Here’s 5 Big Marketing Budget Mistakes to Avoid

Like any other business department, the marketing team is often assigned limited resources to do its function.

As a result, it ultimately ends up being a numbers game: did the marketing team generate sufficient ROI with the restricted amount of money they had? And if you could re-allocate those resources in a particular way, could they have gotten the company more bang for the buck?

The Devil is in the Detail

While maximizing a budget for ROI seems like a straightforward concept, the devil is all in the detail. In the marketing world, ROI is a subjective term – no one agrees what it means, how to measure it, how to develop a strategic plan around it, or what tactics to use. Not surprisingly, it’s within these fuzzy parameters that most marketing decisions and mistakes can be found.

Today’s infographic from MDG Advertising dives deep into marketing budgeting, and it outlines some of the most common mistakes that even seasoned marketers make.

Marketing is one of the most fluid business functions, and things are always changing.

The emergence of social media and influencer marketing in recent years is a testament to how dynamic the trade is – and it makes maximizing the value of a marketing budget a perennial challenge for entrepreneurs and seasoned execs alike.

Marketing Budget Mistakes to Avoid

With that in mind, here are five common marketing budget mistakes you can avoid.

1. Starting with bad data
Marketing already relies on hunches and intuition to some extent – so when bad data is driving the rest of the decisions, it’s a recipe for disaster. There are two simultaneous problems here to consider: (1) Data is inaccurate, and (2) Marketers are often measuring the wrong data to begin with.

It’s impossible to plan for the future without better understanding the present.

2. Failing to loop in Sales
Ultimately, the purpose of marketing is to drive sales. Oddly enough, many marketers get wrapped up in the details of their tactics and forget about this key outcome.

It’s absolutely essential for marketing to coordinate with other departments, but no department is more important than the sales team. Managers also need to make sure incentives align accordingly.

3. Not doubling down on what works
This seems obvious, but it’s often missed by marketers for all sorts of reasons, including cognitive biases.

Ryan Holiday, the author and media strategist that has worked with people like Tony Robbins and Tim Ferriss, says that not “doubling down” or going “all-in” on a tactic that works is a huge mistake. If something is working, put more money towards that channel until the returns notch down.

4. Underestimating the speed of change
There’s no doubt that the marketing world changes fast, and becoming complacent can lead to failure. Testing new mediums, channels, and tactics must be done to stay current, and not allocating time and resources to this is one of the biggest marketing budget mistakes made by companies.

5. Evaluating efforts too little and too late
In the digital world, it’s extremely easy to test new ideas or campaigns through A/B testing and other simple means. Because of this, all ideas should be tested, adjusted, and re-tested at the micro-level on a real-time basis. Infrequent or inadequate testing can lead to missing out on ideas, techniques, and channels that could have proven useful or even essential.