Budget Management¶
Campaign And Line Item Budget¶
In BidCore, budgets can be managed on the line item level and the campaign level. Setting up budget on the line item level is mandatory, as the data is used by the system for planning and optimizing media spend.
If a campaign budget is not set, the campaign total is the sum of all its line items, and the campaign total can increase as more line items or their budgets are increased. If a campaign budget is set, it acts as a cap on the total amount available to a campaign and the sum of all line items may not exceed this amount. BidCore automatically stops buying for the line items assigned to the campaign when the total spend on the line items equals the planned spend on the campaign level.
You can check spend and remaining budget for campaigns and line items in automatically calculated Spend and Remaining Budget fields in the UI. The budget spend can also be monitored in u-Slicer and in Performance widgets available in the BidCore UI.
Lifetime, Monthly, Daily Budget¶
Lifetime Budget¶
By default, campaigns and line items have a lifetime budget spent within the predefined flight dates. This means the budget will be spent by the system during the specified time period according to the specified settings, pacing and targeting.
Monthly Budget¶
In case a campaign or a line item is not limited with a strict time period and has a fixed budget for each month of their lifetime, a monthly budget is applied. The monthly budget suggests that the campaign or the line item spends a fixed amount of money during a calendar month.
To set up the monthly budget on the campaign level, enter the amount required for one calendar month into the Campaign Budget field on the campaign level and mark the The campaign budget is for each calendar month checkbox. Thus, the campaign will spend the selected amount during each calendar month within the campaign flight dates.
To set up the monthly budget on the line item level, select the buying strategy with monthly budget settings - ID 103: Spend monthly budget with fix CPM evenly (pay for imps) (see the details on the strategies here: Budget Optimization Strategies).
The monthly budget spend depends on both the flight dates and actual trading start date. For example, if the campaign becomes active on the 15th day of month with the same start date, it will only spend a half of the monthly budget that month. However, if the entity becomes active on the 15th day of month with the start date on the 1st day of month, it will spend the entire monthly budget in 15 days.
Daily Budget¶
Daily budget can be set on the line item level only. To set up the daily budget on the line item level, select the buying strategy with daily budget settings - ID 12: Maximize conversions with target CPM and CTR (pay for media cost, daily budget) (see the details on the strategies here: Budget Optimization Strategies).
The daily budget suggests that the line item repeatedly spends the given amount of money every day within the line item flight dates.
Pacing¶
The budget spend pace is set on campaign and line item levels according to the preferred buying pattern.
There are two standard budget spend paces:
The default as soon as possible (ASAP) pace: the line item spends its budget as soon as possible, buying all the impressions that fit the targetings and line item settings.
Evenly (EVEN) pace: the line item spends its budget evenly within this line item flight dates.
If the budget is set on the campaign level, by default it is spent as soon as possible. You can set the spend pacing as EVEN on the campaign level by marking the Spend the campaign budget evenly through the campaign term checkbox. It makes the campaign total budget distribute evenly within the campaign’s lifetime. With the EVEN spend pacing set on the campaign level, the line items assigned to the campaign are limited by the total spend of all line items within the campaign in addition to their own budget. It might affect the performance of individual line items if the total campaign budget is less than the sum of all the line items budgets. For example: a campaign with a budget of $1000 for 30 days, with evenly spend pacing enabled (which gives roughly $33 spend for a day), and 2 line items with a budget of $1000 each and evenly spend pacing (which gives about $66 daily spend for both line items). In this case the total spend would be limited to $33 a day by the campaign pacing, and the line items would underdeliver.
By default the Spend the campaign budget evenly through the campaign term checkbox is inactive. If the budget is not set on the campaign level, BidCore only takes the line items budget and pacing into consideration.
There are possible cases that suggest assigning line items with the ASAP spend to campaigns with the EVEN spend. In these cases the line item spend is limited by the minimal pacing of the campaign or the line item. For example, if an EVEN campaign has a budget of $100 for 100 days and an assigned ASAP line item with an equal budget, the line item won’t be able to spend more than $1 a day, thus its spend is limited by the spend pacing of the campaign. At the same time, in case an ASAP line item budget is less than its parent EVEN campaign budget for one day (in the example above, less than $100/100 = $1/day), the line item is able to spend all its budget ASAP.
On the line item level the pacing is defined by the buying strategy. Most buying strategies spend the budget evenly. To spend the budget as soon as possible (ASAP pacing), select the buying strategy with ASAP pacing specified - ID 102: Spend budget with fix CPM ASAP (pay for imps) (see the details on the strategies here: Budget Optimization Strategies).
Fees¶
There are two types of fees in the BidCore - vendors fees and custom fees.
Vendor Fees¶
Vendor Fees are applied to line items that use 3rd party vendor data for targeting or extra services, such as creative hosting. All applied vendor fees are included in the actual media cost.
Check Vendors And Services section for detailed information on vendors and fees applied for provided services
Custom Fees¶
Custom fees can be created in BidCore on the line item level to support clients’ financial and reporting requirements. You can add up to 5 custom fees to a line item in the BidCore UI.
In BidCore, a custom fee can be included in the actual media cost or added on the top of it. The fees are withheld by the system automatically before bidding.
To include a fee into the actual media cost, mark the Include in the total media cost when setting up the fee in the BidCore UI and lay it down within the Actual Media Cost. For example, if you want to spend $70 and include a 30% media fee in the media cost, it calculates as follows:
SSP Original Media Cost: 70
Custom Fee: 70 * 0.3 = 21
Actual Media Cost: 70 + 21 = 91
Therefore, you should set the Actual Media Cost to $91. Then you will spend $70, save 30% aka $21 as the custom fee and have $91 in the Original Media Cost tab in reporting. If you add the fee on the top of the media cost, you should not lay it down in the Actual Media Cost.
There are two types of custom fees in BidCore.
CPM fee
A CPM fee is a fixed amount, unrelated to any parameters of the selected strategy. It should not be included in the line item CPM in case a CPM strategy is selected.
Media fee
The amount of a media fee is calculated as a percentage from the SSP original media cost.
Budget metrics in reporting¶
When monitoring budgets in u-Slicer, pay attention to the following metrics:
Advertiser Spend: the total spend that include SSP payouts, vendors and custom fees, and margin
Actual Media Cost: the amount paid to SSPs, custom fees included in the media cost, vendor fees
SSP Original Media Cost: the amount paid to SSPs
Media Margin: the client margin (if specified on line item level)
Custom Fee: the custom fee based on settings in the line item configuration
Grapeshot Fee: The total amount of Grapeshot fees applied
Grapeshot Fee (Standard): The Grapeshot fee applied for targeting based on Grapeshot content categories
Grapeshot Fee (Brand Safety): The Grapeshot fee applied for targeting based on Grapeshot brand safety categories
Liveramp Fee: The Liveramp fee applied for the use of Liveramp 3rd party segments
Moat Prebid Fee: The Moat prebid fee applied for targeting content which has historically met a specific viewability threshold (i.e. “at least 80% viewable) based on the Moat viewability
Tapad Fee: The Tapad fee applied for the use of Tapad Audience Extension graph targeting individual users cross-device or all users in a household location
Creative Hosting: banner and video creative hosting fee calculated individually
Log Data: applied for access to trading log data as an extra client service
In case a custom fee is included in the media cost, it can be seen separately in u-Slicer in the Custom Fee column, but at the same time it is included in the amount of the actual Media Cost metric value. If a fee is not included in the media cost, it can be seen as a Custom Fee too, but the Media Cost metric value will be calculated without considering it.