When you’ve spent over two decades in B2B marketing, you’re bound to slip on a few banana skins along the way. You tend to be the better from it in the long run too, which is why I’m sharing a series of them with you, curated by me from a list of memorable and not-so-memorable faux pas along the way.

B2B marketing banana skin no 6 is this: don’t assume that your marketing budget is fixed. It is not. It is a fluid, movable feast subject to the fortunes of your company and likely be adjusted up or down – sometimes a few times during a financial year.

I’m generally for front-loading expenditure in a budget period. The earlier you can make the investment, the earlier you can see the rewards. Then, if you’ve very little or nothing left in Q4, hopefully you can ride the wave of the good work that’s gone before and see the returns come in before the next financial year. On the other hand, if things don’t go well in H1 you might find that rug of a big event earmarked for Q4 gets pulled from under your feet.

If you’re ahead of plan, there’s every chance you can bid for and be allocated additional funds. Also, if you can demonstrate why a market is proving harder to crack than you anticipated, the executive might go to the well some more for you.

Let’s face it, we all hope that our budgets get revised upward during the year. It’s wise to bear in mind that there’s always a chance they might get revised down too.