Holiday Marketing Budget Template 2025: Complete Step-by-Step Guide

Here's what nobody tells you about Q4 marketing budgets: copying last year's spend and adding 20% isn't a strategy—it's a guess dressed up in a spreadsheet.

I've reviewed hundreds of small business holiday budgets, and the pattern is always the same. Someone creates a rough estimate in September, tweaks a few numbers in October, panics during Black Friday when budgets cap out early, then scrambles to reallocate in December when performance tanks.

The result? Overspending on channels that don't convert, underspending during high-intent windows, and zero visibility into what actually worked until January when it's too late.

2025 is different because the playbook changed. According to Adobe Analytics, online holiday sales are projected to hit $240.8 billion (up 8.4%), but consumer behavior has shifted hard toward early shopping and strategic deal-hunting. That means your budget pacing needs to match October awareness, November conversion blitzes, and December urgency—not arbitrary monthly allocations.

This guide gives you the actual template framework we use with DTC brands doing $200k-$2M in Q4 revenue. You'll get phase-by-phase budget allocation, channel mix recommendations based on 2025 benchmarks, interactive calculators for ROAS targets, and a downloadable Google Sheets template you can customize in under an hour.

No theory. No fluff. Just the system that works.

Photo by Vitaly Gariev on Pexels

What Goes Into a Holiday Marketing Budget

Look, most "marketing budget templates" are just blank spreadsheets with channel names and empty cells. That's not helpful.

A functional holiday budget needs five core components that actually interact with each other:

1. Total Budget Sizing (The Foundation)

You can't allocate what you haven't defined. Your total Q4 marketing spend should be based on contribution margin, customer acquisition cost (CAC), and lifetime value (LTV)—not "what we spent last year plus inflation."

The baseline formula: (Projected Q4 Revenue × Target Marketing %) = Total Budget. For most DTC brands, target marketing percentage in Q4 runs 15-25% of revenue, compared to 8-12% in normal quarters.

Example: If you're projecting $500k in Q4 revenue and your normal marketing spend is 10% of revenue, your Q4 budget should be 15-20% = $75k-$100k. That 1.5-2× multiplier reflects higher CPMs, increased competition, and the need to capture market share during peak intent periods.

2. Phase-Based Pacing (When to Spend)

This is where most budgets fail. You can't just divide your Q4 budget by 90 days and call it "daily pacing." Consumer behavior in October (browsing, building wishlists) is completely different from Black Friday (conversion frenzy) and December 20th (panic buying).

Your budget needs three distinct phases with different goals and channel mixes. We'll break this down in detail below, but the quick version: 30% awareness (Oct-mid Nov), 50% conversion (mid Nov-early Dec), 20% urgency (mid-late Dec).

3. Channel Allocation (Where to Spend)

Not all channels perform equally during the holidays. Google Ads data shows that search and shopping campaigns see 40-60% volume increases during BFCM, while social campaigns see more modest 20-30% lifts.

Your channel split should reflect both performance history and 2025 benchmarks. A balanced mix for most businesses: 30% Google Search, 20% Google Shopping, 25% Facebook/Instagram, 12% Display/Retargeting, 8% YouTube, 5% TikTok or other. Adjust based on what actually works for your business, not industry averages.

4. ROAS Targets (Profitability Guardrails)

Revenue without profit is just expensive busy work. Every channel in your budget needs a minimum ROAS target based on your margins, CAC, and acceptable payback periods.

Calculate your breakeven ROAS first: 1 ÷ (Profit Margin %). If your contribution margin (after COGS, shipping, discounts) is 40%, your breakeven ROAS is 2.5×. That's the floor—anything below loses money. Your target ROAS should be 1.5-2× higher to actually generate profit worth the effort.

5. Contingency Reserve (The Safety Net)

Q4 is unpredictable. Competitors increase spend. CPMs spike unexpectedly. Creative fatigues faster. Your budget needs 10-15% held in reserve for two scenarios: scaling winners mid-campaign and covering unexpected costs (rush creative production, influencer opportunities, Google Ads shared budget overages).

This isn't "extra" budget you plan to spend—it's insurance you hope not to use. But when your best-performing campaign hits diminishing returns on Tuesday and you find a new audience segment crushing on Wednesday, having reserve budget means you can move fast.

For a broader overview of holiday budgeting for both business and personal use, see our complete guide: Holiday Budgeting & Forecasting 2025.

The Three-Phase Budget Framework (Oct-Dec)

Stop thinking in months. Start thinking in phases.

