If you run a contracting business, you have almost certainly had the same uneasy thought after a slow stretch: maybe you should be spending more on marketing. Then the next thought arrives just as fast — but how much is the right amount, and how do you know you are not just throwing money away? Most contractors have been burned at least once by a directory listing, a lead service, or an ad campaign that quietly drained the bank account and brought back nothing they could point to.
The honest problem is that nobody hands you a number. A roofer down the road might be spending nothing and staying booked on referrals, while another spends thousands a month and swears by it. That makes it hard to tell whether you are underspending, overspending, or spending on the wrong things entirely.
This article gives you a straightforward way to think about it — a starting percentage, what actually counts as marketing, and how to tell whether the money is working.
Most contractors should plan to spend somewhere between 5% and 10% of revenue on marketing. Lean toward 5% if you are established and already busy, and toward 10% or a little more if you are newer or actively trying to grow. The exact percentage matters far less than spending it consistently on things that genuinely reach local homeowners.
Why “how much” is the wrong first question
Asking how much to spend before you know what you are spending on is how money disappears. A number with no plan behind it just becomes a budget for whoever is selling to you that month. Before you set a figure, get clear on what you are actually trying to do: stay visible to past customers, reach new homeowners in your area, or show up when someone searches for your trade. Those are different goals, and they cost different amounts.
The contractors who waste the least are the ones who decide on the job first and the budget second. Once you know you want to be the roofer or plumber people in your town already recognize, the spending question gets a lot easier to answer.
The simple percentage rule, and when to ignore it
The 5% to 10% of revenue range is a useful anchor because it scales with the size of your business. A solo operator doing $200,000 a year lands around $10,000 to $20,000 annually, or a few hundred to a couple thousand a month. A larger outfit doing $2 million scales up from there. It keeps your spending tied to what you can actually afford.
But treat it as a guide, not a rule. If you are brand new with no reputation, you may need to spend at the high end or beyond for a year or two just to get on the map. If you are established, fully booked, and turning work away, you can sit at the low end and focus that money on staying visible rather than chasing more leads you cannot serve.
What actually counts as marketing spend
A lot of contractors undercount their marketing because they only think of paid ads. Marketing is everything that helps a potential customer find you and decide to trust you. That includes your website, your photos and videos, your truck wraps and signage, the time you or someone on your team spends posting online, any software or services you pay for, and yes, advertising.
When you add it all up honestly, you may find you are already spending more than you thought — just scattered and uncoordinated. Counting it properly is the first step to spending it better. If you have never mapped out where your marketing time and money go, our piece on where to actually spend your time is a good companion to this one.
Where the money should actually go
For most contractors, the highest-value spending is on the things that make you visible and believable to local homeowners, not on broad advertising. That usually means a clean website that loads fast and shows your work, real photos and video from your job sites, and consistent presence on the platforms where people in your area actually look.
Video deserves a specific mention because it does something a static ad cannot — it shows the quality of your work and the kind of person you are before a homeowner ever calls. A few short clips of a finished install or a quick walkthrough of a project does more to win trust than a stack of stock images. You can see the difference in our examples of contractor video.
New business versus established business
The right number depends heavily on where you are. A new contractor is buying something an established one already owns: recognition. Nobody knows your name yet, so you have to spend more, and more aggressively, to build it. Expect to sit at the higher end of the range, and expect it to feel uncomfortable before it pays off.
An established contractor is in a different position. You have past customers, reviews, and word of mouth working for you. Your marketing job is mostly to stay top of mind and keep feeding the reputation you already built. That can often be done at the lower end of the range, which is one reason a busy contractor and a struggling one can spend wildly different amounts and both be right.
How to tell if your spending is working
The point of a marketing budget is not to spend the money — it is to get jobs. So track the connection. The simplest habit is to ask every new customer how they found you and write it down. After a few months you will see which channels actually bring in work and which just bring in invoices.
Be patient but not naive. Some marketing, especially building an online presence, takes months to pay off, so do not kill it after three weeks. But if something has had a fair run and still brings nothing you can trace, stop paying for it. The goal is to gradually move your budget toward what works and away from what does not, year after year.
The bottom line
There is no single correct marketing budget for a contractor, but 5% to 10% of revenue is a sensible place to start — lower if you are established, higher if you are growing. What matters more than the percentage is spending it deliberately: on the website, photos, video, and consistent local presence that make homeowners trust you, and tracking results closely enough to keep shifting money toward what actually books jobs. Spend with a plan and a way to measure it, and the question stops being scary.
At Lighthouse Digital Studio, we create short-form video content for contractors — no filming required on your end. Take a look at our video content plans, browse real examples, or get in touch to talk through what would work for your business.