MEDIA PLANNING + BUYING
CTV / VIDEO / SOCIAL / SEARCH

Media, decoded.

01 / DECODE
02 / DEPLOY
03 / DELIVER
MEDIA PLANNING + BUYING
POLITICAL · PUBLIC AFFAIRS · ADVOCACY · CORPORATE
Cipher brings clarity to a complicated media landscape. We plan, buy, optimize, and measure campaigns across CTV, YouTube, social, search, display, audio, and traditional media, giving clients a clearer understanding of where their money is going and what it is accomplishing.

Built for political, public affairs, advocacy, and corporate teams that expect senior attention, technical expertise, and straight answers.

HOW WE WORK ↓
BASED IN TEXAS · WORKING NATIONWIDE
CHANNELS
CTVSOCIALSEARCHYOUTUBE + VIDEOAUDIODISPLAY + TRADITIONAL
CLARITY IN A FRAGMENTED MARKET
A lot happens between the budget and the outcome.
Modern media buying is spread across platforms, publishers, audiences, inventory types, pricing models, and measurement systems. Every channel operates differently, and every vendor has a reason its channel should receive more of the budget.
Cipher starts somewhere simpler: What are we trying to accomplish? From there, we determine the audience, geography, timing, media mix, and measurement strategy required to get there. The result is a plan built around the objective rather than whatever platform happens to be selling inventory.

CAPABILITIES
STRATEGY BEFORE INVENTORY

Cipher works across the media landscape, but we are channel-neutral by design. The objective determines the plan, and the plan determines the buy.

01

Plan

We define the audience, geography, budget, timing, and channel mix before dollars begin moving.
  • AUDIENCE STRATEGY
  • VOTER-FILE-INFORMED TARGETING
  • GEOGRAPHIC PLANNING
  • BUDGET ALLOCATION
  • REACH + FREQUENCY
  • CAMPAIGN ARCHITECTURE
  • INVENTORY EVALUATION
02

Buy

Cipher executes across the channels your audience actually uses rather than forcing the strategy into one platform.
  • CONNECTED TV / OTT
  • YOUTUBE + ONLINE VIDEO
  • PROGRAMMATIC DISPLAY + AUDIO
  • PAID SOCIAL
  • PAID SEARCH
  • STREAMING MEDIA
  • LINEAR TV + RADIO
03

Optimize

Launching the campaign is only the beginning. Throughout the flight, we monitor:
  • Delivery
  • Pacing
  • Cost
  • Audience saturation
  • Inventory quality
  • Channel performance
Then we adjust when the evidence supports it.
ACTIVE CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT
04

Measure

Reporting should help clients make decisions, not simply prove that impressions were delivered. Depending on the campaign, Cipher can evaluate:
  • Reach
  • Frequency
  • Media efficiency
  • Conversion activity
  • Attribution
  • Mixed-media performance
  • Estimated return on investment
REPORTING + ATTRIBUTION
THE BUY, DECODEDONE OBJECTIVE. A LOT OF VARIABLES.

From objective
to allocation.

Every media plan is different. The logic behind it should not be.

01 / INPUT

Objective
Persuade 150,000 priority voters
Market
4 media markets
Flight
28 days
Budget
$750,000
Audience
Likely voters + modeled persuasion targets

02 / CIPHER

  1. 01Audience modeling
  2. 02Inventory analysis
  3. 03Channel allocation
  4. 04Frequency planning
  5. 05Buying
  6. 06Optimization
  7. 07Attribution

03 / EXAMPLE OUTPUT

Connected TV42%
Online Video24%
Paid Social17%
Programmatic Display9%
Audio + Search8%
100% ALLOCATED ILLUSTRATIVE MEDIA MIX

Illustrative scenario and allocation. Not a client campaign or a recommended media plan.

THE NUMBERS THAT MATTERILLUSTRATIVE METRICS · NOT CLIENT RESULTS

Measure the job,
not the dashboard.

Priority Audience Reached

Percentage of the defined audience exposed during the campaign window.

Average Frequency

Enough repetition to reinforce the message without paying indefinitely for the same impressions.

Effective CPM

A clear view of what qualified audience delivery is actually costing.

Lower Cost per Reached Household

Example improvement produced through allocation and optimization.

