Reflecting on the past year puts you in the right position to crush it in the next.
Answer the questions below to get a start on your planning for a profitable year:
Reflection + Goal Setting
- Were the goals measurable? Did you reach them?
- If you did not reach your goals, why not?
- Did you introduce any new marketing initiatives?
- What things worked? What things didn’t?
- Have you established a marketing budget for next year?
- What would success look like to you at the end of the year? (i.e. increase in sales, increase in staff, increase in market share, etc.)
Establishing a Marketing Budget
Generally speaking, committing 10% of your gross revenue is a healthy approach to setting a marketing budget. The following breakdown by webstrategies gets more specific. Where you fall on the spectrum will be determined by whether you are in maintenance mode, growth mode or an aggressive growth mode.
Average Marketing Spends
B2B Product: 10.4
B2B Services: 12.6
B2C Products: 13.4
B2C Services: 9.3
Overall: 11.4
Allocating Marketing Funds Offline vs. Online and Across Digital Channels
Once you’ve established a budget that’s right for you, you need to decide where to put those dollars to work. Below are allocation insights from recent reports by Forrester Research and eMarketer. Check them out to get a better idea of how you can get the biggest bang for your marketing buck(s).
- In 2018, the average firm was expected to allocate 41% of its marketing budget to online, and this rate is expected to grow to 45% by 2020.
- Search engine marketing will capture the largest share of online spending with online display (banner ads, online video, etc.) taking the second largest share.
- Social media advertising investments will continue to grow, with a 17% compound annual growth rate from 2016 to 2021, and is expected to represent 25% of total online spending in 2018.
- Mobile marketing has grown to a point that it’s no longer tracked in the forecast and it’s presumed to be considered across all channels.
- Digital marketing is pacing at an 11% compound annual growth rate between 2016 and 2021 with the biggest growth occurring in online video.
- Investment in paid search, display advertising, social media advertising, online video advertising and email marketing is predicted to account for 46% of all advertising by 2021.
Good luck wrapping up the year and best wishes for a fun and profitable year ahead!
