How much should a UK SME spend on social media?

"How much should we be spending on social media?" is one of the questions we are asked most, and the honest answer starts with another question: spending on what? Social media covers content production, community management and paid advertising, and the sensible split between them changes completely depending on what you sell.

Here is a straightforward breakdown of what UK small and medium businesses actually spend, what those budgets buy, and how to tell whether the money is working.

The three things you are paying for

Content production

Graphics, photography, short-form video, copywriting. This is the biggest hidden cost, because it is the part most businesses assume they will do in-house and then quietly stop doing after six weeks.

Management and community

Strategy, a content calendar, scheduling, replying to comments and messages, and monthly reporting. Unglamorous, but the difference between a channel that grows and a channel that just exists.

Paid media

The money that goes directly to Meta, TikTok or LinkedIn. This is separate from management fees and should always be discussed as its own line so you can see cost per lead clearly.

Realistic monthly budgets

£100–£250 per month: build a presence

At this level you should expect a clear strategy, a content calendar and consistent organic posting across your main channels, plus monthly reporting. It is enough to look professional and stay in front of existing customers. It is not enough to generate a predictable stream of new enquiries on its own.

£250–£600 per month: presence plus paid testing

Typically a management retainer of around £200 with £200–£400 of ad spend behind it. This is the first level where paid campaigns gather enough data to be meaningful. Expect the first two months to be learning: testing audiences, hooks and formats until a couple of combinations clearly outperform.

£600–£1,500 per month: a genuine acquisition channel

Multi-channel campaigns, regular short-form video, retargeting and proper creative testing. At this level social should be measured like any other sales channel: cost per lead, lead quality and return on ad spend, reviewed at least fortnightly.

How to split the money

• Local service businesses: heavier on organic and reviews, lighter on paid — most work comes from proximity and trust
• E-commerce: heavier on paid and creative production — you need volume and constant new hooks
• B2B and professional services: LinkedIn-led, smaller audiences, higher cost per click but far higher deal value

A reasonable rule of thumb for a business starting out is roughly 40% content production, 20% management and 40% paid media. As campaigns mature, the paid share tends to grow because you know what works and can safely put more behind it.

What good looks like after 90 days

Do not judge social on followers. After three months you should be able to answer these questions with numbers: how many enquiries came from social, what each one cost, and how many turned into paying customers. If your agency cannot tell you, tracking was never set up properly.

As a benchmark, UK SMEs we work with typically see a cost per qualified lead somewhere between £15 and £60 depending on sector, with professional services at the higher end and local trades at the lower. Anything wildly outside that range is worth investigating.

Where budgets get wasted

• Boosting posts instead of running structured campaigns with proper targeting
• Spreading a small budget across five platforms rather than winning on one
• Sending paid traffic to a homepage rather than a page built for the offer
• Changing the campaign every week before the data has settled
• Paying for follower growth that never converts into enquiries

The honest answer

If you are just starting, £99 to £199 a month buys a properly managed presence and is a sensible first commitment. If you need social to generate leads rather than just maintain a presence, plan for £500 a month all-in and give it a full quarter before judging it. Anything less than that, spent inconsistently, is usually money you would rather have put into your website.

Whatever you spend, insist on one thing: a monthly report that shows enquiries and cost per enquiry, not impressions. That single discipline will tell you within a quarter whether the budget is the right size.