CoPlanner: Revolutionizing ad operations with advanced AI

In March, we shared how we built Insights Navigator to enhance the quality of our insights delivered to clients, leveraging generative AI. Today, we’re sharing how we’ve leveraged generative AI to revolutionize ad operations with CoPlanner.

In the dynamic world of ad operations, the demand for efficiency, accuracy, and speed is ever-increasing. With the launch of CoPlanner, we’re taking a significant leap forward, combining the latest in language model technology and the ad operation knowledge to streamline the media planning process like never before.

A game-changing solution

CoPlanner is a new and innovative tool that vastly simplifies the process of media planning. It uses the power of advanced language models such as OpenAI's GPT-4 to turn free-form textual order details into structured JSON data that contains relevant information such as dates, pricing, and targeting criteria.

Once the campaign details are extracted, CoPlanner connects to:

1. Yield Analytics: Using the YA API, CoPlanner checks whether there is enough available inventory to run the campaign. The tool also includes a feature to run multiple combinations of campaigns to test different scenarios for media planning.
2. Placements.io (OMS): If the campaign is good to go, CoPlanner then prefills fields required for object creation in the order management system (OMS), saving a large amount of manual effort.

Our ambition is for CoPlanner to set a new standard across future managed service engagements.

How you can benefit

CoPlanner is a tool we’re currently only using internally, so you’ll need to work through your Microsoft Advertising representative to use it. However, it demonstrates how you, as a publisher or sell-side client, can build on our existing forecasting product, known as Yield Analytics.

One of the key features of CoPlanner is its ability to use large language models (LLMs) for parsing. This allows for automation in two key areas simultaneously: forecasting (we also call them availability checks) and campaign set-up. This means less manual work and more efficiency.

In essence, CoPlanner is a single tool that handles the entire Media Planning workflow. A workflow that starts with the Order Form, involves forecasting via Yield Analytics, and ends with a new campaign in our Order Management System.

How CoPlanner helps

More productive

If you’re working in media planning, you’re most likely dealing with a manual workflow that takes up a lot of your time. This includes drafting an order form, converting the details into exact syntax to check the inventory, and filling in the same information to book the order in an entirely different system. This traditional way of doing things is not only slow but also prone to mistakes.

That’s where CoPlanner comes in. It’s designed to tackle these problems directly. With CoPlanner, your workflow is smooth and efficient, saving you precious time while also reducing the chance of making errors. So, instead of getting bogged down with manual tasks, you can focus on what really matters—planning great media strategies.

More creative

Imagine being able to compare inventory availability for multiple campaigns and targeting options at the same time. CoPlanner can do that for you so that it becomes easy for you to see which options are the best fit for your goals and budget.

But that’s not all. CoPlanner also gives you the ability to see the unique user reach for each of your Media Plans. This means you can understand how many unique users each of your plans could potentially reach.

So, in a nutshell, CoPlanner is a tool that helps you be more creative, make effective comparisons, and understand your potential reach better.

The future of CoPlanner

The implementation of CoPlanner is poised to transform the media planning processes. It aims to significantly diminish time spent on manual tasks, leading to a substantial reduction in operational expenses and an increase in productivity. This will enable users to expedite order processing at unprecedented speeds. In addition to these immediate advantages, CoPlanner is also set to improve employee satisfaction and retention by alleviating the burden of tedious manual work.

As we look to the future, CoPlanner is set to evolve into an even more capable tool. By incorporating increasingly advanced AI and language models, the capabilities of CoPlanner will expand to cover a broader range of clients and tasks, further enhancing efficiency and effectiveness in media planning.