Marketing budgets usually only move when things look urgent. How to focus on the right things with a marketing budget.
By Max Porter
Digital Marketing Director, Screenfire Media
Most marketing budgets do not get approved because someone suddenly believes in marketing.
They get approved because leadership feels pressure.
Revenue slows. Competitors gain ground. Occupancy drops. Leads dry up. Conversion rates stall. Suddenly, a project that was “nice to have” becomes urgent.
If you’re a CMO or marketing leader, this is the reality you probably face when trying to secure buy-in internally. The challenge is not proving that marketing matters in theory. The challenge is connecting marketing investment to a business problem leadership already feels right now.
Hospitality Marketing Strategy: The Here and Now
At Screenfire, we recently worked with a hospitality client that initially explored a larger long-term rebranding initiative.
The conversations were productive, but they stalled.
Why? Because there was no immediate pressure attached to the project. Leadership viewed it as something that could happen later…maybe.
So, in concert with the CMO, we shifted our approach. Instead of leading with long-term brand positioning, we shifted toward immediate operational impact:
- Website performance improvements
- Booking engine optimization
- Conversion-focused lead generation
- Reducing friction in the booking process
The result:
- Sales increased more than 30% within a couple of months
- Improvements happened ahead of peak season
- Leadership saw measurable business impact quickly
The need was always there. What changed was the urgency tied to the investment.
How Should CMOs Position Marketing Internally?
One of the biggest mistakes in marketing communication: A focus only on awareness, branding language, or similar abstract long-term goals when leadership is focused on immediate outcomes.
Sure those things are vital. But executives want to know:
- What problem are we solving?
- What risk are we reducing?
- What revenue opportunity are we protecting?
- What happens if we wait?
This does not mean manufacturing panic or exaggerating problems. That approach usually backfires.
It means identifying what is the low-hanging fruit or already at risk and clearly communicating the business impact of inaction.
The strongest marketing initiatives are often tied directly to moments of operational pressure:
- Seasonal revenue windows
- Sales slowdowns
- Competitive threats
- Conversion bottlenecks
- Customer acquisition costs rising
When marketing aligns with those realities, budgets move faster and internal buy-in becomes easier.
The key question is simple:
“What business problem is urgent enough that leadership would act on it today?”
If that answer becomes clear, approval can get out of stall mode.
— Max Porter, Digital Marketing Director at Screenfire Media
PS: If your hospitality brand is struggling with conversions, bookings, or digital performance, Screenfire Media can help identify where opportunities are being lost — and how to fix them quickly.
Use the form to the right or email us at info@screenfiremedia.com.
About the author: Max Porter has broad experience in entertainment, video game, law, and technology marketing, including extensive SEM and SEO work across Google, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitch. Before joining Screenfire, he developed content and marketing for leading AAA video games, did script development for Lakeshore Entertainment, Character/Lore/PR development for Falcon’s Beyond Global, and content for the Dell/EMC solution partner program—as well as driving fan communications for City State Entertainment. He is a graduate of UCLA’s English Creative Writing program, where his work in modern literature derived from ancient myths helps him weave compelling storylines for client communications.