The way consumers shop has fundamentally changed. People used to wait for Black Friday deals, impulse buy on Cyber Monday, then shop in-store through December. Now they research in October, compare options early November, pounce during BFCM week, then either buy early (by Dec 10) or panic-buy last minute (Dec 18-24).

Your budget needs to match this behavior.

Phase 1: Awareness & Consideration (October 1 - November 15)

Budget Allocation: 30-35% of total Q4 spend

This phase is about getting into consideration sets before everyone starts screaming about Black Friday. Your goal: build brand preference, identify high-intent audiences, and create retargeting pools.

According to Adobe's consumer research, shoppers who engage with brands in October have 18% higher average order values and lower return rates than those who only see you during BFCM. That's because they're making considered purchases, not impulse buys driven by discount FOMO.

Channel Mix: Heavy on top-of-funnel channels. Facebook/Instagram for awareness, YouTube for storytelling, display for brand building, and broad match search to capture early intent signals. You're not trying to convert aggressively yet—you're planting seeds.

Creative Focus: Benefits and differentiation, not discounts. Show why someone should consider you for their holiday shopping. Value propositions, product demos, gift guides, and brand storytelling work best here.

Key Metrics: Impressions, reach, engagement rate, retargeting pool size, cost per landing page view. ROAS will be lower here (2-3×) because you're building awareness, not harvesting demand.

Phase 2: Conversion Blitz (November 16 - December 10)

Budget Allocation: 45-50% of total Q4 spend

This is the money phase. Black Friday (Nov 28, 2025), Cyber Monday (Dec 1, 2025), and the immediate aftermath. High-intent buyers actively comparing options and ready to purchase.

Within this phase, you need sub-allocations. Approximately 35-40% of your Phase 2 budget should concentrate on Nov 26-Dec 2 (BFCM week), with the remaining 60-65% spread across early-to-mid November and the first week of December.

Channel Mix: Shift heavily toward performance channels. Google Search (especially non-brand terms), Google Shopping, retargeting, and conversion-optimized social campaigns. Email goes into overdrive here if you built a list during Phase 1.

Creative Focus: Urgency, social proof, and clear offers. "40% Off Sitewide Ends Sunday" with countdown timers and stock scarcity signals. This is not the time for subtle brand building—you're closing deals.

Key Metrics: ROAS (should peak at 4-7× for search, 3-5× for social), conversion rate, revenue per session, new customer acquisition rate. Watch daily budgets like a hawk—capping out early on Black Friday means leaving money on the table.

Critical consideration: Google Ads Shared Budgets are essential here. If you run multiple campaigns (brand search, non-brand search, shopping), shared budgets let high-performers pull from a central pool when traffic spikes. Manual campaign-level daily budgets will cost you conversions during BFCM surges.

Phase 3: Last-Minute Urgency (December 11 - 24)

Budget Allocation: 15-20% of total Q4 spend

The procrastinators and panic buyers. People who forgot about someone on their list, need a last-minute replacement, or are shopping for themselves after spending their budget on others.

Many businesses underfund this phase because they're exhausted from BFCM. Huge mistake. According to Mastercard SpendingPulse, December 18-24 accounts for 22% of total holiday e-commerce sales, with AOVs 12-18% higher than Black Friday due to gift urgency.

Channel Mix: High-intent search (especially long-tail like "ships by December 23" or "digital delivery"), retargeting, and local inventory ads if you have physical stores. Social spend drops here unless you're promoting e-gifts or gift cards.

Creative Focus: Speed and convenience. "Order by 3pm for Same-Day Pickup," "Digital Delivery in 5 Minutes," "Guaranteed Christmas Delivery." Shipping cutoff dates should be in every headline.

Key Metrics: Revenue per transaction (should be highest here), fulfillment speed, customer service response time, gift card or e-gift conversion rate. ROAS stays solid (3-5×) because these buyers aren't comparison shopping—they need solutions now.

How to Size Your Total Q4 Budget

Alright, let's get specific. You need a number before you can allocate it.

Most small businesses approach this backwards—they look at what they spent last year, apply an inflation adjustment, and call it done. That's lazy and often wrong.

Here's the right way:

Method 1: Revenue-Based Sizing (Simple, Works for Most)

Formula: Projected Q4 Revenue × Target Marketing % = Total Budget

Step 1: Project your Q4 revenue. Use last year's Q4 as a baseline, adjust for growth trends, and factor in any major changes (new products, expanded channels, market conditions).

