📖 How to use this template

A quarterly marketing budget in one table: what each category was allocated, what it actually spent, and where the overruns are. The sample covers Q3 and Q4 across six spend categories.

1. Duplicate this project into your own organization (dropdown next to the project name, then Duplicate)
2. Rename the six sections to your own spend categories, then add or delete rows beneath them
3. Fill in Budget Q3 and Budget Q4 on every row at the start of the quarter
4. Update Actual Q3 and Actual Q4 as spend lands. Variance Q3 and Variance Q4 turn red on their own once actual passes budget
5. Delete the Allocated Budget field. It hardcodes a $32,000 threshold taken from the sample data, so it will be wrong in your copy

Section rows are not totals

The numbers on the six section rows were typed in by hand. They are not rolled up from the rows beneath them and they do not sum. Either maintain them yourself as category targets, or clear them and read the table row by row. Do not assume the parent figure equals its children.

The fields

Variance is a formula, so it updates itself. The two Budget and two Actual fields are yours to keep current.

Reading it

Switch to Table view. That is the only view where the six money columns sit side by side, and this template is a table pretending to be a task list.

Sort by Variance Q3 to bring the overruns to the top. A category that is red two quarters running is not an overrun, it is a budget set at the wrong number.

Adapting it

The template is built around two quarters because that is the horizon most marketing budgets are actually managed on. If you plan a full year, duplicate the four money fields for Q1 and Q2 and add matching variance formulas. If you run monthly, rename them and expect a wider table.