Marketing leaders, you don't need to track every penny spent on marketing. There's a better way.
Your job is to manage a marketing budget like an investment fund manager, not like an accountant.
If you track every little expense, that's a colossal time suck.
Instead use the 80/20 rule to think about how you spend your budget. Your top 20% expenses account for 80% of your budget.1
By tracking those 20% big expenses, you can get a directionally accurate idea of your budget.
For example, if you're managing a SEO budget, the biggest expenses will likely be contractor fees, link-building expenses and writer costs. Tracking those will give you a good idea on the SEO unit economics and how to manage/plan this budget.
By doing so, you give yourself back some time to think big-picture. Are we over-investing on this channel? Are we under-investing in this channel? Do we need to build capacity? Should we drop this channel?
And you know what they say - Don't be penny wise, pound foolish!
Btw I shared this snippet from my book "How To Plan A SaaS Marketing Budget?". It's a quick start guide for new Heads of Marketing who're tackling their first marketing budget.
It includes:
- 5 steps to build your first SaaS marketing budget
- Screenshots from my own marketing budget
- Data on how much other SaaS companies are spending on marketing