What should your marketing
budget actually be?

Most marketing budgets start with last year's number plus or minus a bit, then get defended backward. This model runs the other direction: it starts at the revenue target, works the funnel backward to the lead volume it demands, prices the timing against your sales cycle, and sizes the spend against five models before you take a number to a board. Built on my proprietary Observe / Analyze / Execute framework.

Step 1–2 Funnel, worked backward revenue target → raw leads Wins, opportunities, SQLs, MQLs, and the raw lead volume your number actually requires — blended, or split by product line and ICP when one cycle no longer describes the business.
Step 3 Five sizing models stage-adjusted · triangulated Percentage of net-new ARR, sourced ARR, YoY growth delta, total ARR, and the 3:1 LTV:CAC golden ratio — computed side by side, with the one I'd anchor on for your stage flagged.
Step 4–5 A budget that holds up branded Excel workbook Every function line-itemized, events by territory, headcount and BDR costed at US benchmarks, twenty percent always reserved as open funds. Change one input and the whole workbook repopulates.

The Observe / Analyze / Execute framework

The budget is the deliverable at the end of Analyze. It only holds up if Observe came first — which is why this model asks for your conversion rates and cycle length before it will produce a number.

Days 1–30Observe

Listen before acting. Every stakeholder, customer conversation, platform, and number, mapped before anything changes.

Days 31–60Analyze

Benchmarks, the funnel worked backward from the ARR target, every function rated, the budget scoped against the number.

Days 61–90Execute

Dashboards, operating cadence, the plan of record. The budget becomes a plan people run, not a spreadsheet people cite.

The model runs entirely in your browser once unlocked.

No code yet?

The Budget Scoping Model is available to clients and by request. Tell me the stage you're at and the number you're working toward, and I'll send access.

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Questions

What does the model actually produce?

A programmatic marketing budget sized from your revenue target, the full funnel-to-pipeline view behind it, per-territory event spend, a costed headcount and BDR plan, and a branded Excel workbook with live formulas that recalculates when you change an input.

Why start at revenue instead of last year's budget?

Because a budget defended backward from last year can't answer the only question that matters in a board meeting: what does this number buy, and what happens to pipeline if you cut it. Starting at the target means every dollar traces to a lead volume and a close date.

What if we sell more than one product, or into more than one ICP?

Then one blended sales cycle is already misleading you. Path B models each segment separately — its own deal size, conversion rates, cycle length, and pipeline deadline — and rolls them up, so you can see which segment has the least slack and fund it first.

Does headcount count against the budget?

Your choice, and it's a toggle. Programmatic spend excludes headcount by benchmark convention so the number stays comparable; switching headcount and BDR on layers fully-loaded US base and bonus costs on top and shows both subtotals.

Is my data stored anywhere?

No. Everything is computed in your browser, and the workbook is generated locally on download. Nothing is transmitted or saved.

Everything is computed in your browser. Nothing is stored or sent anywhere.

Revenue target → funnel math → defensible number

Scope a year of marketing budget backward from the number you have to hit.

Set the revenue target, let the funnel produce the lead volume it requires, price the timing against your sales cycle, size the budget against five models, then build the allocation line by line. Everything recomputes live and exports as a branded Excel workbook.