Step 2: Determine your target marketing percentage. For Q4, this should be 1.5-2× your normal quarters. If you typically spend 10% of revenue on marketing in Q1-Q3, plan 15-20% for Q4.

Example calculation:

• Projected Q4 revenue: $400,000
• Normal marketing %: 12%
• Q4 multiplier: 1.75×
• Target marketing %: 12% × 1.75 = 21%
• Total Q4 marketing budget: $400k × 21% = $84,000

This method works well if you have consistent margins and predictable customer behavior.

Method 2: CAC/LTV-Based Sizing (Advanced, More Accurate)

Formula: (Target New Customers × CAC) + (Remarketing Budget) = Total Budget

Step 1: Determine how many new customers you need to acquire in Q4 to hit revenue goals. Factor in your average order value and repeat purchase rates.

Step 2: Calculate your target CAC based on LTV. If your LTV is $300 and you want a 1:3 CAC:LTV ratio, your max CAC is $100. For Q4, you might accept higher CAC (1:2.5 ratio = $120 CAC) because volume and brand building matter.

Step 3: Allocate 60-70% of budget to new customer acquisition, 30-40% to retargeting and repeat customer campaigns.

Example calculation:

• Target new customers: 800
• Target CAC: $110
• New customer budget: 800 × $110 = $88,000
• Retargeting/repeat budget (40%): $88k ÷ 60% × 40% = $58,667
• Total Q4 marketing budget: $88k + $58.7k = $146,700

This method is more work but gives you clearer profitability visibility.

Reality Check: Can You Actually Afford This?

Just because the math says you should spend $150k doesn't mean you have $150k in cash flow. Run a quick sanity check:

Cash Flow Test: Do you have the working capital to fund this spend 30-45 days before revenue hits? Most ad platforms bill weekly or bi-weekly, but you might not collect revenue until December or even January (Net-30 terms, payment processor holdbacks, returns).

Profitability Test: At your projected ROAS (usually 3-5× blended for Q4), will you generate enough contribution margin to cover the spend AND make profit? Calculate: (Total Budget × ROAS × Contribution Margin %) - Total Budget = Net Profit. If that number is negative or minimal, scale back.

Risk Tolerance Test: What if your ROAS is 30% lower than expected? Can you absorb that loss? If not, build more conservative budgets or focus on higher-ROAS channels even if they have less volume.

Channel Mix & Allocation Strategy

You've got your total budget. Now you need to split it across channels in a way that maximizes return.

The mistake most businesses make: allocating based on channel preferences ("we love Instagram!") or what's trendy, rather than historical performance and Q4-specific benchmarks.

2025 Holiday Benchmarks by Channel

Based on aggregated DTC data and retail benchmarks, here's what realistic performance looks like in Q4 2025:

Email isn't "budgeted" in paid channels since it's owned, but it should drive 15-25% of your total Q4 revenue if you have a decent list. Factor this into your overall strategy—strong email performance means you can be more conservative on paid acquisition.

How to Customize Your Channel Mix

Don't just copy the table above. Adjust based on three factors:

1. Historical Performance
If Google Shopping consistently hits 6× ROAS for you while Facebook struggles at 2.5×, allocate more to Shopping even if "best practices" suggest balance. Past performance is your best predictor—until it isn't.

2. Product Category
Visual lifestyle products (fashion, home decor, beauty) perform better on Instagram and TikTok. Technical or comparison-heavy products (electronics, B2B tools) perform better on search and YouTube. Match channels to how people actually discover and evaluate your category.

3. Audience Maturity
If you're a new brand with limited awareness, you need more top-of-funnel spend (social, display, YouTube) to build consideration. Established brands can run leaner on awareness and heavy on search/shopping to harvest existing demand.

The Search + Shopping Foundation

No matter your business, Google Search and Shopping should be 40-50% of your total Q4 budget. These are demand capture channels—people actively searching for solutions. They're not the most exciting or creative, but they're the most reliably profitable.

Within search, your split should be roughly 20% brand (protecting your name), 80% non-brand (capturing category demand). Yes, brand search is wildly efficient (8-15× ROAS), but the volume is limited to people who already know you.

Shopping campaigns deserve 18-22% of budget because they appear in multiple placements (Google Search, Google Shopping tab, YouTube, Display Network) and catch people in comparison mode. Make sure your product feed is pristine—poor feed quality kills Shopping performance faster than any budget increase can fix it.

Social as Scale Driver

Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok are where you find new customers who don't know you exist yet. Budget 25-35% here, split based on where your audience actually spends time (age and demo matter).

