61-budget-planning-global

name	61-budget-planning-global
description	Use when a marketing BUDGET has to be planned or managed in USD — allocation by bucket, channel, and month, test versus scale split, scale-up and stop-loss thresholds, reserve, a plan-versus-actual tracker, and a review cadence. Trigger on 'budget planning', 'marketing budget', 'split the budget across channels', 'stop loss threshold', 'quarterly budget', 'we keep overspending and nobody notices'. Also use when a number has been approved and nobody has divided it up. Not for — the revenue-backward math that produces the number, see `10-reverse-kpi-global`; paid media allocation only, see `54-media-plan-global`; paying an external vendor, see `67-agency-vendor-brief-global`.
metadata	{"version":"1.0.1","category":"strategy"}
license	MIT
triggers	["budget planning","marketing budget","budget allocation","how much should we spend on ads","campaign budget","stop loss threshold","quarterly budget","media budget split"]
output	File .md — budget plan: overview, allocation by bucket / channel / campaign / month, test vs scale split, adjustment rules and stop-loss thresholds, tracker, review cadence
related	["product-marketing-context-global","10-reverse-kpi-global","00-marketing-plan-global","54-media-plan-global","55-scaling-ads-global","21-ads-audit-global","07-marketing-report-global"]

Budget Planning (Global)

A budget is not a fixed number — it is a decision tool: where you place bets and when you pull back. The leader must know total spend, ROI per channel, what to increase, and what to cut. Run 10-reverse-kpi-global first to derive the minimum budget from the revenue target before allocating anything.

Information gathering

Read .agents/product-marketing-context-global.md, the marketing plan, and the previous period's report if available. If missing, ask up to 4 questions:

1. Total budget and planning period? How much, for a month, a quarter, or a year (USD)?
2. Revenue target for the period? Needed to compute marketing as a percent of revenue and the minimum viable budget.
3. Active channels and last period's ROI? Meta / TikTok / Google / email + SMS / affiliates / agency — which has the best ROAS or CPA?
4. Any large campaign needing a reserve? Launch, Black Friday / Cyber Monday, or another seasonal peak.

Principles

1. Budget follows performance. Do not stay rigid to the opening plan. Channels that work get more; channels that do not get cut.
2. Always hold 10-15% in reserve. Never allocate everything on day one. The reserve covers unexpected opportunities and incidents.
3. Every dollar has a measurable KPI. "Branding you cannot measure" is not an acceptable line item.
4. Do not spread evenly. Concentrate on the best-performing channel. New channels get a minimum test allocation (10-15%) first.
5. Plan backwards from revenue, not from channels. The budget is the output of a revenue equation, not an arbitrary number.
6. Do not divide the annual budget evenly across quarters. Median Meta CPM in Q4 runs roughly 26% above Q1 (references/benchmarks-global.md), so identical monthly spend buys materially less reach in Q4. Either front-load acquisition into cheap Q1 months or explicitly reserve a larger Q4 allocation for the same volume.

Workflow

1. Choose the budget-setting method

Method	How it works	Strength	Weakness
Percent of revenue	Budget = X% of expected revenue	Simple	Ignores growth stage
Backwards from targets (recommended)	Set revenue > derive CAC/CPL > derive spend