Which marketing spend is actually working? How Black & Decker and Sylvania found out

Clients: Black & Decker (power tools) and Sylvania (lighting), both global manufacturers
My role: Graduate project team member at Black & Decker; Marketing Communications Manager at Sylvania
What I launched: Two new ways of deciding where marketing money goes

Sound familiar?

• Every launch is "a priority", so every launch gets a little and none gets enough.

• The board asks what marketing returns and the honest answer is "it depends".

• Budgets are set by last year's numbers rather than next year's opportunities.

The starting point

Two global manufacturers, the same problem: many launches and campaigns competing for the same budget, and no shared way to say which ones deserved it.

How we worked

Black & Decker: listening first

As part of a graduate project team, we started by interviewing stakeholders and visiting factories and local markets across Europe to understand what "success" meant to each of them. Only then did we build a tool mapping every cost of each launch and campaign, central and local, against hard and soft results.

Sylvania: deciding together

At Sylvania I introduced "launch windows". We agreed the measures of success with the business, researched the most profitable segments, and built a calculator that graded every project Gold, Silver or Bronze. Resources followed the grade, and the grades fed the annual marketing calendar and budget.

Going further

At Black & Decker, we did not just hand the tool over: we presented it to the European board and toured Europe training local marketing teams to use it. At Sylvania, the calculator was shared with every market each quarter so they worked to the same priorities.

What changed

• Black & Decker: tool adopted across the business to identify successful projects and align resources

• Sylvania: resources concentrated on the highest-value launches every quarter

What it means for your business

If everything is a priority, nothing is. A simple, agreed way to grade projects does more for marketing return than a bigger budget.

Could you say which of your marketing is paying back? Take the free two-minute Growth Check and see where you score.