Small budgets fail for one reason: they get spread so thin that nothing gathers enough data to optimise. Below is the split I start with, and why.
The 60 / 25 / 15 starting point
- 60%: high-intent search. People already looking for what you sell. Lowest risk, fastest read on whether the offer converts.
- 25%: retargeting. Cheap, and it protects the traffic the other 75% paid for.
- 15%: cold social. Treated as research, not revenue. It tells you which message earns attention.
Give each line item enough to learn
A campaign needs roughly thirty conversions a month before the numbers mean anything. If a split leaves a campaign below that, merge it into another one. Fewer campaigns, more signal.
Two campaigns that learn beat six that guess.
Review on a fixed rhythm
- Weekly: spend pacing and obvious waste, such as search terms, placements, frequency.
- Fortnightly: creative and ad copy rotation.
- Monthly: the split itself, moved by no more than 10 points at a time.
The reporting side of this lives in the five metrics I report every month.