Billion Dollar Boy (BDB) needed a pricing calculator for their advertising campaigns that could be easily used by stakeholders across the business, regardless of their Excel skills. The calculator needed to be simple yet flexible enough to accommodate the unique requirements of each bespoke project.
The previous version of the calculator was overwhelming, difficult to maintain, and often inaccurate.
The goals of the project were to update the calculator to make it easier to use, maintain, improve its accuracy, as well as to add new functionality to better manage FTE and FX.
[Original version of the fee calculator]
Method
To address these challenges, the following approach was taken:
Understand the users and the problem by speaking to different stakeholders to get a clear understanding of the issues and their causes, define the scope of work, and determine what was currently working.
Build quickly by creating MVPs of the product to test new concepts and ideas, gather feedback, and iterate quickly with stakeholders.
Learn from user feedback to determine what was working and what was not, and iterate accordingly.
[Some early concepts shown to stakeholders to test viability]
This process was repeated until the final product was achieved, which was easy to use, fit for purpose for different stakeholders, and included all the requested features. The final product included a simplified UI, scalable backend, and various enhancements to features. The calculator also includes detailed breakdowns of project costs, margin analysis, and profitability analysis.
Final Product
Overall, the updated pricing calculator has been well received by stakeholders and has helped BDB to better serve their clients, streamline their processes, and improve their profitability.
Talent Inputs
A single tab is dedicated to all talent inputs, including updated pricing models.
The "card style" categories allow for new platforms to be added in a standardized format.
The ability to expand and collapse categories ensures that the user only sees the relevant information.
Project Time Estimates
Initial estimates are provided by finance based on inputs in previous tabs.
Revised estimates and additional line items can be added to ensure that each project is tailored to the specific client's requests.
Consistent use of "card style" categories that can be expanded and collapsed.
Client Output
A clean and well-presented project overview that account managers can give to clients.
FTE Tracking
Based on the inputs of the project, an FTE capacity table is created. This is used later in the process to ensure that the accounts team is correctly staffed and each project has the right number of people assigned to it.
Calculations
Despite the relative simplicity on the front end, the backend that powers the talent pricing, rate cards, FTE capacity, and FX controls is very complex. This is best demonstrated in person.
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