Some media companies start discussing their online budgets for the coming year as early as May. Now that May has arrived, it may be helpful to begin thinking and talking about the numbers.

The three basic numbers are profit, revenue and audience. Audience drives revenue; revenue drives profit. Expenses are set accordingly.

A mature online organization can achieve a margin of 20 to 30 percent. Anything higher cuts into the growth potential of the operation. Lower is better for the sake of growth, but we recognize the need to expand the online margin to make up for the squeeze on the print side.

A good revenue target for next year is 10 percent of online sales to print or broadcast sales. The reason is backed up by fact: The newspaper industry hit 7.5 percent last year and should hit the high 8s to low 9s this year. Quite a few papers are already above 10 percent.

The audience target should be high enough to provide the advertising inventory needed to achieve the revenue target. This one takes a bigger product, more staff and more promotion.

An advertising rate increase should reflect the increased audience reach that came with this year’s growth. A combination of the higher rate and expanded inventory that comes with a larger site will propel revenue and profit.

In keeping with previous posts, I suggest that content and technology expenses should be around 30-35 percent of revenue while sales and marketing expenses should be the same. The remaining gap between these two expenses and total revenue will be taken up by general and administrative expenses, profit margin, taxes, etc.

The longer you think and talk about the 2009 budget – starting now – the more reliably you and your staff will deliver on the numbers. Being right takes a lot of work.