Scheduling (Digital 2)

Setting your criteria

When scheduling in Digital (2), users can either select locations using the Auto Chart feature or they can manually select locations from the Reservations tab.

Auto Chart

One of Ad Manager's most powerful features is the ability to establish your criteria and provide the best possible showings for your clients.

First, find the appropriate Subcontract to schedule, and click on the Chart () button. From the Chart window, you can choose to override the duration of the reservation or the number of spots that will be taken by selected locations when scheduling.

You can specify the order of the locations to be displayed/considered for scheduling. From the View menu, select Order. You can identify the order you wish to use from this screen. If you wish to randomize the list within the parameters of your sort selection, click the Randomize button. You can also select which columns of information you wish to display by Customizing Your View.

If you wish to have Ad Manager create a listing of available locations to select from, use Interactive Scheduling. If you wish to have Ad Manager schedule the locations for you, use Automatic Scheduling.

Overriding the Default Settings

If you are tight for space during a particular time frame or want to find locations that may be acceptable that aren't currently considered available, you can use the Take Over features to generate a larger pool of locations to select from.

If you wish to refine or change the targeting criteria requirements or the distributions on the Subcontract, this information can also be modified. Changing these criteria allow you to fine tune a campaign showing.

If you make any changes to the original settings, the Chart window will display in the bottom right corner of the Status bar, indicating that an item has been changed.

Ignoring Conflicts

Ad Manager automatically checks for a variety of conflicts. However, if you wish to schedule Faces despite the fact that they generate certain types of conflicts, you can do so by going to the Tools menu and selecting Ignore Conflicts.

<Digital 2 Ignore Conflicts> From this screen you can select which conflicts you wish to ignore. To select an item, simply click on it. Ad Manager will not warn you if a location has this scheduling conflict and will allow you to assign the location without the Conflicts screen appearing. The Automatic scheduling feature will treat locations with these conflicts as available and usable on the showing. Once you have made your changes, click OK to continue. Ad Manager will display in the bottom right corner of the status bar.

Interactive Scheduling

When you click on the Find button (()) in the Chart window, a listing of Candidate (available) locations will appear in the bottom portion of the window.

Assign One Face

Double click the location you wish to assign to the flight. A window will appear that you can use to identify the desired dates, posting type and Design to use. If a conflict exists, will appear in the bottom right corner of the status bar. You can see a list of these conflicts this Face may have generated on the Conflicts Tab. To accept the location, click the Accept button (). If you want to remove a location from the list of candidate locaitons, click the Reject button ().

Assign Multiple Faces

To select multiple locations, use the CTRL+click or the SHIFT+click, select the locations you wish to schedule to the selected dates. Once you have selected the desired locations, click the Accept button ().

Ad Manager will attempt to assign the locations up to the charting requirements that have been specified on the Requirements page. If a location is not available because it generates a conflict, Ad Manager will skip the location. After you have scheduled the locations to the dates, the following window will appear, providing you with the status of the locations you tried to assign. To close this window, click on the Close button. <Assign Multiple Locations>

To see a listing of locations that have been assigned, click on the Scheduled button (<scheduled>). If you wish to remove a location scheduled from the Scheduled window, highlight it and click the Delete button ().

To return to the list of candidate Faces, click on the Candidates button (). If ??? appears in the status bar, click Find () to generate the list of available locations again. You can monitor your scheduling progress against your established criteria from the Summary Summary Tab.

Automatic Scheduling

Automatic Scheduling takes the same list of available locations found in the Interactive Scheduling and attempts to add all these locations up to the charting requirements specified on the Requirements page of the Subcontract. Ad Manager will attempt to assign locations in the order that the locations have been sorted. If a location is not available because it generates a conflict, Ad Manager will skip the location.

To use the Automatic Scheduling feature, click the Auto Chart button (). Once Auto Charting is complete, the following screen will appear.

<Assign Multiple Locations>

To see a listing of locations that have been assigned, click on the Scheduled button (<scheduled>), then click on the Find () button. If you wish to remove a location scheduled from the Scheduled window, highlight it and click the Delete button (). You can monitor your scheduling progress against your established criteria from the Scheduling Summary Tab.