Every planning season, the same negotiation: marketing asks for more, finance asks for proof, and the number lands somewhere near last year's plus inflation. Both sides leave unsatisfied, because the question itself is wrong. A marketing budget is a portfolio of intended changes, not a cost line.
“A marketing budget is a portfolio of intended changes, not a cost line.”
The question that changes the conversation
Not “how much should we spend on marketing?” but “what must this money change?” Awareness among a defined audience. Preference against a named competitor. Enquiries from a target segment. Conversion at a specific stage. Repeat purchase in a cohort. Each is a different investment with a different timeline and a different proof.
When the change is named, the budget conversation becomes concrete: what does that change require, what is it worth, and how will we know it happened?
Three buckets, honestly labelled
Working money — activity with a traceable line to demand. Maintenance money — presence that protects what exists. Learning money — deliberate experiments with defined questions. Most budgets are honest about the first, vague about the second, and quietly zero on the third.
The learning bucket is not optional. Markets shift, channels fatigue, and the portfolio that produced this year's demand will not, unchanged, produce next year's.
Judging it without false precision
Not everything valuable is attributable, and not everything attributable is valuable. The workable standard: measure what can be measured commercially, review the rest against its stated intention, and cut anything that can articulate neither.
The CEO's role is not to audit the media plan. It is to insist that every rupee has a named intended change — and that next year's budget is built from what this year's actually changed.
Facing this question inside your business?
Tell us the growth or commercial challenge you are working through — we will help determine where the constraint sits.