Free tool
Dealership ad budget calculator
Most dealership budgets get set by percentage of revenue, or by whatever last year was plus a bit. Neither tells you what to do. Start from the two numbers that decide it, then look at where the money should go.
New and used combined, or your target if you are planning up.
What you are willing to spend on advertising to move one car. Default reflects a rounded planning figure, not a target.
Monthly ad budget
$31,500
$378,000 a year
| Channel | Share | Monthly |
|---|---|---|
| Paid searchBrand plus city, core models, and conquest terms, with a serious negative keyword list. The waste here is usually negatives, not bids. | 30% | $9,450 |
| Paid socialReaches shoppers in the neighborhoods around the rooftop with actual inventory in the ad. Fatigues fastest, so it depends on the production line below. | 24% | $7,560 |
| Streaming and CTVKeeps the big-screen impression while holding the geography to your real trade area and the corridors feeding it. | 20% | $6,300 |
| Creative productionThe line most dealer budgets omit entirely. Without it, a tired ad can only be answered by moving budget or rebuilding audiences, neither of which fixes the ad. | 15% | $4,725 |
| Test and reserveHeld back for seasonal pushes, model-year changeover, and testing a channel before committing a monthly line to it. | 11% | $3,465 |
$4,725 a month for creative. This is the line most dealer budgets do not have. Without it, the only answers to a tired ad are more budget and new targeting, and neither replaces the ad.
- At this level the creative refresh cadence matters more than the media mix. Concentrated spend in one trade area drives frequency up fast.
These splits are starting points for a conversation, not optimal allocations, and nothing here is a promise about results. Your own numbers beat any benchmark: pull what you actually spent and what you actually retailed, and start from that.
How the math works
The total is deliberately simple: units retailed per month multiplied by what you are willing to spend on advertising to retail one. That is how the number gets defended in a meeting, because both inputs are yours and both are arguable.
The split is where the opinion lives. Money goes first to demand that already exists, then to creating it, and fifteen percent is held back for creative production. That last line is the reason this tool exists. Almost every dealership advertising budget is a media budget with no production line, so when the ads fatigue, the only levers on the table are raising spend and rebuilding audiences. Neither one replaces the ad that got old.
Nothing here is a benchmark, an industry standard, or a promise. The splits are a starting point for a conversation. Your own history beats any default in this tool.
Questions dealers ask
- How much should a car dealership spend on advertising per month?
- Set it from cost per unit rather than a percentage of revenue. Multiply the units you retail in a month by what you are willing to spend on advertising to move one car. A store retailing 45 units at $700 per unit is planning a $31,500 monthly budget. The right per-unit figure varies widely, and independents typically run leaner than franchise stores.
- What is a normal advertising cost per vehicle sold?
- NADA DATA put franchised new-car dealership advertising at roughly $739 per new vehicle retailed in 2025. Treat that as a reference point for planning rather than a target, because it blends every store size and market in the country. Independent lots commonly plan considerably lower per unit.
- How should a dealer split an advertising budget across channels?
- Fund capture before awareness. Paid search comes first because those shoppers have already raised a hand, then paid social with real inventory, then streaming and CTV for reach inside your trade area. For an independent lot, marketplace listings and photography come before all of it, because that is the actual storefront.
- How much of an ad budget should go to creative production?
- Enough to refresh what is running on the cadence your frequency demands, which for most single-rooftop stores means monthly. This calculator holds back fifteen percent for production. Most dealer budgets allocate nothing, which is why the only available responses to a fatigued ad are raising budget or rebuilding audiences.
- Does market size change the budget split?
- It changes the split more than the total. In a large metro, broadcast makes you pay for households hours from your rooftop, so zip-level streaming does more with the same money. In a small or rural market, waste is lower but the audience is smaller, so frequency builds quickly and creative fatigues sooner.
Related reading
Want the creative half handled?
The production line in that table is the part we do. Cinematic spots for your store, cut for every screen, on a monthly cadence so the market never sees a stale ad.