Brand on a Budget: Tom McCave on Why Cutting Marketing Budget is a False Economy
Former Economist marketer Tom McCave shows publishers how to defend budgets, measure impact rigorously, and protect brand equity while keeping brand building alive without spending like a conglomerate
Publishers face a challenge to ad revenues, AI-driven disruption and pressure to cut marketing investment. Former senior marketer at The Economist Tom McCave argues that long-term brand building, measured rigorously and executed smartly, is a path to sustainable growth. His playbook: owned channels, earned media, smarter buying and partnerships.
Introduction: A shrinking pie, a bigger fight
Every downturn has its fall guy. In publishing, the marketing budget so often gets caught in the crosshairs. When revenues dip, finance chiefs reach for the red pen. Brand spend is usually the first casualty.
Tom McCave puts it plainly: “Short-termism is the enemy of growth.” In his decade leading global paid media investment into brand marketing at The Economist, he saw the consequences of cutting brand too quickly: “You save in the short run, but you pay later in acquisition costs, in churn, and staying front of mind for consumers
This isn’t abstract. Ad revenues have fallen sharply this year. Traffic dead-ends at AI summaries. Advertisers are increasingly wary of content adjacency in such a febrile political landscape. Meanwhile digital platforms offer cheaper reach. “In that context, cutting brand is a lever to balance the books,” McCave told the audience of the INMA Innovation Week in Dublin. “In reality, it accelerates decline.”
“We always said if you covered the logo, you should still know it was The Economist,” McCave said. That discipline compounded over decades. Campaigns separated by forty years looked cut from the same cloth. “It wasn’t nostalgia,” he insisted. “It was consistency. ”
The headwinds
The industry is buffeted by four storms:
• Ad revenues falling — double-digit declines across markets.
• Traffic lost to AI summaries — Google and Perplexity strip out casual readers.
• Brand safety fears — advertisers avoid adjacency to politics or conflict.
• Cheap inventory elsewhere — Meta, YouTube, TikTok and others offer reach for pennies and win a growing share of advertisers wallets
McCave argues: “That’s exactly why brand matters. If your awareness dips, if you’re not distinctive, you’re just another name on a media plan. You must protect the thing that makes you different, even when the numbers are against you.”
Tom McCave presents at the INMA Innovation Sumit in Dublin, September 2025
The 60/40 split
Les Binet and Peter Field’s research set the benchmark: 60% on brand, 40% on activation. The ratio still provokes sharp intakes of breath. “It is readily accepted in other sectors but questioned in media,” McCave said. “But the principle holds. Activation gives you today. Brand creates tomorrow. Ignore that balance, and you’re on the treadmill forever spending more, chasing less.”
Measuring what matters
Finance directors want hard evidence. A CFO cares less about awareness scores and more about numbers they can audit. That’s why brand marketing has to be measured with the same rigour routinely applied to performance marketing
Two heavyweight tools:
• Media mix models (MMM) — regression modelling using months/years of data to show contribution.
• Incrementality testing — test vs control groups to prove uplift.
Both are by design slower, but both convince. “If you want to protect brand budgets, you need rigour,” McCave insisted. “Otherwise, it’s just vanity metrics and opinion.”
While waiting for long models to deliver, he recommends six quicker ‘temperature checks’:
• Media efficiency (CPMs, CTRs, CPLs)
• Daily sales vs benchmarks
• Share of search vs competition
• Site engagement (dwell time, return visits)
• Brand lift studies
• Brand trackers on awareness and willingness to pay
Four plays for brand on a budget
McCave synthesizes his advice to four plays: “It’s not about spend, it’s about plays. Plays you can run on a lean budget.”
• Owned channel activations — “Brand everything you control. Even your 404 page. As he demonstrated with the Lego 404 page specifically designed to look like a landing page.
• Earned media — “Editorial, PR, marketing if they’re aligned, you look three times bigger.”
• Smart media buying — “Question the assumption that agencies always buy cheaper.”
Owned channel activations: branding the journey
Every touchpoint matters. “Your invoice is a brand moment. Your renewal email is a brand moment,” McCave said. At The Economist, even a broken page carried a witty one-liner..” Lego did the same with a headless minifigure. The lesson: “Audit every touch point; small plays add up”
Earned media: aligning the flywheel
“The flywheel spins faster if everyone pushes together,” McCave said. At The Economist, marketing, PR and editorial shared calendars. Campaigns and stories reinforced each other. “You publish on AI, and at the same time marketing pushes AI. Suddenly one plus one equals three.”
Other tactics he suggested:
Break big reports into snackable insights that can easily socialised and picked up
Prepare visual templates for breaking news; its not just about what you deliver but how you deliver it
Equip journalists with assets; they often have large followerships and a great mouthpiece for your brand
• Pitch columnists onto podcasts and panel3.
3.Smart media buying
Agencies promised better rates. “I didn’t find that to be the case,” McCave said. At The Economist, buying was brought in-house. “TV, radio, outdoor, we did it ourselves. We saved money, reinvested it into the media, we moved faster, increased accountability and owned our own data.”
He still sees value in agencies for strategy, planning, competitive intelligence and auditing best practice. But not for most media buying. His pointers:
Audit channels; reallocate investment poor performers into brand
Go niche: “Highly engaged audiences are often in the corners—Reddit, podcasts, newsletters”
Use AI for creative testing: “Synthetic panels are cheaper than live ones, and faster”
Audio: reaching the unreachable
Asked which channel offered best value, McCave didn’t hesitate. “Audio all the way,” he said. Podcasts, radio, streaming. “You reach people who don’t see you on social media. And they listen properly. That’s rare.”
At The Economist, formats were tested: baked-in sponsorships, dynamic insertions, partnerships. “They all worked in different ways “And for a fraction of TV’s cost” with “Creative costs are lower than TV and can be worked up quickly” Creative costs are lower than TV and can be worked up quickly.”
Protecting brand in lean times
Cuts are inevitable. The trick is survival. “You need two things,” McCave said. “Rigour and champions.” Rigour means models and data. Champions means leaders willing to fight for brand.”
Digital performance channels are not as effective as they were 5 years ago - “Performance itself is weakening” with “Digital performance channels are not as effective as they were 5 years ago -privacy changes, cookie loss and now AI summaries. “That’s why brand matters even more. It’s not a luxury, it’s the foundation.”
Closing thought
Publishers already know the theory. They applaud the case studies, nod at the research. Yet when budgets tighten, brand is still the first to go. McCave’s warning is blunt: “If you neglect brand, you decline. It’s that simple.”
Thanks for reading all the way to the end of the article! This post is public so feel free to share it, and if you have not done so already sign up and become a member.