How Much Should a Private Practice Spend on Marketing?

The honest answer most agencies won't give you plus a clear framework to set your budget with confidence.

You’re trying to decide if you should spend another $2,000 on ads next month… and you have no idea if it’s the right move. Truth is, if you've ever Googled this question, you've probably found one of two things: a vague percentage pulled from a generic business article, or a sales pitch dressed up as advice. Neither is actually useful when you're a dentist trying to decide how much to put toward ads next quarter, or a therapist wondering if your current marketing spend is even in the right ballpark.

So let's answer it directly.

The Short Answer: 5–20% of Revenue

Most private practices should plan to allocate between 5% and 20% of their gross revenue toward marketing. Where you fall in that range depends on three things: how established you are, how fast you want to grow, and how competitive your local market is.

That range might feel wide. That’s because it is. And it should be. 

Here's a simple way to think about it:

5–10% of revenue: You're an established practice with strong word-of-mouth, good reviews, and a consistent patient base. You're not trying to grow aggressively; you mainly want to maintain your current volume and protect your reputation online. Marketing here is about staying visible, not expanding.

11-15% of revenue: You want steady, intentional growth. You're seeing new competition in your area, you've hit a plateau in new patient volume, or you're expanding your services or locations. This is where most growing private practices should be.

16-20% (or more): You're in a competitive metro market, you're launching a new practice, or you're in a rapid expansion phase (adding providers, opening a second location, pivoting your service model). Higher spend is appropriate here because you're buying market share and building infrastructure, not just maintaining it.

What the Numbers Look Like by Practice Size

To make this practical, here's what those percentages look like in real dollars across different revenue levels:

$500,000/year practice → $25,000–$100,000/year ($2,100–$8,300/month)

$1M/year practice → $50,000–$200,000/year ($4,200–$16,700/month)

$2M/year practice → $100,000–$400,000/year ($8,300–$33,300/month)

Most solo or small group practices fall between $3,000–$8,000/month in total marketing spend when you include everything: agency fees, ad spend, software, and content creation. If your practice falls somewhere in the middle, the real question is whether your current spend actually reflects where you want to go. 

What "Marketing" Actually Includes (Most Practices Underestimate This)

One of the most common mistakes we see is a practice owner saying, "We spend $1,500/month on marketing" when really, they're only counting the ads. Marketing spend includes:

• Paid advertising (Google Ads, Meta Ads, etc.)

• Agency or consultant fees (strategy, management, execution)

• Website (design, hosting, ongoing optimization)

• SEO (content, local search, technical)

• Review management and reputation tools

• Email and SMS platforms (for patient follow-up and retention)

• Content creation (photography, video, copywriting)

• Social media (management, scheduling tools)

When you add all of this up, the number is often higher than practice owners expect, but it also explains why piecemeal marketing rarely works. Spending $500/month on ads while your website hasn't been updated since 2019 is like putting premium fuel in a car with a flat tire.

We see this all the time. A practice will pause ads because “they didn’t work,” without realizing the issue was everything around the ads. 

The Biggest Mistake: Spending Without a System

The question isn't just how much to spend. It's whether your spending is connected to a system that actually converts interest into booked appointments.

We've worked with practices spending $8,000/month on ads with a booking rate so low that their cost per new patient was over $400. We've also worked with practices spending $3,000/month who were consistently booked out 6 weeks in advance, because every dollar was part of a coordinated strategy.

Imagine a patient clicks your ad, visits your site, fills out a form, and gets a follow-up text within 5 minutes. Now that’s a system. Without it, leads disappear. 

Budget alone doesn't drive growth. A marketing system does. And more budget doesn’t fix broken marketing. 

To build a system that actually scales, you need tracking. We’ve had practices come to us spending $5,000 a month with no idea where their patients were coming from. Once you can see what’s working, you can make better decisions and grow with confidence. 

A real system includes:

• A website that converts visitors into appointment requests

• Ads that target the right people in your area

• Automated follow-up so leads don't go cold

• Review generation so new patients trust you before they call

• Tracking so you always know what's working

Without the system, more budget just means more waste.

How to Set Your Marketing Budget (A Practical Framework)

You don’t need a perfect plan to get this right. You just need a starting point that makes sense. 

If you're not sure where to start, use this three-step approach:

Step 1: Know your numbers. What's your current monthly revenue? What does a new patient mean for your practice in lifetime value? If the average patient is worth $2,000–$5,000 over their relationship with you, spending $150–$300 to acquire them is a very good investment.

Step 2: Define your goal. Are you trying to maintain, grow, or launch? Each goal demands a different level of investment and a different mix of tactics.

Step 3: Start with a system, then scale. Don't add more ad spend to a broken foundation. Audit your website, your tracking, and your follow-up process first. Once those are working, scaling ad spend becomes predictable, not a gamble.

What About "I Can't Afford Marketing Right Now"?

This is coming from a real place. You’ve probably spent money before and didn't see a return. This is one of the most common things we hear and it's almost always a sign that the marketing that has been done isn't being tracked well enough to justify continued investment.

If you don't know what your current marketing is producing, you don't have a budget problem. You have a measurement problem.

The goal of a good marketing system isn't to be an expense. It's to be the most reliable driver of revenue in your practice. When you know that every $1,000 in ad spend produces $6,000 in booked appointments, the conversation about budget becomes very simple.

If you take nothing else from this, take this:

• Most practices should spend 5–15% of revenue

• Your growth stage determines where you fall

• Budget doesn’t matter without a system

• Track everything before you scale

Bottom Line

Most private practices should be spending 5–15% of gross revenue on marketing, with the exact number determined by their growth stage and market. But the percentage matters less than how the money is being used. A coordinated, systems-based approach will almost always outperform a higher budget spent without strategy.

If you're not sure whether your current spend is working, or if you're starting from scratch and want to know what the right investment looks like for your specific practice, that's exactly the kind of conversation we have in our free 30-minute strategy sessions. Most practices don’t need to spend more. They need to use what they’re already spending better. 

You shouldn't have to guess how to grow your practice. Let's build a system that makes it predictable.

MG Media Creative helps health and wellness private practices build marketing systems that consistently attract new patients without the guesswork. Based in Walnut Creek, CA. Book a free strategy session →