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Template · six areas · no email required

Marketing audit template

Six questions, one per area of a marketing audit. Write down your number for each, score it 0 to 2 against the line from 74 audited budgets, and you have a first pass audit of your own marketing on one page.

Two to four hours
6 areas, scored out of 12
Median finding $58k a year across 74 audits

Cristian BragauFounder & Lead Auditor · Reviewed Nov 2026

Download the template (CSV)

The marketing audit template

One row per area. Score each 0 if you cannot answer it, 1 if your answer is an estimate or the honest answer is the wrong one, and 2 if it is measured and healthy.

Area	The question	Where your number comes from	Benchmark from 74 audits
Paid media and incrementality	What share of last quarter’s paid conversions would have happened without the ads?	A geo or audience holdout, or a two week pause on one channel, read against total revenue in your store, CRM or bank deposits.	Non incremental paid spend appeared in 68% of the 74 audited budgets.
Attribution and measurement	Do the conversions every platform claims add up to more than your real orders or deals?	Each platform’s conversion report for one month, summed, against the orders in your store or the closed deals in your CRM for the same month.	Attribution inflation appeared in 54% of the 74 audited budgets.
Pricing, offers and discounts	Does every standing discount, code and free shipping threshold still clear its full landed cost?	A year of order lines from your store or ERP, with this year’s landed cost, shipping, payment fees and returns attached.	Mispriced offers appeared in 47% of the 74 audited budgets, discount habits in 34%.
Retention and lifetime value	What share of new customers from each channel buys again inside your normal repeat window?	A cohort report from your store, subscription platform or CRM, split by the channel of the first order.	Retention leaks appeared in 41% of the 74 audited budgets.
Channel and budget allocation	Is budget moved between channels by contribution, or by last year’s split?	Twelve months of spend by channel from the platform billing screens, against contribution by channel from the cohort report.	Wasted paid spend was 22% of spend across the 74 audited budgets.
Reporting and governance	Does one number, reconciled to the bank, decide the marketing budget each month?	Your monthly marketing report next to bank deposits and the P&L for the same month.	A median 18.7% of spend was leaking in the 74 audited budgets, inside an 11% to 28% band.

The same six rows, with columns for your number, your score and notes, are in the CSV. It opens in Excel, Numbers or Google Sheets.

Download the template (CSV)

How to fill in the template

Pick one recent month and use it for every row, so the six numbers describe the same period.
Pull the exports first. Platform conversion and billing reports, your store or CRM orders, a cohort report and the bank deposits for that month. The middle column says which one each row needs.
Write the number before you score it. A share, a dollar figure or a yes with a date. If you cannot find it in an hour, score the row 0: not knowing is the finding.
Score against the benchmark line. It shows how often the 74 audited budgets had that leak, so a 1 or a 0 puts you in the common case, not the rare one.
Add the six scores for a total out of 12, and keep the sheet: the next pass in six months shows what moved.

Each row has five deeper checks behind it in the marketing audit checklist, if a score needs more detail.

How to read your template score

10 to 12

Your numbers are measured and mostly healthy. Repeat the template twice a year and watch the fastest movers: paid media and standing discounts.

6 to 9

Start with the lowest scored row. Its five checks in the checklist usually show where the money goes within a week.

0 to 5

Start with attribution and reporting. Every other number on the sheet depends on them, so fix the measure before judging the spend.

Across the 74 audits a median 18.7% of marketing spend was leaking, inside an 11% to 28% band, and the median highlight finding was worth $58k a year. The benchmark breaks that down by industry and spend band.

What the template cannot show

A score says where to look, not how much it is worth. It cannot put an annual figure on a leak, test whether a channel is incremental, or reconcile three sources that disagree. A full audit does those things and hands back each finding with its figure, its evidence and its fix: the sample report shows the format, and what a marketing audit costs covers the options. Whichever route you take, get the audited numbers first.

Template questions

Is this the same as the marketing audit checklist?

No. The checklist asks 30 yes or no questions so you can see where you are unsure. The template asks for six numbers, one per area, and scores each one against the 74 audit benchmark. Use the checklist to find the gaps and the template to put figures on them. The marketing audit checklist →

What does a finished marketing audit look like?

A finished audit names every finding with its annual figure, the evidence behind it, the fix and an owner. The sample report shows that format, built from a real audit. See the sample report →

How long does the template take?

About two to four hours when your exports are at hand. Most of the time goes into pulling order lines and platform reports, not into scoring. Pick one recent month and keep it the same across all six areas. The marketing audit process →

Have the six numbers audited.

Every area measured against your own data, in 5 to 7 working days. $10k to $50k of findings, or your money back.

Request the audit Book the fit call

Fixed fee. No retainer. NDA first.

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