tiring — promote the best candidate from the experiment share. A new channel delivering organic customers back to back: move early, fund it before rivals arrive. A channel producing only “appearance” for three periods — impressions without customers — say goodbye; nostalgia is not a budget line.
No — it even hurts. An unmaintained account is a shuttered storefront. Few channels, full maintenance.
Possible but slow: search visibility, partnerships and referrals. Ads buy speed; they are not an obligation.
Testing can be done alone; at scale, expertise shows up in the numbers. The border is the hours you can spare weekly.
Next step: Run the ten-customer survey this week and set 60-30-10 by the results. Revisit the table in three months.