Strategy Lab experiment
The $10,000 Decision
Marketing Investment Decision Tool
Start with $1,000, $10,000, $100,000, or any marketing budget. The framework adapts to your numbers.
Fictional demo data, Summit HVAC & Air
Summit HVAC & Air
Your marketing performance
Only metrics that can be calculated from your data are shown. Everything else stays as N/A.
Total spend
$10,000
Total leads
475
Total customers
70
Total revenue
$105,000
Average CAC
$143
Overall ROAS
10.5x
Break-even CAC: $600 Maximum CAC before marketing acquisition cost exceeds gross profit per customer. Your blended CAC is $143, inside that limit.
Executive view
Your marketing decision
The headline answer, before any chart.
Invest more
- Google Search$2,750
- Email Marketing$1,500
- Referrals$2,400
Efficient and productive compared with the other channels in this analysis. Additional investment appears justified.
Optimize
- SEO$1,150
- Meta Ads$1,375
- Content Marketing$825
Producing results, but with room to improve before it earns a meaningful increase in budget.
Reduce / reconsider
No channels in this group.
Inefficient relative to the alternatives available in this analysis. Reduce, fix, or reconsider it.
Insufficient data
No channels in this group.
Not enough reliable leads or customers yet to judge the channel fairly.
Channel detail
Channel scorecard
Sort any column. Columns appear only when the underlying data exists. Relative rankings compare the channels in this analysis, they do not represent universal industry benchmarks.
| Recommendation | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Email MarketingTop performer · Somewhat confident | $500 | 80 | 15 | 18.8% | $33 | $22,500 | 45.0x | Strong | Invest more / maintain |
| Google SearchAbove average · Very confident | $3,000 | 120 | 18 | 15.0% | $167 | $27,000 | 9.0x | Strong | Invest more / maintain |
| ReferralsAverage · Estimated | $1,000 | 25 | 10 | 40.0% | $100 | $15,000 | 15.0x | Strong | Invest more / maintain |
| Meta AdsAverage · Very confident | $2,000 | 160 | 8 | 5.0% | $250 | $12,000 | 6.0x | Needs optimization | Maintain / test / improve |
| SEOAverage · Somewhat confident | $2,000 | 50 | 12 | 24.0% | $167 | $18,000 | 9.0x | Needs optimization | Maintain / test / improve |
| Content MarketingLowest performer · Estimated | $1,500 | 40 | 7 | 17.5% | $214 | $10,500 | 7.0x | Needs optimization | Maintain / test / improve |
Visual analysis
What the numbers look like
Charts render only where the underlying data exists.
Spend vs revenue
Marketing spend against revenue by channel.
Customer acquisition cost
Lower is more efficient.
Conversion performance
Percentage of leads that became customers.
Revenue contribution
Share of total recorded revenue by channel.
Efficiency vs volume
Upper right is where scaling is safest. Lower left is where budget usually leaks.
Scale
High efficiency, high volume
Expand carefully
High efficiency, low volume
Optimize
Low efficiency, high volume
Reduce / reconsider
Low efficiency, low volume
- Google Search, efficiency 43%, customers 18
- SEO, efficiency 37%, customers 12
- Meta Ads, efficiency 47%, customers 8
- Email Marketing, efficiency 100%, customers 15
- Referrals, efficiency 56%, customers 10
- Content Marketing, efficiency 32%, customers 7
Allocation engine
Where should your next budget go?
The engine weighs performance, efficiency, volume, conversion, data confidence, existing spend, diminishing returns and diversification. Change the budget below and everything recalculates.
Current spend $10,000, allocating $10,000.
Google Search
27.5% of the next budget. Reduced so budget can move toward more efficient channels.
SEO
11.5% of the next budget. Reduced so budget can move toward more efficient channels.
Meta Ads
13.8% of the next budget. Reduced so budget can move toward more efficient channels.
Email Marketing
15.0% of the next budget. Increase justified by performance, capped by growth and diversification limits.
Referrals
24.0% of the next budget. Increase justified by performance, capped by growth and diversification limits.
Content Marketing
8.3% of the next budget. Reduced so budget can move toward more efficient channels.
Total recommended budget
$10,000 of $10,000 requested
Strategic conclusion
The decision
What I would actually do next.
Increase
Additional investment appears justified.
- Email Marketing$500 to $1,500
- Referrals$1,000 to $2,400
Maintain
Performing well enough to continue at current levels.
- Google Search$3,000 to $2,750
Optimize
Potential is there, efficiency is not yet.
- SEO$2,000 to $1,150
- Meta Ads$2,000 to $1,375
- Content Marketing$1,500 to $825
Reduce
Inefficient against the alternatives.
Nothing in this group.
Investigate
Insufficient or questionable data.
Nothing in this group.
Observations
What stands out?
Generated from fixed rules against your own numbers. If the data does not support a statement, it is not shown.
Meta Ads generated the most leads (160) but converted 5.0% of them into customers, below the 14.7% overall average.
Email Marketing has the lowest customer acquisition cost at $33, while Meta Ads costs $250 per customer.
Email Marketing returns 45.0x on every dollar spent, the strongest return in this analysis.
Google Search produces meaningful customer volume (18) while staying efficient, which makes it a candidate to scale first.
Data quality
Read these before you act
Estimated data: Referrals, Content Marketing are marked below "somewhat confident". Recommendations may change as data improves.
Live editing
Adjust your numbers
Change anything here and every metric, chart and recommendation above updates instantly.
| Channel | Spend | Leads | Customers | Revenue | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Google Search | $ | $ | |||
| SEO | $ | $ | |||
| Meta Ads | $ | $ | |||
| Email Marketing | $ | $ | |||
| Referrals | $ | $ | |||
| Content Marketing | $ | $ |
Transparency
Methodology and limits
This tool uses the performance data provided by the user to calculate marketing efficiency and compare channels. Recommendations are generated using transparent rules based on efficiency, conversion, value, volume and data confidence. No AI is involved.
Relative rankings compare the channels in this analysis. They do not represent universal industry benchmarks.
This tool does not guarantee future marketing performance. Actual results depend on market conditions, campaign execution, audience quality, pricing, competition and other factors. It is not professional financial advice.
Edit, export, reset
Every change recalculates instantly.
Where this sits
Strategy Lab, an experiment in decision making.
Marketing data is not valuable simply because it exists. It becomes valuable when it improves a decision. This tool exists to show the path from data, to analysis, to insight, to decision, to action.