Don't expect social ROAS to match search ROAS. Social is prospecting—3-4× is solid. If you're hitting 5-6×, you're either retargeting heavily (which has limits) or you're in a low-competition niche (which won't last).

Creative quality matters more on social than any other channel. Testing 5-7 creative variations in October and doubling down on winners for BFCM will outperform perfect targeting with mediocre creative every time.

Black Friday / Cyber Monday Budget Planning

BFCM is where Q4 budgets either crush or crumble. You need a specific plan for November 26-December 2, 2025.

According to Adobe, this 7-day period will account for $40+ billion in US online sales—roughly 17% of the entire holiday season compressed into one week. Your budget needs to reflect that concentration.

BFCM Budget Weighting

Within your Phase 2 budget (45-50% of total Q4), allocate 35-40% specifically to BFCM week. That means if your total Q4 budget is $100k, BFCM should get $18k-$20k (18-20% of total budget in one week).

This feels aggressive. It is. But BFCM traffic is 3-5× normal days, competition is fierce, and CPMs spike 40-60%. If you budget normally, you'll cap out by Friday afternoon and miss Cyber Monday entirely.

Daily Pacing for BFCM Week

Don't spread BFCM budget evenly across 7 days. Consumer behavior peaks hard on specific days:

• Tuesday Nov 26 (Pre-BF): 5% of BFCM budget. Early bird shoppers, momentum building.
• Wednesday Nov 27: 8% of BFCM budget. "Sneak peek" deals, email list warmup.
• Thursday Nov 28 (Thanksgiving): 12% of BFCM budget. Evening shopping surge after dinner.
• Friday Nov 29 (Black Friday): 30% of BFCM budget. Peak day, highest volume, most competition.
• Saturday Nov 30: 15% of BFCM budget. Continued momentum but slightly lower traffic.
• Sunday Dec 1: 12% of BFCM budget. "Last chance" messaging before Cyber Monday.
• Monday Dec 2 (Cyber Monday): 18% of BFCM budget. Second peak, office/lunch shopping surge.

This pacing hits the high-traffic days (Friday + Monday) hardest while maintaining presence throughout the week.

Channel Mix Shifts for BFCM

Your normal channel allocation changes during BFCM week. Search volume spikes dramatically, so you need to rebalance:

• Search (Non-Brand): Increase to 30-35% of BFCM budget (vs. 22-28% normally)
• Shopping: Increase to 25-28% (vs. 18-22% normally)
• Social: Decrease slightly to 18-22% (vs. 20-28% normally) because CPMs spike and efficiency drops
• Display/Retargeting: Maintain at 10-12% but focus on recent site visitors only

The logic: search and shopping intent spikes, so lean into performance channels. Social CPMs rise 50-70% during BFCM, making prospecting less efficient—shift those dollars to retargeting instead.

Google Ads Shared Budgets for BFCM

This is critical. Set up Google Ads Shared Budgets before BFCM week so your best-performing campaigns can pull from a central pool when traffic surges.

How it works: Instead of setting daily budgets per campaign (Search Brand: $200/day, Search Non-Brand: $500/day, Shopping: $400/day), you create one shared budget pool ($1,100/day) that all three campaigns draw from. On Black Friday when non-brand search explodes, it can pull $700/day while brand takes $150 and shopping takes $250—automatically adjusting based on real-time performance.

This prevents the nightmare scenario where your best campaign caps out at 2pm while lower-ROAS campaigns keep spending. Shared budgets let winners win.

Interactive Budget Allocator & ROAS Calculator

Enough theory. Let's build your actual budget.

These two tools work together: the Budget Allocator splits your total Q4 spend across phases and channels, while the ROAS Calculator helps you set realistic targets and calculate breakeven points.

Holiday Budget Allocator

This tool takes your total Q4 budget and automatically allocates it across the three phases and your chosen channel mix. You'll get a downloadable table you can import into your tracking sheet.

ROAS Target Calculator

Before you spend a dollar, you need to know what ROAS you need to hit to stay profitable. This calculator shows your breakeven ROAS and recommended targets based on your margins.

Google Ads: Performance Planner & Seasonality Adjustments

If you're running Google Ads (and you should be), two features make Q4 budget planning dramatically more accurate: Performance Planner and Seasonality Adjustments.

Most small businesses never touch these tools. That's money left on the table.

