The EOFY rush is nearly over. The receipts are in, the last-minute spend is done, and 1 July is sitting there like a clean page.
Most business owners use that page for everything except marketing. New budgets get set, new targets get written down, the new financial year gets a fresh start with the accountant. Marketing tends to roll over untouched, running on whatever was set up months ago because no one stopped to look at it.
That is the mistake. A bit of new financial year marketing planning is the cheapest, quietest chance you get all year to fix what is not working before you pour another twelve months of budget into it. If money is tight, start with the low-cost options that actually work. You do not need a big campaign or a new agency. You need about half a day and a willingness to look honestly at what last year actually did.
Here is how to spend that half day.
Week one: look at what really happened
Before you plan a single thing for the year ahead, look back at the one that just finished.
Not at the highlight reel. At the numbers. Which channels brought you real enquiries, and which just brought you traffic, likes and a warm feeling? Those are very different things, and most owners cannot tell them apart because no one ever set the reporting up to answer the question.
Pull twelve months of data and ask three plain questions. Where did my actual enquiries come from? What did each one roughly cost me? And which channel did I assume was working but cannot actually prove?
That last one catches people out. Our piece on real-time reporting and reading the signal instead of the noise walks through how to separate the two, and if your analytics keep dumping everything into “direct” traffic, here is why that number is usually lying to you. You cannot plan next year on data you do not trust.
Week two: fix the leaks before you spend more
Once you know where your enquiries come from, the temptation is to immediately spend more on the channel that worked. Resist it for a week.
The faster win is usually plugging the holes you already have. There is no point buying more traffic to send it to a page that does not convert. If your visitor numbers look healthy but the phone stays quiet, the problem is rarely the ads. It is what happens after the click. Worth reading: why your ads probably do not suck, your landing page does and the quiet ways a website bleeds leads.
A leaky funnel is the most expensive problem in marketing precisely because it is invisible. The traffic shows up, the spend goes out, and the enquiries just quietly do not arrive. Fixing one slow-loading page or one confusing contact form often does more than doubling your ad budget would.
This is also the week to tidy your tracking. A new financial year is the natural moment to make sure your analytics and conversion tracking are actually counting the things that matter, so next year’s reports are worth reading rather than worth guessing at.
Week three: decide the plan, then put a number on it
Now you plan. And the order matters: goals first, channels second, budget last.
Most businesses do it backwards. They start with “we spent about this much last year” and work outward from the number. Start with what you actually want instead. More of a certain type of job? A quieter reliance on one risky channel? A steadier flow of enquiries rather than the usual feast and famine? Write the goal down in plain words before you write down a dollar figure.
Then pick the two or three channels most likely to get you there and ignore the rest. You do not need to be everywhere. One or two channels done properly will always beat five done badly, and trying to cover everything is how small teams burn out and budgets disappear. The digital marketing strategy framework we use with clients is built around exactly this, and if paid search is in your mix, setting the right Google Ads budget and knowing what a good cost per lead looks like will keep you honest about whether it is paying off.
If you did your EOFY housekeeping properly, our companion piece on smart EOFY marketing moves covers the spending side. This is the planning side that comes straight after.
Week four: start small and watch the numbers
You do not need to launch everything on day one. The businesses that start the new financial year well are not the ones that spend the fastest. They are the ones that start with a clear plan and then actually watch what happens.
Pick the first thing on your list. Set it live. Then check, a couple of weeks in, whether it is doing what you hoped. Marketing is not a set-and-forget purchase, it is a habit of looking. The owners who win are simply the ones who keep looking and adjust when the numbers tell them to, instead of finding out in next year’s EOFY scramble that nothing changed.
That is the whole reset. Look back honestly, fix the leaks, plan from your goals, start small. Half a day in early July, and you spend the next twelve months proving what works rather than guessing at it.
New financial year marketing FAQ
When should I review my marketing for the new financial year?
Early July is ideal, while last year’s full twelve months of data is sitting there complete. Reviewing in the first couple of weeks means you start the year executing on a plan rather than running on autopilot from settings you chose months ago.
What should I look at first?
Where your actual enquiries came from, not your traffic or follower numbers. Separate the channels that brought real business from the ones that just brought activity. Everything else in your plan follows from getting that one answer right.
Do I need to increase my marketing budget for the new year?
Not necessarily. Often the bigger gain comes from fixing what you already have, a landing page that does not convert or tracking that does not count properly, before adding spend. Decide your goals first, then size the budget to match them.
How many marketing channels should a small business run?
Usually two or three, done properly. Spreading a small budget and a small team across every platform tends to mean everything gets done at half effort. Pick the channels your real enquiries actually come from and commit to those.
A simple next step
If you want a quick read on where your marketing stands before you plan the year, our free Marketing Scorecard benchmarks you against Australian SMB best practice in a few minutes. Or if you would rather talk it through, you can book a strategy call and we will help you turn the new financial year into a year you can actually measure.
Related read: For a practical, channel-by-channel version aimed at professional services, see our guide to marketing for architects. The same 12 month plan works for any founder-led services business that lives on referrals.
Phoenix Marketing is a Melbourne based digital marketing agency helping Australian founders grow through SEO, Google Ads, social media and content. Learn more about Phoenix Marketing.