Digital marketing proposal template

A digital marketing proposal is priced as a retainer, and the retainer has two parts that clients confuse unless the proposal separates them: the media the client pays the platforms for, and the fee they pay you to run it. This tool takes the client's monthly ad spend and your management fee as a share of it, adds content and creative hours at your rate, puts the one-off setup and audit fee on the first invoice, and shows the fees over the initial term. It also shows your fee as a share of the client's total outlay, which is the number they will work out for themselves if you do not.

Never put the media spend through your books

The ad spend field is here so the fee can be worked as a share of it, not because the money should touch you. The client pays the platform directly from their own account and card, and you manage the account. Running media through the agency turns your revenue into a pass-through, your cash flow into a float for the client and a missed client payment into a debt you owe Google or Meta.

Separate the management fee from the making

Managing campaigns and making the things that go in them are different work at different rates. A percentage of spend pays for the management; content and creative are hours, priced at your rate, and a client who wants more assets should see the line move. Bundling them into one retainer figure means every extra video is free and every quiet month is overpaid.

Setup is real work and gets its own line

The audit, the tracking, the account structure and the first creative round happen before the retainer earns anything, and they are the reason the first months are hard. Charging a setup fee, shown on the first invoice, pays for that work and filters out clients who are not committed. An initial term of a few months then gives the campaign time to work before anyone judges it.