Buyer readiness

Advertiser intake worksheet

Published July 3, 2026. Updated July 3, 2026. Status: evergreen worksheet.

Use this worksheet before a contextual campaign is priced, trafficked, or summarized. It turns buyer objective, package lane, creative and destination handoff, floor inputs, reporting cadence, and readout boundary into one proposal record.

The intake record should be clear enough for sales, ad operations, analytics, and the buyer to use the same source of truth. It does not replace a campaign brief or final report; it prevents those documents from starting with different assumptions.

Editorial advertiser intake packet showing sales, operations, creative, and reporting owners connected to one shared proposal record. — The intake worksheet works when every owner is looking at the same proposal record. Buyer fit, package scope, creative handoff, and reporting expectations should move into one shared packet before pricing or launch work starts.

Check media kit

Proposal-quality packet

Before the worksheet becomes a price quote or launch task, make the five records below visible enough for the next owner to reuse without guessing.

Fit

Buyer and reader fit is named

Record the buyer category, offer type, reader problem, clean-fit context, and any context where the offer should not appear.

Lane

Package scope is trafficable

Name the package ID, deal key, eligible page set, placement mix, device classes, and whether the campaign includes native or display only.

Handoff

Creative and destination are traceable

Capture creative IDs, native fields, click path, destination URL, source capture, consent state, and routing owner before launch work starts.

Supply

Floor and availability have evidence

Attach the floor rationale, eligible supply, pacing limits, blackout dates, refresh expectations, and makegood rule that support the proposal.

Readout

Measurement language is bounded

Fix the primary signal, comparison rule, reporting cadence, buyer-side fields, and strongest allowed readout language before results arrive.

Advertiser intake handoff board showing buyer fit, package scope, creative destination, availability, and reporting records flowing into one source folder. — The proposal-quality packet has five records, not one generic brief. Buyer fit, package scope, creative and destination, supply evidence, and readout boundaries each need enough detail to survive the next handoff.

1. Campaign record

Buyer category and offer type

Reader problem the offer helps solve

Campaign objective and decision at stake

Review date, owner, and buyer contact

2. Package lane

Package ID and deal key

Reporting key and buying path

Eligible desk, guide group, page set, or URL pattern

Excluded contexts, devices, dates, or page states

Placement IDs, formats, sizes, and device classes

Native card, sponsorship, or display-only boundary

Package proof visible

Reader job and package fit are named. Placement IDs, sizes, and device classes match the media kit. Exclusions and run-of-publication boundaries are explicit. Reporting key, source fields, and readout grain are recorded.

3. Creative and destination handoff

Display assets, creative IDs, sizes, and active dates

Native fields, brand name, image, copy, and disclosure text

Click URL, UTM values, redirects, and buyer-side tracking

Landing page, form path, source capture, consent, and lead routing

5. Reporting cadence and readout boundary

Primary signal selected before launch

Comparison rule, baseline, holdout, or no-comparison label

Launch QA, mid-flight check, data close, and readout dates

Buyer-side status deadline and downstream fields

Strongest allowed readout language

Descriptive: delivery quality, traffic quality, creative response, and reported outcomes. Directional: comparison with a named prior flight, matched page set, or agreed baseline. Designed lift: holdout, matched-market, randomized, or other pre-set causal comparison.

Advertiser intake readout downgrade board showing a complete proposal packet checked against missing comparison evidence before broad campaign claims are softened. — The readout boundary should downgrade the claim before results arrive. If the intake record lacks a planned comparison, holdout, or buyer-side outcome field, the final packet can still describe delivery, audience fit, and response quality without promising lift.

6. Intake decision

Ready to price: package, creative, destination, floor, and readout fields are usable. Revise before pricing: one or more handoff fields needs buyer or operations clarification. Hold: the offer, package fit, destination, or readout language is not ready.