Clicks, likes, views, and engagement can all provide useful information, but none should automatically become the definition of success. Cipher establishes the business or campaign objective first, then determines which numbers deserve attention.

COMPLEXITY, HANDLEDCOMPLEXITY IN. CLARITY OUT.

The hard part
stays with us.

You don’t need to become a media expert to know whether your plan makes sense.

WE HANDLE THE COMPLEXITY
  • Programmatic auctions
  • Platform mechanics
  • Attribution models
  • Inventory economics
YOU GET CLARITY
01

A strategy you understand.

02

Costs you can see.

03

Decisions you can trust.

SENIOR PEOPLE. STAYING CLOSE.From planning and buying to optimization and decisions, senior strategists stay involved throughout the engagement.

FRAGMENTED MEDIA →

One connected strategy.

Audiences move between channels. We build one connected strategy around how they actually consume media.

OPAQUE PRICING →

Transparent economics.

You should know what you are buying, what it costs, and where the money is going.

VANITY METRICS →

Meaningful measurement.

We focus reporting on the numbers that help determine whether the campaign is accomplishing its objective.

WHO WE WORK WITH

Different environments. Same expectation.

CAMPAIGNS + POLITICAL
/
PUBLIC AFFAIRS + ADVOCACY
/
BRANDS + CORPORATE

Cipher works with organizations where media decisions have consequences and the timeline does not always leave room for trial and error.

01

Campaigns + Political Committees

Political media moves quickly. Cipher brings disciplined buying, platform expertise, and the ability to make informed decisions under compressed timelines.

Congressional campaigns · Statewide campaigns · Legislative campaigns · Independent expenditure efforts · Leadership PACs · Political committees

02

Public Affairs + Advocacy

When audiences are narrow and outcomes matter, broad assumptions become expensive. We build around the people who actually need to be reached.

Issue advocacy organizations · Trade associations · Coalitions · Public affairs campaigns

03

Brands + Corporate Teams

Cipher brings the speed and technical discipline of political media into corporate environments without bringing the conventions of a traditional political agency with it.

Brands · Corporate communications teams · Organizations with complex audience challenges

04

Consultants + Agency Partners

You stay close to the client. We stay close to the media. Cipher can operate as the specialist buying and strategy arm behind a larger communications effort.

General consultants · Communications firms · Creative agencies · Strategic partners

People crossing a busy city street between office buildings.
WHY CIPHEREXPERTISE WITHOUT THE BLACK BOX

We know how
the machinery works.

Cipher coded wordmarkPLATFORM KNOWLEDGE. HUMAN JUDGMENT.

Cipher was built after six years inside Meta’s political advertising operation across two presidential cycles. That platform-side experience informs how we think about targeting, delivery, optimization, compliance, attribution, and the technical infrastructure behind modern media.

But technical knowledge only matters when it produces better decisions.

That is why Cipher pairs deep platform understanding with transparent economics, senior-level access, and a willingness to challenge the plan when the evidence points somewhere else.

Platform-side perspective

Experience inside the systems most agencies buy from.

Senior attention

The people shaping the strategy stay close to the work.

Clear economics

Clients understand how the budget is being deployed.

Straight answers

If we think there is a better move, we will say so and explain why.

HOW WE WORKSIMPLE ON PURPOSE

A clear process.
A lot happening underneath it.

RESULTSILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLES · NOT VERIFIED CLIENT OUTCOMES

Proof, not activity.

Examples of how campaign outcomes can be reported. All figures below are placeholders for verified case studies.

STATEWIDE CAMPAIGN

81%

Priority audience reached

Share of priority audience · %

Average frequency
6.2×
Reduction in effective CPM
18%

PUBLIC AFFAIRS

+27%

Improvement in cost efficiency

Efficiency index · baseline = 100

Qualified households reached
2.4M
Integrated media channels
4

CORPORATE CAMPAIGN

−34%

Cost per completed action

Cost index · baseline = 100 · lower is better

Budget within target audience
91%
Return on attributed media spend
3.1×
START WITH THE OBJECTIVE

Bring us the problem.
We’ll decode the media.

Have a difficult audience, a fragmented plan, or questions about where the budget goes? Tell us what needs to happen. That’s enough to start.

CIPHER MEDIA