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Marketing budget calculator

See how much to spend on marketing each month and year, based on your revenue and what companies like yours spend. Free, instant, no sign-up.

Use the calculator

Your business

Last 12 months, or your target for the next 12 if you are new.

Sets the starting percentage from The CMO Survey benchmarks below.

Change it to test a lower or higher budget.

What a typical customer spends with you in their first year.

Monthly marketing budget

$3,917

That is $47,000 a year, or 9.4% of $500,000 revenue.

Ad spend a month
$1,199 (30.6% typical share)
Everything else a month
$2,718 (team, content, tools)
Benchmark (all companies)
9.4% of revenue

Not sure how to split it? We plan the channels, run them and report what each dollar brings back.

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Or compare our packages (ad spend is always paid directly to Meta or Google).

How much should you spend on marketing?

Most companies spend between 6% and 16% of their revenue on marketing. The CMO Survey (Spring 2025) put the average at 9.4% of revenue, and Gartner's 2025 CMO Spend Survey put it at 7.7%. What you sell matters most: consumer product companies spend the most, and consumer service companies the least.

  • B2C product companies: 15.5% of revenue.
  • B2B service companies: 9.0% of revenue.
  • B2B product companies: 6.4% of revenue.
  • B2C service companies: 6.0% of revenue.

These figures come from surveys of marketing leaders at established, mostly larger companies, so use them as a starting point rather than a rule. A business trying to grow fast, launch in a new area or catch up with busier competitors usually needs to sit at or above its benchmark.

How do you calculate a marketing budget?

Multiply your yearly revenue by the share you plan to spend on marketing, then divide by 12 for the monthly budget. If you are new and have little revenue, use your revenue target for the next year instead. Then check the result against how many customers it would take to pay it back.

  1. Take your revenue for the last 12 months, or your target for the next 12.
  2. Pick a percentage: start with the benchmark for your type of business.
  3. Multiply revenue by the percentage to get the yearly budget, and divide by 12.
  4. Split it between ad spend and everything else (people, agency, content, tools).
  5. Divide the monthly budget by the value of a new customer to see how many customers a month it needs to bring in.

Worked example

A business with $500,000 in yearly revenue using the 9.4% all-company average has a marketing budget of $47,000 a year, or about $3,917 a month. At Gartner's 30.6% paid media share, about $1,199 a month would go to ads and about $2,718 to everything else.

If a new customer is worth $2,000 in their first year, that budget needs to bring in about two new customers a month to pay for itself. If that looks easy for your business, you may be under-spending; if it looks out of reach, start lower and grow the budget as results come in.

What should a marketing budget cover?

A marketing budget covers every cost of winning and keeping customers, not just ads. In Gartner's 2025 survey, paid media took 30.6% of marketing budgets on average; the rest went to people, agencies, technology and other programs. For a small business, the main lines are usually these:

  • Ad spend on Meta, Google and other platforms, paid directly to the platform.
  • An agency, freelancer or in-house person to plan and run the work.
  • Content: photos, video, copywriting and design.
  • Tools: email, CRM, scheduling and analytics.
  • Your website and its upkeep.

How do you know if your marketing budget is working?

Track how many new customers each channel brings in and what each one costs you, every month. Compare that cost with what a customer is worth. If a channel brings customers for less than they are worth, it can take more budget; if it doesn't after a fair test, move the money elsewhere.

For ads selling online, our break-even ROAS calculator shows the most you can pay per sale before ads lose money.

Frequently asked questions

How much should a small business spend on marketing?

Most companies spend between 6% and 16% of revenue on marketing, depending on what they sell. In The CMO Survey (Spring 2025) the average was 9.4% of revenue, with consumer product companies highest at 15.5% and consumer service companies lowest at 6.0%. A new business trying to grow usually needs to sit toward the top of its range.

What percentage of revenue should go to marketing?

Use the average for your type of business as a starting point: 9.4% across all companies, 15.5% for B2C products, 9.0% for B2B services, 6.4% for B2B products and 6.0% for B2C services, according to The CMO Survey. Then adjust for your growth goals and margins.

Does the marketing budget include ad spend?

Yes. A marketing budget covers everything: ad spend, people, agencies or freelancers, content, tools and events. In Gartner’s 2025 CMO Spend Survey, paid media took 30.6% of marketing budgets on average, so most of the budget goes to things other than ads.

Should a new business use revenue or a revenue target?

Use your revenue target for the next 12 months if you have little revenue yet. Budgeting from current revenue can leave a new business with too little to reach anyone. Keep the target realistic and check every quarter whether marketing is bringing in enough customers to justify it.

Are these benchmarks right for very small businesses?

Treat them as a starting point. The surveys behind them mostly cover established and larger companies, and Gartner’s respondents were mainly companies with over $1 billion in revenue. Small businesses vary widely, so the customer check in the calculator is the better test of whether a budget makes sense for you.

Sources

Want a plan for your budget? See our packages, read what social media management costs and what SEO costs, or browse more free marketing tools.

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