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Standard Deviation

StandardPlanning

StandardPlanning is the campaign-strategy module. It runs the Frequency-First planning framework as the default output: you start from “how often does the right person need to see this campaign” and back into reach and budget, not the other way around.

The five sub-tools

A campaign in StandardPlanning has five working modules. Order matters — each reads from the prior.

Campaigns

The campaign list — view, create, manage. Each campaign has a name, an objective, a status, and a brand it belongs to. Pick a campaign to unlock the other four sub-tools; create one from a brief in 30 seconds.

Strategy

AI-drafted positioning, messaging pillars, and the strategic narrative for the campaign. Reads from the brand graph (voice + business context + competitive set) and from the campaign brief (objective + window + constraints). Outputs:

  • Strategic narrative (1-2 paragraphs — the “what this campaign says and why”)
  • 3-5 messaging pillars (the recurring claims the campaign makes)
  • Recommended emphasis vs the brand’s standing position (where this campaign tilts vs the baseline)

You review, edit, and lock the strategy before moving on. Subsequent modules read from the locked strategy.

Audience

Who this campaign targets. Reads from the brand graph (audience segments) and lets you refine for the campaign — narrower segments, different geos, different psychographics.

The audience module is where Frequency-First gets sharp:

  • Audience size estimate (per platform / market)
  • Recommended effective-frequency target (drawn from objective + category defaults; editable)
  • Media-consumption description (where this audience spends time, what they consume, how often)

Budget (Investment)

The honest budget conversation. Given the audience + frequency target from the prior step + the channel mix you intend to use, what’s the spend envelope this campaign actually requires?

The module returns three numbers:

  • Floor — the smallest budget that still hits effective frequency on a viable audience subset
  • Recommended — the budget that does the full job at the defined audience size
  • Stretch — the budget that buys frequency cushion + concept testing room

Plus an explicit comparison to whatever envelope you brought in. If your budget is below the floor, the module tells you so — and recommends one of: shrink the audience, lower the objective, raise the envelope, skip the campaign.

Media Plan (Phasing)

Flighting schedule. When each channel turns on, when it ramps, when it tapers, when it ends. Built so the effective-frequency target lands in the right window, not spread thin across the whole quarter.

Output: a week-by-week (or day-by-day for short campaigns) channel allocation, with explicit dependencies between channels (e.g., “Meta retargets video viewers from YouTube, so YouTube must lead by 2 weeks”).

A worked example, end to end

You’re launching a new SKU for a DTC supplement brand. Budget: $30K over 6 weeks.

  1. Strategy — Draft a launch narrative around the new SKU. Two messaging pillars: “scientifically formulated” + “no-mystery-ingredients.” Strategy locked.
  2. Audience — Brand-graph segment “women 28-45, fitness-aware, supplement-buyers, US” = 2M people. Effective-frequency target (launch awareness): 8 contacts over 6 weeks.
  3. Budget — Module returns: Floor $80K (on 500K-person subset), Recommended $250K (full audience), Stretch $400K. Your $30K is below the floor.
  4. Iterate Audience — Narrow to top-decile fit (existing parent-brand customers, ~200K people). Re-check budget: Floor $25K, Recommended $50K. Your $30K is between Floor and Recommended. Workable.
  5. Media Plan — Flighting puts 60% of spend in weeks 1-3 to land effective frequency early, then 40% in weeks 4-6 for reinforcement. Channel mix: Meta + YouTube (the audience’s actual media diet, not a generic 60/30/10).

Total time: ~20 minutes once the brand graph is set up. The output is a media plan you can hand to a buyer, with the trade-offs surfaced rather than buried.

What StandardPlanning is not

  • Not a buying platform. It doesn’t place ads or move money. Output is a plan that gets executed in Meta Ads Manager, Google Ads, etc.
  • Not a measurement platform. Post-campaign attribution and incrementality testing happen elsewhere (the brand’s GA4 / Meta reporting / mixed-media model). StandardPlanning is the upstream design.

Where to go next