About Variable Pricing

To optimize revenue during periods of high demand, you can implement variable pricing. This allows you to adjust your rate cards and package prices based on market fluctuations and special events. For example, you can increase rates for periods like Boxing Day, Valentine's Day, or other high-demand events.

Variable pricing adjustments are managed within your rate cards. To learn how to add or edit rate cards, see Add and Edit Rate Cards.

Note: Only users with the Admin or Direct Sales Admin role can add or edit variable pricing. See User Permissions.

Overview

Variable pricing allows you to adjust your rate cards and package prices based on demand. This is achieved by applying percentage-based increases or decreases to your standard rates.

Direct Sales Managers can enable or disable variable pricing when creating or editing packages.

Key Features

Flexibility – Apply rate changes to existing packages and selected inventory, eliminating the need to create separate packages for different time periods.
Cumulative Effect – When overlapping date ranges with different variable pricing adjustments occur, the effect is cumulative. For example, a 25% holiday premium combined with a 3% annual increase results in a 28.75% increase for holidays next year (3% of 25% = 0.75%; 25% + 0.75% = 28.75%).
Prorated Application – If a rate card applies to only a portion of a campaign's date range, the variable pricing is applied only to the overlapping period.
Discounts – Use negative percentages to offer discounts during slower periods.
Bridging Periods – If a screen's selected period spans across different variable pricing periods, the appropriate pricing adjustments are applied to the corresponding dates.
Automatic Recalculation – When campaign dates are changed, the system automatically recalculates rates based on the currently active variable pricing.
Line Item Selection – Variable pricing is automatically enabled for line item manual selections, applying all active discounts or increases within the date range.

Example

Let's say that your system has the following settings:

A rate card with CPM (Cost per thousand) 10.
Two variable pricing:

One from 2018-08-15 to 2018-08-30 with a variable price of +10%
One from 2018-08-25 to 2018-09-07 with a variable price of +25%

Six screens named screen1 to screen6.
The following screen schedules for all days of the week:

Screen Name	Start Date	End Date	Start Time	End Time
screen1	N/A	N/A	07:00:00	23:59:59
screen2	N/A	N/A	07:00:00	23:59:59
screen3	N/A	N/A	07:00:00	23:59:59
screen4	N/A	N/A	07:00:00	23:59:59
screen5	N/A	N/A	07:00:00	23:59:59
screen6	N/A	N/A	07:00:00	23:59:59

The following impressions set on the screens:
- screen1: 558
- screen2: 572
- screen3: 630
- screen4: 637
- screen5: 639
- screen6: 651
The screens are related to the rate card.

The following scenarios may apply:

Scenario 1: Rate card variable pricing with impressions single goal seek

Impressions goal of 1,000,000 impressions
Result: a CPM of 12.88 and a budget of 12 875$

Scenario 2: Rate card variable pricing with impressions dual goal seek (budget)

Impressions goal of 1,000,000 impressions and a secondary budget goal of 10,000$
Result: a CPM of 12.67 and a budget of 12,668.75$

Scenario 3: Rate card variable pricing with impressions dual goal seek (CPM)

Impressions goal of 1,000,000 impressions and a secondary CPM goal of 12
Result: a CPM of 12.67 and a budget of 12,668.75$

Scenario 4: Rate card variable pricing with budget goal single goal seek

Budget goal of 10,000$
Result: a CPM of 12.88 and 776,699 impressions

Scenario 5: Rate card variable pricing with budget goal dual goal seek (impressions)

Budget goal of 10,000$ and a secondary impressions goal of 1,000,000 impressions
Result: a CPM of 12.68 and 788,350 impressions

Scenario 6: Rate card variable pricing with budget goal dual goal seek (CPM)

Budget goal of 10,000$ and a secondary CPM goal of 10
Result: a CPM of 12.68 and 788,350 impressions