Marketing Budget 101: Begin With Goals
There are a few tasks that, no matter how many times you do them, they’re still daunting. Box jumps for one. Cooking chicken without drying it out for another.
And pulling together an annual marketing budget. After nearly two decades in the marketing industry, I still have to mentally prepare for budgeting tasks. I’m relieved once it’s done, but hidden among dollar amounts for digital media, print materials, events, and every other thing required to keep your business active in the marketplace is a much bigger set of priorities and goals. What if you miss something? What if you don’t allocate enough? Or what if you don’t get the ROI you hoped for?
Suddenly box jumps don’t look so hard.
To jumpstart my budgeting — and now yours — I use this checklist. It’s possible you already do all of these things, but I hope that having them here together is just what you need to make budgeting easier.
Before You Budget Checklist
At MJM, we work with a variety of budgets and needs so we agree with you — setting an annual budget isn’t easy! However, it is worth it, and you’ll be glad you put in the work.

Courtney is a Partner and the Vice President of Operations and Account Service at Matt Jensen Marketing.