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JAOT

Advertising & Media Planning

Optimize advertising budget allocation across channels and campaigns to maximize reach, conversions, or return on ad spend. Media planning optimization distributes a fixed budget across channels like TV, social media, search, display, and email based on each channel's cost efficiency and audience overlap.

When to Use This Guide

Media planning optimization helps whenever you need to decide where to spend advertising dollars:

  • Media mix optimization -- Allocate budget across channels to maximize total reach
  • Campaign budget allocation -- Distribute spend across campaigns with different goals
  • Audience targeting -- Balance reach and frequency across demographic segments
  • Cross-channel planning -- Coordinate spend between online and offline channels
  • Seasonal budget planning -- Adjust allocation based on seasonal demand patterns

Step-by-Step Walkthrough

1. Define Your Channels

List every advertising channel available. For each, specify the cost per unit (CPM, CPC, or cost per impression), estimated reach per dollar, and any minimum or maximum spend requirements.

2. Set Budget and Frequency Constraints

Set your total campaign budget. Add minimum spend per channel (if you must maintain presence) and maximum spend (diminishing returns or platform limits). Add frequency caps to avoid audience fatigue.

3. Choose Your Objective

Maximize total reach (unique people exposed), total conversions (actions taken), or a weighted combination. You can also minimize cost while requiring a minimum reach level.

4. Solve and Allocate

The optimizer distributes the budget across channels. Review the allocation for practical feasibility, then implement the media plan. Track actual performance to refine future optimizations.

Example: Allocate $100K Across 5 Channels

Distribute a $100,000 advertising budget across TV, social media, search, display, and email. Each channel has different reach per dollar and minimum/maximum spend limits. Maximize total audience reach.

import httpx

API_URL = "https://api.jaot.io/api/v2"
headers = {"Authorization": "Bearer ok_live_your_key_here"}

channels = ["tv", "social", "search", "display", "email"]
budget = 100000  # total budget

# Reach per $1,000 spent (thousands of people)
reach_per_k = [15, 25, 20, 12, 30]
# Minimum spend per channel
min_spend = [10000, 5000, 5000, 0, 2000]
# Maximum spend per channel
max_spend = [40000, 30000, 25000, 20000, 15000]

variables = []
for i, ch in enumerate(channels):
    variables.append({
        "name": ch,
        "type": "continuous",
        "lb": min_spend[i],
        "ub": max_spend[i],
    })

# Maximize total reach (reach per $K * $K spent)
# Coefficients are per-dollar reach: reach_per_k / 1000
objective = {
    "sense": "maximize",
    "coefficients": {
        ch: reach_per_k[i] / 1000
        for i, ch in enumerate(channels)
    },
}

constraints = []
# Total budget constraint
constraints.append({
    "name": "total_budget",
    "coefficients": {ch: 1 for ch in channels},
    "sense": "<=",
    "rhs": budget,
})

# Digital channels must be at least 40% of budget
digital = ["social", "search", "display", "email"]
constraints.append({
    "name": "digital_minimum",
    "coefficients": {ch: 1 for ch in digital},
    "sense": ">=",
    "rhs": budget * 0.40,
})

response = httpx.post(f"{API_URL}/solve", headers=headers, json={
    "variables": variables,
    "objective": objective,
    "constraints": constraints,
})
result = response.json()

print(f"Status: {result['status']}")
total_reach = result["objective_value"]
print(f"Total reach: {total_reach:,.0f} thousand people")
print(f"\nBudget allocation:")
for i, ch in enumerate(channels):
    spend = result["solution"][ch]
    reach = spend * reach_per_k[i] / 1000
    print(f"  {ch.capitalize():>8}: ${spend:>8,.0f} "
          f"({spend/budget*100:>5.1f}%) -> {reach:>6,.0f}K reach")

Templates

Build media planning models with the Budget Allocation Optimizer template. It is pre-configured for distributing budgets across categories with minimum/maximum constraints -- perfect for advertising channel allocation.

Next Steps