Digital Advertising: Budget Settings

Overview
 

The DigAd Budget page is built around transparency and ease-of-use. The budget you input for Digital Advertising is the total you would like spent per month across all relevant channels: Google Search, Display Ad networks, Performance Max, as well as on Facebook and Instagram (Social). It shows Allocations to specific objectives and channels, any Custom Campaigns you have created and are running on the account, and also the spending choices selected by our AI

How does it work? 

Our Digital Advertising solution spends the monthly budget in an organized and completely transparent manner, optimizing by default for Max Conversions. You may switch to a Max Clicks strategy however it is recommended to do this at the very beginning of the month only and in consultation with your Customer Success Manager.

 

Budget shifts take place across channels and on a near-daily basis as the algorithm is constantly finding the best balance between your budget, the real-time market opportunity, and getting you the most leads possible.

Throughout the month, the system will make sure to spend between 95% up to 105% of your intended monthly budget.  
 

Setting Your budget inside the Dashboard

The monthly budget setting is nested in the Digital Advertising Settings under the Budget Tab. 
 

1. Enter the Fullpath Dashboard
2. Click on the settings icon
3. Select Digital Advertising as the Product
4. Scroll down to Budget

https://dashboard.fullpath.com/settings/acquire/budget-management 

Budget Page Layout

There are two main sections of the Budget page:

1. Quick View side panel
2. Strategy and Allocations center panel
   
    

Quick View Side Panel

The Quick View side panel shows the user an overview of the Total Monthly budget indicating what has been spent, what has been allocated, and what remains to be spent / managed by Ai algorithms. 

The Quick View also contains a drop down menu allowing you to select which sub-views of your Budget breakdown according to either Channel or DigAd Objective.

 

Strategy and Allocation Center Panel

The Strategy and Allocation center panel lists all allocations (those active and those deleted) as well as any Custom Campaigns with specific allocations.

 

Additionally, the list shows a line for the remaining budget Managed by Ai.

 

Adding Allocations

Allocations allow you to designate a portion of your monthly budget to a specific Channel or Advertising Objective. Allocations are repeated the following month unless they are deleted or removed. Deleted Allocations will NOT be visible the following month. 

To Allocate funds, click on the blue Add Allocation button in the upper right hand corner of the Budget Page. 

The Allocations Side Panel

Clicking on the Add Allocation button opens a side panel where the Allocation may be set up and saved. The side panel guides the user through 3 main components of setting up an Allocation: the Objective, the Channel, the Budget.

Supported Objectives

Users may allocate budget to the following Objectives:

• New Inventory 
• Used Inventory
• Certified Pre-Owned
• Brand
• Dealer Near Me
• Competitor
• Trade-In
• Service
• Parts
• Custom Campaigns

Supported Channels

Users may allocate budget to the following Channels

• Search
• Display
• Social
• PMAX (all performance max channels)
• PMAX VLA only (performance MAX vehicle ads only)
• PMAX non-VLAs (performance MAX non vehicle ads only)

  • When a user selects PMax as a channel, they must specify either PMax-VLAs, PMax-non VLAs or check both.

  • An additional selection layer will appear within the new allocation section whenever PMax is chosen.

  • Users may allocate budget to both sub-channels within the same allocation.

  • Note that not all Objectives apply to PMax (only New Inventory, Used Inventory - and - CPO -only for non VLAs)

• Demand Gen
   

Editing Allocations

You may edit existing allocations by clicking on the edit pencil icon to the right of each allocation row in the Strategy and Allocations Center panel.  

The Edit window will display which Objective and Channel the Allocation is currently set for, the total budget and it will also display the maximum funds available for this allocation based on what's been spent and how much of your unallocated budget you have remaining for that calendar month.

The date of the last update to this allocation (which could just be the date it was created) is displayed in the lower left hand corner.

When increasing budget / allocations, if the total by which you wish to increase exceeds your original total monthly budget, you will see an alert notice to this effect.

Important to Note
 

• While it is not recommended to make budget changes toward the middle or end of the calendar month, you may adjust your budget at any time and as often as you would like. Simply click on the budget input editor button and type the new total amount you want spent by the end of the month. Our system will automatically calculate how much increased spend per day needs to be added.
  
   
• Wait at least 24 hours to see allocated spend as it takes time to send the data and preferences to Google and Facebook's platforms, process the request, create the new campaign, run ads, get views and clicks, and then see any spend on those ads reported in Google / Facebook and then pulled back into the Fullpath Dashboard.
  
   
• You may allocate budget by Objective or Channel. With custom campaigns, you can even allocate budget according to vehicle model or geo-target. 
  
   
• If you reduce your budget such that at the time of making this adjustment you have already spent your total desired amount, ads will be paused, no further money will spent, and the amount you input will be set up to run the following month.
  
  
  
  
   

View Budget and Spend History

Users may view previous month's budget history to compare, analyze, or export for co-op submissions from the DigAd Product menu under https://dashboard.fullpath.com/acquire/budget-history  . Learn more about Budget History here.