Proposal summary to carry forward

Open questions before launch

Next owner and due date

Brief, media plan, or source record link

Advertiser intake decision workflow moving incomplete proposal documents through fit, package, destination, supply, and readout checks into approve, revise, or hold paths. — The final intake decision should make missing fields visible before they become pricing or launch problems. A ready record can move forward; a partial record needs revision; a weak fit or unsupported readout should stay on hold.

Before pricing, check the intake record

The worksheet should produce a decision record, not just a set of blank fields. Use the table below to decide whether the proposal can move into pricing, needs a narrower revision, or should remain on hold until the buyer or operations owner supplies stronger evidence.

Record	Ready pattern	Revise before pricing when
Buyer fit	The offer helps the reader continue a task already served by the page set, and excluded contexts are named.	The offer is plausible for the publication but too broad for the proposed package lane.
Package lane	The buyer-facing package, eligible pages, exclusions, placement IDs, formats, and reporting key can be copied into a brief.	The package name exists, but the actual page set, device rule, or native/display boundary is still implied.
Creative and destination	Assets, native fields, click URL, destination, form path, source fields, and routing owner are complete enough for launch QA.	The destination can be fixed, but the current handoff would hide message mismatch, source loss, or lead-routing risk.
Floor and availability	The floor rationale is tied to context fit, eligible supply, reservation tradeoff, pacing limits, and makegood rules.	The floor is written as a desired price without enough supply, scarcity, or exposure-quality support.
Reporting boundary	The primary signal, comparison rule, reporting cadence, and strongest allowed readout language are locked before launch.	The buyer expects lift, quality, or renewal language that the planned reporting fields cannot support.

Hold or revise when

The reader job is still generic. Ask for the professional task, page set, and offer value before the package is priced.

The package lane cannot be trafficked. Rebuild the eligible context, placement IDs, accepted sizes, device classes, and exclusion list before launch approval.

The destination would blur the result. Fix the landing page, source fields, consent path, and routing owner before paid traffic starts.

The readout asks too much of the setup. Choose descriptive reporting unless a comparison, holdout, matched market, or randomized design was planned before launch.

How to use the result

If the record is ready, turn it into the campaign brief and trafficking handoff without changing the package ID, placement list, source fields, or readout boundary. If the record needs revision, ask for the missing buyer, creative, destination, availability, or comparison field before pricing. If the record is on hold, narrow the package, change the destination, or choose descriptive reporting before the campaign moves forward.

Intake routes

Choose the next proposal-quality check.

Use these routes when the intake exposes a missing buyer-fit, source-quality, package, launch, inventory, or reporting field.

Audience fitConfirm reader intentMatch the buyer offer to the reader job before choosing a package lane. Source qualityReview the offer trailCheck source, destination, claim quality, and sponsor fit before acceptance. Package proofName the scopeWrite eligible context, exclusions, placement scope, and reporting grain. LaunchApprove the campaign recordCheck package proof, creative approval, destination QA, inventory, and readout fields. InventoryCheck placement contractsMatch placement IDs, sizes, device classes, refresh rules, and reporting keys. ReportingPreserve fieldsKeep package, placement, creative, traffic-quality, outcome, and comparison records aligned.

Pair with

Use this worksheet after the audience intent map and media kit, then carry the result into the private marketplace package brief template, private marketplace deal review checklist, and contextual campaign brief template. Use the private marketplace buying terms guide for term definitions, the creative asset acceptance checklist and landing-page QA worksheet before trafficking, and the reporting field dictionary before final readout language is drafted.

Keep reading

Choose the next buyer-readiness step

Move from this page into package proof, activation gates, and buyer-facing readout fields without losing the evidence trail.

Buyer deskStart the readiness pathUse the buyer-readiness desk to connect audience fit, launch QA, reporting, and renewal evidence. Readiness indexSequence the handoffTrace audience fit, package proof, activation, launch, reporting, and renewal checks in order. Package proofName the reader jobKeep package scope, eligible context, creative fit, reporting grain, and renewal evidence visible.