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Key takeaways
A social media budget review every quarter needs five numbers and three decisions. Pull total spend, ad spend, enquiries, sales and cost per enquiry by platform. Then decide what to keep, what to cut and where to move money. Thirty minutes is enough if the tracker has been kept up weekly.
- 5 numbers: spend, ad spend, enquiries, sales, cost per enquiry.
- 3 decisions: keep, cut, move.
- Move about 10% of budget per quarter, not more.
- Book the next review before you finish this one.
Want a second pair of eyes on your review? Message us on WhatsApp.
Chat on WhatsApp →Which numbers should you pull?
From your tracker: total social spend including time, ad spend by platform, enquiries from social, sales from social and cost per enquiry by platform or campaign. Add one context note, such as a busy season or a staff absence, so the numbers are read fairly.
Which questions should the review answer?
Did we hold the planned cadence? Which campaign or platform brought enquiries at the lowest cost? Which line had spend but no enquiries? Did we have capacity for more work? The answers point straight to the three decisions.
- Did we post and advertise as planned?
- What brought enquiries most cheaply?
- What spent money with nothing to show?
- Could we have handled more work?
How much should you change at once?
As a GBL rule of thumb, move about 10% of the budget between lines each quarter. Bigger swings make it hard to tell what caused any change. The exception is a line with spend and no enquiries for a full quarter, which can be stopped outright.
Send us your five numbers on WhatsApp and we will discuss your requirements.
Chat on WhatsApp →What if the cadence was not held?
Then that is the finding. Judging results when half the planned posts or ads never ran says nothing about the channel. Fix resourcing first, such as time, help or approvals, before changing the budget split.
What does this look like in practice?
A pattern we see: a business reviews social media only when cash is tight, and cuts whatever is visible. A short quarterly routine usually catches waste earlier and moves money gradually to what works, without the stop-start that damages results.
Quarterly review checklist
- Pull the five numbers from the tracker.
- Answer the four review questions.
- Decide what to keep, cut and move.
- Move about 10% of the budget.
- Book the next review date now.
Next step
Book 30 minutes in the first week of next quarter. Put the five numbers and four questions in the calendar invite.
Message us on WhatsApp with your numbers, or book a 30-minute consultation.
Chat on WhatsApp →Sources and further reading
- About key events · Google Analytics Help
- URL builders: collect campaign data with custom URLs · Google Analytics Help
Frequently asked questions
How often should I review my social media budget?
Quarterly for decisions about the split, monthly for cost per enquiry, and weekly only for keeping the tracker current. Reviewing the budget weekly tends to cause overreaction to normal variation, while yearly reviews let waste run on too long. Review it each quarter against your enquiries and sales, and adjust in small steps.
What should a social media budget review include?
Total spend including time, ad spend by platform, enquiries, sales and cost per enquiry, plus a note of anything unusual. Then decide what to keep, cut and move. A review without decisions is a report, and reports alone rarely change results.
Who should be in the review?
Whoever owns the commercial result, usually the owner or a director, and whoever runs the social media day to day. If an agency or freelancer is involved, include them, because they hold the detail needed to explain the numbers and act on the decisions.
Written by
Global Bridge Labs (GBL) is a UK–Sri Lanka partner for social media, websites and BPO. Everything here comes from client delivery, not theory.