Performance Planner: Forecasting Your Budget Needs

Performance Planner is Google's forecasting tool that shows you expected clicks, conversions, and CPA at different budget levels for upcoming time periods. It's buried under Tools > Planning in your Google Ads account, but it's powerful.

Here's how to use it for holiday planning:

Step 1: In Google Ads, go to Tools > Planning > Performance Planner. Click "Create Plan."

Step 2: Select the campaigns you want to forecast (usually your main search and shopping campaigns). Choose date range: November 1 - December 31, 2025.

Step 3: Set your budget slider to 150-200% of your normal monthly spend. The tool will show projected clicks, conversions, cost per conversion, and total cost.

Step 4: Compare scenarios. What happens if you spend $50k vs. $75k vs. $100k? Performance Planner shows diminishing returns—the point where extra budget generates minimal additional conversions.

Step 5: Download the forecast and use it to justify your budget to stakeholders or set realistic expectations for what's achievable.

According to Google's documentation, advertisers who use Performance Planner see 12% more conversions at the same CPA compared to those who don't. It's not perfect, but it's better than guessing.

Seasonality Adjustments: Telling Smart Bidding About BFCM

If you use Google's automated bidding strategies (Target CPA, Target ROAS, Maximize Conversions), you need to tell the system when you expect major traffic spikes. Otherwise, Smart Bidding will underbid during BFCM because it's optimizing for "normal" conditions.

Seasonality Adjustments fix this. Here's how:

When to use: Any time you expect conversion rates to change by +/-50% for a short period (1-7 days). BFCM definitely qualifies—conversion rates often jump 100-300% on Black Friday.

How to set up (1 week before BFCM):

1. In Google Ads, go to Tools > Bid Strategies > Advanced Controls > Seasonality Adjustments
2. Click the plus button to create new adjustment
3. Name it "Black Friday 2025"
4. Set dates: November 28-30, 2025 (or extend through Cyber Monday)
5. Select campaigns using Smart Bidding
6. Set expected conversion rate change: +150% (or use your historical data)
7. Save

What this does: Smart Bidding will temporarily bid more aggressively during these dates, expecting higher conversion likelihood. Without this adjustment, automated bidding will "learn" slowly as Black Friday progresses, wasting budget on underperformance early in the day.

Critical warning: Only use Seasonality Adjustments if you actually expect significant conversion rate changes AND you're using automated bidding. If you're on Manual CPC or Enhanced CPC, this feature does nothing. Also, don't over-index—setting +300% when reality is +100% will cause overbidding and waste budget.

For deeper context on ROAS expectations and channel benchmarks during the holiday season, check out: ROAS Benchmarks for Holiday Season 2025.

Daily Budget Tracking & Pacing

Having a beautiful budget means nothing if you don't track it daily. Q4 moves fast—waiting until next week to check performance is how you overspend on losers and underfund winners.

What to Track Daily

Every morning (or every afternoon if you prefer), pull these metrics:

• Spend vs. Target: Are you on pace? If you budgeted $3,000 for today and spent $2,400, you're 20% under. That's budget left on the table.
• ROAS by Channel: Which channels are hitting targets? Which are underperforming? Shift budget within 24-48 hours, not next week.
• Conversion Rate Trends: Sudden drops signal creative fatigue, technical issues, or audience exhaustion. Catch these early.
• New Customer vs. Repeat Customer Split: Q4 is about acquiring customers who'll buy again. If 90% of conversions are existing customers, your prospecting isn't working.

The Daily Pacing Formula

To stay on budget across a phase, use this check:

(Days Elapsed ÷ Total Days in Phase) × Phase Budget = Target Spend to Date

Example: You're 10 days into Phase 2 (which lasts 25 days total). Your Phase 2 budget is $50,000.
(10 ÷ 25) × $50,000 = $20,000 target spend
If you've only spent $16,000, you're $4,000 behind pace. Time to increase daily budgets or add campaigns.

This simple check prevents the "oh no, we spent 80% of budget with 40% of the month left" disaster.

Weekly Review Questions

Every Sunday during Q4, review these questions with your team:

1. Which campaigns exceeded ROAS targets this week? Can we scale them?
2. Which campaigns underperformed? Are they fixable (creative refresh, audience adjustment) or should we pause?
3. Are we on pace for the phase? If not, where do we reallocate?
4. What creative is fatiguing? What new tests do we need to launch Monday?
5. Are there any budget constraints limiting performance (daily caps hit, shared budget tapped out)?

These weekly reviews let you course-correct before small issues become big losses.

