Comprehensive Operations, PO Tracking, and Media Planning Guide

Operations and Scheduling Strategy

  • Weekly Sync Cadence:

    • Scheduling meetings toward the end of the week (specifically Thursdays) is preferred to facilitate catching up on priority deliverables, resolving urgent partner dependencies, and ensuring alignment before entering the weekend.

  • GSA Call Resolution & Operational Focus:

    • Unplanned absences on GSA alignment calls were necessitated by urgent operational triage ("putting out fires") in Italy to align cross-functional teams and facilitate launching Mobland in that region.

  • Share of Voice (SOV) Proposal Review:

    • Sunny submitted a custom one-off proposal for Share of Voices (SOVs).

    • Implementation of these SOVs is currently unfeasible due to budget constraints, which are not expected to change.

  • GSA Custom Build & Tile Units Workflow:

    • Custom tile unit options were presented by the vendor two weeks after the initial build request was submitted, despite an explicit kickoff call intended to establish asset needs.

    • Current build status: Awaiting final mockups from the GSA team for review.

    • Action item for the upcoming week: Draft and finalize copy and descriptions for the core five titles/categories.

    • Asset delivery status: KIPP has already completed trafficking for all standard assets requested in the original brief.

    • Team alignment strategy: The internal team will communicate with GSA via Slack to mirror previous alignment discussions and prepare for follow-up discussions early next week.

  • Category Expansion Planning:

    • Following a creative review with Joe and Mike, Amazon (both GSA and UK) offered to build customized experience units for additional categories beyond the initial launch scope to target specific audience segments.

    • Strategy: Prioritize establishing and deploying the core launch build featuring the primary five titles for Mobland before evaluating secondary builds or broader category rollouts.

Purchase Order (PO) Management and Above-The-Line (ATL) Activity

  • September PO Submission Plan:

    • A recorded walkthrough of the PO creation process will be conducted to establish operational mastery and facilitate full ownership of future submissions.

    • Timeline: Complete entry procedures on Friday, followed by an operational sanity-check session on Monday.

  • Partner Invoicing Protocol:

    • Standard Policy: All media partners must submit physical invoices directly to the marketing operations team rather than routing them straight to central finance or accounts payable.

    • Partner Performance:

    • OG Samsung and OG: Consistently compliant, submitting invoices directly on a title-by-title and campaign-by-campaign basis.

    • Amazon: Regional markets frequently bypass protocol ("going rogue") and route invoices directly to payment teams, creating internal tracking visibility gaps.

    • Audit & Recovery Procedures:

    • Invoices are cross-referenced via Gmail searches prior to reaching out to partners.

    • Recovered documents include 2026 invoices for Germany and Italy (e.g., the Italy invoice was already present in the SharePoint directory despite central finance marking it missing).

    • January 2026 served as a cleanup month for 2025 financial errors, with direct invoice routing strictly enforced from February 2026 onward.

  • PO Tracker Field Specifications:

    • Budget Allocation Column: Identifies whether an entry is Above-The-Line (ATL) spend or Direct Response (DR) spend to ensure correct hit-lines in finance system. ATL operates under a significantly tighter budget ceiling than DR.

    • Dropdown Identifier: Select pleat plus for all entries.

    • Core Inputs: Specify Market, Year, Month, and Spend Type (all pending entries are classified as ATL spend).

    • Partner Mapping:

    • Amazon

    • Samsung

    • Alfonzo (Internal naming standard representing LG)

    • Description Conventions: Must include detailed descriptors containing partner, title, activity, and market (e.g., Amazon, Mobland, ATL or Amazon UK Mobland ATL).

    • Category Mapping:

    • Amazon campaigns: Classified as Amazon.

    • Samsung campaigns (e.g., Samsung UK Mobland): Classified as OTT.

    • LG campaigns (e.g., LG UK Mobland ATL): Classified as OTT.

    • Title Mapping: Explicitly state Mobland for dedicated campaigns. Generic multi-title entries are acceptable only when specific campaign attribution is absent.

    • Market Cost Center Codes:

    • Cost center codes must be extracted from internal team line items.

