When creating scenarios, there is multiple combinations and possibilities. Easiest way to get started is to start testing different scenarios, compare them with each other and analyse accordingly.
To get easily started, you can follow the following process to build five example scenarios.
Purpose of these five scenarios is to help you understand different options you have when crafting your scenarios. Reference scenario shows you how your previous media plan would perform and then you can compare that with different optimization scenarios.
Let's dive deeper!
Note: If you are not yet familiar on how to create, open and setup Media Optimizer scenarios, please check these articles first!
1. Reference scenario
First, let's create a reference scenario. Purpose of the reference scenario is to replicate the media plan of your reference period. For example, if you are crafting media plan for next year, reference scenario can show you what can happen if you replicate your current media plan.
When creating Refence scenario, choose "Reference scenario" in the Optimization mode section. Continue creating scenario accordingly.
Note that when you have created your scenario, you are not able to set budget boundaries, as the purpose is to replicate the reference.
2. Optimized weeks
Now that we are ready with our reference scenario, we can start optimizing. But before we go into channel allocations, let's create a scenario called "Optimized weeks"!
The purpose of the "Optimized weeks" is to highlight how much value we can create only by optimizing our budget as efficiently as possible between weeks. For example, if model can detect that certain seasons offer better performance, it can suggest allocating budget to those weeks instead of low season weeks.
When you create "Optimized weeks", choose "Budget optimization" in the Optimization mode section. Continue creating scenario accordingly. As we don't want to change channel allocation yet, you don't need to any other setup for your scenario.
3. +/-30%
Now that we have highlighted the power of weekly allocation, we can start to optimize channel allocation. With "+/-30% scenario", we give freedom for the Media Optimizer to optimize the previous scenario. +/-30% means that Optimizer has the freedom to raise or lower each media investment by 30%.
When you create "+/-30% scenario", choose "Budget optimization" in the Optimization mode section. Continue creating scenario accordingly. When you have created a scenario, use +/-30% quick selection button to apply freedom of 30% for the model.
NOTE: If you are modelling Email or SMS marketing, keep the budget boundary as it is for these channels. Because Email and SMS marketing generally doesn’t involve any actual media investment, it also can’t be scaled in the same way as other paid media channels. By fixing the investment, you can tell the model that scaling email or SMS marketing isn’t worth suggesting.
4. Full range
While +/-30% is still relatively cautious scenario, we are also able to give full freedom for the model. With "Full range scenario", we can give the Optimizer full freedom to optimize the allocation. It means that Optimizer has the full freedom to raise or lower each media investment as it sees best.
When you create "Full range scenario", choose "Budget optimization" in the Optimization mode section. Continue creating scenario accordingly. When you have created a scenario, use "Full range" quick selection button to apply freedom of 100% for the model.
5. Sales target
In previous scenarios we have optimized our current media budget. But Media Optimizer can also be used to forecast what kind of media budget and plan is needed to achieve a specific sales target. Media Optimizer can therefore also suggest increasing or decreasing the budget if it sees it as effective in the context of the sales goal.
For example, if your goal is to double your sales for the next year, you can ask Optimizer to forecast how to achieve it.
When you create "Sales target scenario", choose "Total sales target" or "Incremental sales target" in the Optimization mode section. Continue creating scenario accordingly. When you have created a scenario, remember to adjust your "Sales target to reach" according to your goal.
When using Sales target optimization mode, model is given the full range freedom to optimize by default. But if there is some constraints with some channel, you can also manually adjust budget boundaries.
Analysing example scenarios
Congrats, you have created example scenarios! Now it's time to analyse them.
Note: If you are not yet familiar on how to analyse Media Optimizer scenarios, please check this article first!
Now you can see what kind of incremental uplifts you can gain by optimizing your media plan. You can compare how the media budgets, sales numbers and ROI metrics compare between different scenarios.
Questions you can ask from yourself and from your team:
What will happen if we replicate our previous media plan?
How much sales we can generate just by allocating budget more wisely from week to week?
How much sales we can generate by optimizing channel allocation based on scenarios?
How much budget do we need to reach our sales target?
What kind of ROI we are able to maintain if we want to reach our sales target?
In addition to Result Charts view, you can use Result Table, Timeseries and Response Curves view to analyse scenarios.