A plastic surgery practice should spend $5,000 to $10,000 per month on paid advertising, which at typical performance produces a 5-10x return on ad spend and booked consultations at $80-150 each. Those are agency averages across active practices, not guarantees, and this piece walks through the math behind them.
Most budget advice for surgeons is either a percentage rule borrowed from retail or a number an agency reverse-engineered from its own retainer. Neither survives contact with a real surgical calendar. The useful question is not what to spend. It is what a booked procedure is worth, what a booked consult costs to acquire, and how many consults the practice can actually absorb. Set those three numbers and the budget sets itself.
What do plastic surgery practices actually spend per month?
Across the practices we operate campaigns for, sustainable paid media budgets cluster between $5,000 and $10,000 per month on Meta and Google combined. Below roughly $3,000 per month, campaigns starve: the platforms cannot exit their learning phase, audiences are tested one at a time instead of in parallel, and a single bad week erases the month's data. Above roughly $15,000 per month, most single-location practices hit an absorption ceiling before an advertising ceiling. The front desk cannot return calls fast enough, consult slots fill three weeks out, and additional spend buys inquiries the practice cannot service. The budget range is not about ambition. It is about matching spend to the number of consults the practice can answer, book, and sit within seven days, because response speed is where paid leads live or die.
- Under $3K/month: campaigns rarely exit the learning phase, data too thin to optimize
- $5-10K/month: the working range for most single-location surgical practices
- $10-15K/month: justified once show rates hold above 70 percent and the calendar absorbs volume
- $15K+/month: multi-provider or multi-location practices, or aggressive procedure-line launches
What does a booked consultation cost in 2026?
A booked surgical consultation costs $80 to $150 to acquire through paid media, measured across our active plastic surgery accounts over the last 12 months. That figure is the cost of a consultation that actually lands on the calendar, not the cost of a form fill. The distinction matters because raw leads routinely cost $25 to $50, and practices that optimize to lead cost end up paying twice: once for the click and again in front-desk hours chasing people who never intended to book. Procedure mix moves the number. High-intent, high-ticket procedures carry higher consult costs and better economics per case. These are agency averages, not guarantees, and any agency quoting a single fixed number without asking about your procedure mix is quoting fiction.
- Rhinoplasty: consult costs at the upper end of the range, case values $8-15K
- Mommy makeover: mid-to-upper range consult costs, case values $15-25K
- Breast augmentation: mid-range consult costs, case values $7-12K
- Body contouring: mid-range consult costs, strong volume, case values $6-18K
What ROAS should the budget produce?
A properly run plastic surgery account returns 5-10x on ad spend, meaning $5,000 to $10,000 in monthly spend maps to roughly $30,000 to $80,000 in monthly booked procedure revenue lift inside the first 90 days. Those are agency averages across our partner practices, not guarantees. The arithmetic is straightforward: at $120 per booked consult, a $7,500 monthly budget produces about 62 consultations. At a 60 percent show rate that is 37 sat consults, and at a 35 percent close rate that is 13 booked procedures. If the blended case value is $9,000, that month generated roughly $117,000 in booked revenue against $7,500 in spend. The sensitivity is in the show rate and close rate, which is why tracking and front-desk process are part of the advertising system, not separate from it.
Why percentage-of-revenue rules mislead surgeons
The standard small-business rule says allocate 5-10 percent of revenue to marketing. For a $2M practice that suggests $8,000 to $17,000 per month, which lands near the right answer by accident while hiding the logic. Percentage rules assume marketing scales linearly with revenue. Surgical practices do not work that way. Capacity is stepwise: one surgeon, one OR schedule, one front desk. The correct budget is derived from the calendar, not the P&L. Count the open consult slots you want filled per month, multiply by the cost per booked consult for your procedure mix, and add 15-20 percent for testing. That number is your budget. When the calendar is full and show rates hold, raise prices or add capacity before adding spend.
How long before the spend pays for itself?
Expect the first booked consults inside two weeks and a readable trend by day 60-90, once campaigns are past the learning phase and the consult-to-surgery pipeline has cycled at least once. Surgical sales cycles run 30 to 90 days from first click to procedure date, so judging a campaign at day 21 is measuring the pipeline, not the outcome. The practices that scale are the ones that hold the budget steady through the first 90 days, feed booked-consult data back into the platforms through server-side tracking, and resist the urge to restart campaigns every time a week disappoints. Restarting resets the learning phase and burns the data the budget already paid for.
How much should a plastic surgeon spend on advertising per month?
$5,000 to $10,000 per month is the working range for most single-location practices. Below $3,000 campaigns starve for data; above $15,000 most practices hit a capacity ceiling before an advertising one. Figures are agency averages, not guarantees.
What does a booked plastic surgery consultation cost?
$80 to $150 through paid media, measured as consultations that land on the calendar rather than raw form fills. Procedure mix moves the number within that range.
What ROAS is realistic for plastic surgery ads?
5-10x on monthly spend for a properly tracked account, which typically means a $30,000 to $80,000 monthly booked-revenue lift on a $5-10K budget inside 90 days. Agency averages, not guarantees.
Should the budget go to Google Ads or Meta Ads first?
Start with Google Search to capture existing procedure demand, then layer Meta for audience building and retargeting. Most mature accounts settle near an even split, weighted by procedure mix.
How long until advertising produces booked procedures?
First booked consults typically land inside two weeks. A readable revenue trend takes 60-90 days because surgical sales cycles run 30-90 days from click to procedure.