Download Google Sheets & Excel Templates

You can build your own holiday budget tracker from scratch, or you can start with templates that already have the formulas, structure, and best practices built in.

Here's what you should look for in a good holiday marketing budget template:

Must-Have Template Features

1. Phase-Based Structure (Not Monthly)
Tabs or sections for Awareness (Oct-mid Nov), Conversion (mid Nov-early Dec), and Urgency (mid-late Dec) with different budget allocations and channel mixes per phase.

2. Channel-Level Tracking
Separate rows for Google Search (brand/non-brand), Google Shopping, Facebook/Instagram, Display, YouTube, TikTok, and Email. Each with budget, actual spend, ROAS, and variance columns.

3. Automated Calculations
Formulas that calculate total spend, pacing percentage, budget remaining, average ROAS, and profit margin. You shouldn't have to do math manually—that's how errors happen.

4. Daily Pacing View
A section that shows daily target spend vs. actual for each channel, with color-coding (green = on pace, yellow = 10% off, red = 20%+ off). Makes it easy to spot issues fast.

5. ROAS/MER Tracking
Both platform-reported ROAS and true Marketing Efficiency Ratio (total revenue ÷ total marketing spend). This shows you the real story behind the numbers.

6. Scenario Modeling
A tab where you can adjust budget allocations (what if we shift 10% from social to search?) and see projected outcomes. Useful for mid-season adjustments.

How to Use the Templates

If you're downloading a Google Sheets template (recommended over Excel because of collaboration features), here's the workflow:

Step 1: Make a Copy
File > Make a Copy to create your own editable version. Never work directly in a shared template.

Step 2: Input Your Numbers
Fill in the yellow-highlighted cells (your budget, margins, targets). The template will auto-calculate allocations.

Step 3: Customize Channel Mix
Adjust the % allocations in the Channel Mix tab to match your business. The totals should sum to 100%.

Step 4: Set Up Daily Tracking
Each day, paste actual spend and revenue from your ad platforms into the Daily Tracking tab. The template will show pacing and flag issues.

Step 5: Weekly Review
Use the Dashboard tab to see visual summaries of performance. This is what you review with your team every Sunday.

Free vs. Pro Templates

Most free templates (ours included) give you the basic structure: budget allocation, channel splits, and simple tracking. They work fine for straightforward setups.

Pro templates (paid) add advanced features: automated data imports from Google Ads and Facebook Ads APIs, predictive modeling, contribution margin calculators, and scenario planning. If you're spending $50k+ in Q4, the time saved usually justifies the $15-30 cost.

For a simpler version focused on Google Sheets specifically, see our step-by-step guide: Holiday Marketing Budget Google Sheets Template.

Frequently Asked Questions

Your Holiday Budget Template Action Plan

You've got the framework. You've got the tools. Now you need to execute.

Here's your step-by-step action plan to build and implement your holiday marketing budget in the next 7-10 days:

Days 1-2: Size Your Budget

• Use the revenue-based or CAC/LTV method to calculate total Q4 spend
• Run cash flow and profitability checks to ensure you can afford it
• Get stakeholder buy-in on the number before proceeding

Days 3-4: Allocate Across Phases and Channels

• Use the Budget Allocator tool above to split across awareness, conversion, and urgency phases
• Customize channel mix based on your historical performance
• Set ROAS targets per channel using the ROAS Calculator
• Add 10-15% contingency reserve

Days 5-6: Set Up Tracking and Tools

• Download Google Sheets template (or build your own from the structure above)
• Set up Google Ads Performance Planner forecasts for Nov-Dec
• Configure Google Ads Shared Budgets for main campaign groups
• Create calendar reminders for daily tracking and weekly reviews

Days 7-10: Launch Phase 1 (Awareness)

• Launch October awareness campaigns with Phase 1 budgets
• Test 5-7 creative variations to identify winners
• Build retargeting audiences for Phase 2 conversion campaigns
• Track daily spend and ROAS, adjust as needed

The businesses that win Q4 are the ones who plan in September, execute in October, and optimize continuously through December. You now have everything you need to be one of them.

Related resources to round out your holiday planning:

• Holiday Budgeting & Forecasting 2025 – Complete guide for business and personal planning
• ROAS Benchmarks for Holiday Season 2025 – Channel-specific targets and calculations
• Holiday Spend Forecast for Small Business 2025 – Macro trends and SMB implications
• Holiday Marketing Budget Tracker 2025 – Daily tracking tools and dashboards

Get started today. Your Q4 revenue depends on it.