The State of Marketing Spend Report

For many marketers, a big part of their job is spending company money–this is necessary to raise awareness and bring in new customers. But almost any marketer will tell you that spending money is also the hardest part of their job.

We wanted to find out if marketers’ spending woes were consistent across the board, beyond just our personal experiences. So we surveyed marketing professionals from our networks and got some pretty eye-opening results.

Across the board, marketers say that spending company money is difficult and time consuming.

When a marketer’s job is to plan revenue-driving campaigns and events, diverting their time to purchasing logistics is doing the company a disservice, and yet...

• 71% of marketers say it is difficult to report and track expenditures at their company.
• 29% of marketers say they spend 2 hours or more on expense reports each month, with some reporting as many as 15 hours!‍
• 46% of marketers say they spend 2 hours or more on processing invoices each month, with 18% saying they spend 4 hours or more!

And it’s not just lost productivity– clunky finance processes can sometimes be the reason a project gets delayed or canceled completely.

• 46% of marketers say they've had projects delayed or canceled because the purchasing process was too slow.

Poor Processes Leads to Creative and Painful Solutions

For some marketers, their only option is to resort to less-than-ideal workarounds. Such as...

• 64% of marketers say they've used a shared corporate card to make purchases because they don't have access to their own company card.
• 57% of marketers say they've had to cover company purchases on a personal card to avoid a lengthy and/or complicated finance process.

It may sound obvious but employees should never have to front money on behalf of their company, but it happens all too often due to poor processes that make it difficult or impossible to access company cash when they need it.

50% of marketers say they have had to wait too long to be reimbursed for company expenses. Even more alarming, 43% of marketers have said they've been put in a difficult personal financial situation due to a rejected reimbursement request.

The result – Constant purchasing challenges that leave marketers feeling defeated and at-odds with their finance department.

57% of marketers say that they've had awkward or uncomfortable conversations with the finance team about marketing purchases.

There Has to Be a Better Solution

While all of this may be the norm at many companies, we shouldn't accept it as the status quo!

Recent research has found that this constant friction impacts the broader employee experience, contributing directly to burnout and churn. And in the midst of a financial recession, that's something most organizations can't afford.

Want to learn more about how Teampay can help marketers spend smarter and more efficiently?

‍Click here to see how Teampay works to streamline marketing spend management.

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