Marketing leaders face mounting pressure to generate awareness, fill the funnel, and deliver qualified leads. With budgets tightening, the challenge is more than how to achieve these goals; it is where to invest limited resources for maximum strategic impact. Forrester’s Budget Planning Survey highlights this struggle, revealing that nearly half of B2B marketing decision-makers anticipate a meager budget increase of just 1% to 4% in 2025.
Trends Shaping Marketing Budgets in 2025
Let’s look at a few trends shaping the market:
B2B Tech Buyer Preferences: Most B2B tech buyers conduct hours of research online before entering the “funnel,” which makes third-party sites (such as online publications), digital marketing, social media, and owned content essential tools for reaching, educating, and engaging decision-makers.
Power of ROI Tracking: Advanced analytics and attribution models enable marketers to measure campaign performance accurately. Marketers must investigate the latest tracking tools to ensure data-driven metrics back their budget decisions.
AI (of course): Marketing leaders have access to artificial intelligence-powered applications that can help improve everything from team efficiency to customer and prospect personalization. Just be ready to navigate the AI hype to ensure your budget is going towards the most effective tools.
Where to Spend Your Marketing Dollars
Ready to maximize your marketing ROI? Review your core considerations and align your budget with your business priorities, target audience, and existing assets. An integrated approach, combining the right mix of marketing tactics, is essential for driving results. Experts can help you optimize your spending for the most significant impact:
Public relations remains the foundation of credibility and awareness for B2B tech companies (and yes, it’s the first bullet because this is a PR agency’s blog). When selecting an agency, prioritize those offering a retainer model, a flexible suite of services, and deep expertise in your industry. Consider your existing team and marketing structure to determine the ideal partnership model – whether it’s an agency, a consultant, or expanding your internal team.
Content Marketing is a staple of any successful B2B marketing strategy. To make informed decisions, prospects and buyers expect to be educated not only on your product but also on how you think about solving their problems. Identify content needs at each stage of the buyer’s journey and ensure you have the right content types, from newsletters and blogs to webinars and interactive assets like calculators.
Digital Marketing and Social Media provide tremendous measurement opportunities and are incredibly agile. For example, PPC (pay-per-click) campaigns can tell you where your audience is engaging and where you need to adjust. Social media also creates a forum for amplifying PR wins and content while building community.
Analysts and Influencers provide critical third-party credibility, particularly if publicly referenceable customers are hard to come by. Analysts can support PR programs and provide another source for content creation. Influencers extend audiences and amplify content. Consider your buyer (enterprise, SMB, channel, etc.) before engaging with analysts and influencers.
Events are always a significant budget line item, especially now that in-person conferences are back in full swing. Prioritize events with customer and prospect attendance and create opportunities for personal engagement with attendees (including journalists and analysts), such as dinners, breakfasts, and afterparties.
Setting a B2B technology marketing budget is more than allocating funds—it’s about making strategic decisions that drive measurable impact. By employing effective programs, campaigns, and tools, marketing leaders can position their organizations for growth in the year ahead and beyond.