    • Do NOT use centralized cost center code 13 o two13\text{ o two} (13021302), which is reserved for central account lines managed by Andre or Yusuf.

    • UK Local Market Code: 33913391.

    • Currency Guidelines:

    • Samsung & LG: Always billed in USD across all global territories.

    • Amazon: Billed in USD for all European markets. Billed in local currency strictly for Canada, Mexico, Brazil, and Australia.

    • Tax Flagging Protocol:

    • Applies to bookings made through companies outside the United States.

    • Amazon: Set Tax flag to Yes.

    • Samsung & LG: Booked through US-based entities; set Tax flag to No.

    • Financial Mechanism: Tax does not reduce the paid media budget line; finance calculates tax via market-specific proxy percentages paid from a separate central tax bucket.

    • Risk Protocol: During tight monthly close deadlines, default questionable entries to Yes to guarantee tax dollars are reserved.

PO Approval and Invoicing Workflow

  • PO Generation Process:

    • Operations inputs approved media dollar totals into designated tracker columns.

    • Backend columns are processed by Ernie, who enters details into procurement systems and routes POs through the executive sign-off chain (including Mike, Moe, and MG).

    • Generated PO numbers populate directly back into the master tracking sheet.

  • Invoicing & SharePoint Repository Workflow:

    • Invoices received via email must be manually uploaded into corresponding regional folders on SharePoint.

    • Ernie verifies physical invoice files in SharePoint against PO line items to approve payment releases.

    • PO Security Policy: PO numbers are kept internal and are no longer provided directly to vendors to prevent misattaching POs to incorrect invoices.

    • Optimization: Operations should attach PO numbers to PDF filenames or physical invoice documents prior to SharePoint upload to accelerate clearing.

Media Tracker Updates and Share of Voice (SOV) Scheduling

  • Media Tracker Baseline:

    • September updates are finalized; operations will proceed sequentially backward to reconcile August and July historical entries.

    • Non-title-specific lines must be categorized as September BAU or September multi-title BAU.

  • UK September Media Schedule:

    • Prime Video (PV) Schedule:

    • September 13: Teen Mom UK

    • September 18: Mobland

    • September 20: Mobland

    • September 27: Mobland

    • Fire TV (FTV) Schedule (Categorized as feature rotator share of voice / feature rotator):

    • September 13: Teen Mom UK

    • September 18: Mobland Season 2

    • September 20: Pending confirmation / Mobland & South Park

    • September 24: Pending confirmation

    • September 27: Mobland & South Park

    • Verification Items: Re-verify FTV dates (Sept 20, Sept 24), PV dates (Sept 22, Sept 26, Sept 30), and reference date 9.84 for FTV/PV noted during team calls.

  • Regional Campaign Specifics:

    • Italy: Post-Mobland September SOVs default to supporting Mobland.

    • GSA: Amazon GSA plans require takeover entries for September, including Beauty, dedicated lines, PV feature rotator, and the GSA Twitch buy.

    • UEFA Champions League (UCL) Buy: Assigned cost code/budget of 02:50, running from August 25 (08/25) through September 19 (09/19).

    • France: Acquisition campaign configured on TR for September.

    • Canada: Amazon Canada media plans requested from Chris; transactions remain in local currency.

Channel Classification and Technical Integrations

  • Campaign Objective Rules:

    • LG and Samsung media buys across UK and GSA markets are classified strictly as Awareness due to technical limitations preventing end-to-end conversion tracking.

    • Exception: LG and Samsung campaigns in Canada are categorized as Acquisition.

  • Attribution Integration Roadmap:

    • Jack Palmer is managing Kochava integration efforts with LG and Samsung.

    • Status: Testing is currently underway in the US market; global rollout to international territories is pending successful US validation and rate finalization.

Action Items and Execution Timeline

  • Current Tracker Progress: Completion status is currently at 84%−85%84\% - 85\%.

  • Friday EOD Targets:

    • Finalize missing UK and GSA SOV dates.

    • Confirm high-impact takeover media lines.

    • Integrate Canada Amazon plans shared by Chris.

  • Monday Next Steps: Conduct final oversight review of PO line inputs and September media tracker data before initiating retroactive entries for August and July.