If you’ve searched this question, you’ve probably found ten different answers, all confidently citing “the industry standard.” Here’s the honest version: there isn’t one number. There’s a range, and where you land in that range depends on your industry, your growth stage, and whether you’re trying to maintain your current position or take market share from someone else.
Below is the current data, broken down by industry, plus a framework for picking your number instead of guessing at it.
The general baseline
The U.S. Small Business Administration’s long-standing guidance is 7 to 8% of gross revenue for businesses under $5 million, and that’s still the most commonly cited floor in 2026. Broader industry surveys put the picture in more context. Gartner’s CMO Spend Survey has marketing budgets averaging 7.7% of company revenue, while the Deloitte/Duke CMO Survey puts the number higher, at 9.4%, largely because it includes a wider mix of company sizes and smaller companies spend a higher percentage than large ones.
The pattern that matters most: the smaller you are, the higher your percentage needs to be. A $2 million company competing for the same customers as a $50 million company doesn’t get a discount on visibility. It has to spend a larger share of a smaller pie just to be seen.
A rough rule of thumb across most sources: 5 to 20% of revenue, with 7 to 10% as a common “steady growth” range and 12% or higher for businesses actively trying to take share in a competitive market.
What this looks like by industry
Law firms. This is the one that surprises most attorneys. Professional services firms generally spend 7 to 10% of revenue on marketing, but law firms as an industry chronically underspend relative to that benchmark, with most firms landing between 2 and 10% of gross revenue. Solo and boutique firms tend to sit at 5 to 7%, mid-sized regional firms at 7 to 10%, and large multi-practice firms at 10 to 15%. Firms in aggressive growth mode, especially in competitive practice areas like personal injury in dense metro markets, often push to 15% or higher. The data point worth sitting with: high-growth firms invest roughly 16.5% of revenue in marketing, compared to about 5% for firms with no growth. That gap is not a coincidence.
Regional banks. Banks fall into a professional/financial services pattern more than a retail one, generally spending in the mid-to-high single digits as a percentage of revenue, with community and regional banks needing to invest more heavily in local trust-building and digital presence to compete against national banks with far larger absolute budgets. Compliance requirements (Reg B, UDAAP, fair lending rules) also shape what “marketing” is allowed to look like, which is a factor law firms and restaurants don’t have to think about.
Food and beverage. This sits closer to the B2C end of the spectrum, where consumer-facing businesses typically spend more as a percentage of revenue than B2B companies, generally in the 9 to 12% range, because continuous brand visibility and repeat-visit behavior matter more than relationship-driven sales.
Medical practices. Most practices are conservative here. Roughly 62% of practices allocate just 1 to 5% of revenue to marketing, with that number climbing to 8 to 14% for practices in aggressive growth mode or new practices trying to establish a patient base in a competitive market. Established practices with strong referral networks and reviews can often operate at the lower end sustainably. New practices, or those in saturated specialties like dermatology or cosmetic dentistry, cannot.
Commercial construction. This is the lowest-spending vertical on this list, generally sitting around 3 to 5% of revenue. Long sales cycles, relationship-driven business development, and repeat-client work mean construction firms lean less on continuous demand generation and more on reputation, referrals, and visibility at the right moment in a long buying process.
A framework, not just a percentage
Percentage-of-revenue is a starting point, not a strategy. Two adjustments matter more than the number itself:
- Work backward from your growth goal. If you want $500,000 in new revenue and your average client is worth $5,000 a year, you need 100 new clients. That number, not an arbitrary percentage, should drive your budget.
- Know your acquisition cost before you set your budget. Divide total marketing spend by new clients acquired. If that number is comfortably below what a client is worth to you over time, you have room to invest more. If it isn’t, more budget won’t fix the underlying problem.
The flag worth raising
If your business is spending in the range above but still isn’t growing, the issue usually isn’t the percentage. It’s where the money is going. Law firms are a good example: firms report allocating budget across SEO, PPC, social, and traditional channels, but a large share of legal marketing spend nationally is reported as going toward low-ROI activities. A firm spending 10% of revenue on marketing spread thin across five channels will often lose to a firm spending 6% concentrated on the two channels that actually produce cases.
If you’re not sure whether your current spend is in the right range, or whether it’s going to the right places, that’s a conversation worth having before you set next year’s number.
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