Market Optimizer

Market Optimizer allows you to run a potential analysis using your model on a specific geography in SCOUT at any given time. The optimizer will take into account any newly opened sites giving you the ability to create new market potential sites vs viewing a static potential one time analysis. In this article we will review how to run the tool once you have it built. 

Once you have the feature enabled, the steps below are taken to run your Market Optimizer.

You will want to add a geography to the map to optimize potential locations. It is suggested to choose a geography that is large enough to be a complete market, yet reasonably small enough to consider cannibalization for the market from one site to another. Good examples of this would be a DMA, CBSA, or County. In this example we will focus on the DFW Market DMA located under geographies.  

Next, right click on your geography and select "Create Report" and choose your Market Optimizer report option from the list. 

Now fill out the interface according to how you would like to run the optimizer. *These options may not be exactly the same as every solution will be custom, but in our example the fields will do the following:

Title: Allows you to title your report.
​Scenario: Allows you to title your scenario.
​Max. Cannibalization Threshold (%): Allows you to choose the max allowable cannibalization from one site to another.
​Min. Sales Threshold ($): Allows you to choose the minimum amount of dollars each site will forecast. *Other measures other than sales would apply for custom models.
​Close Site(s): Allows you to close out a site or multiple sites by putting the location number identifier (comma delimited for multiple) in case you'd like to see your scenario with site(s) closed.
​Whitespace Analysis?: Allows you to check off if this will be a scenario with our current existing sites loaded to SCOUT or as if you were to infill the market brand new, ignoring all existing sites.

In our default example here we are updating our fields to 15% cannibalization with a 1.5 million dollar sales threshold that you see pictured here. Now select "Submit". 

Your report will take longer to run than a typical site score and the time will depend on the variables you have input, the time it takes to run a single site score, as well as how large your geography is. Once it is complete it will be located under reports like any other report. The first page(s) will show a picture of your scenario with your existing network (if whitespace was not selected) as well as the trade areas for your potential sites. The following page(s) will be the site scores for each individual potential site (Not pictured below).  

Here is our example below as well as other potential example outputs using the same "xyz" model. Our example yielded an additional 30 sites to continue growth with the following criteria:

Now we will show the exact same model with a whitespace scenario (ignoring existing sites). This next example yielded 20 sites to with the following criteria:

Next, we will show the exact same model with a more slightly more aggressive outlook. In this case choosing a lower threshold and higher allowable cannibalization. This next example yielded 40 sites to with the following criteria:

Finally, in our last example we went extremely aggressive while keeping cannibalization at 15%, sales updated to a very low $300,000. This next example yielded 75 sites to with the following criteria:

Should you have additional questions about this reporting option specifically for your model or would like to investigate if this product is right for you please contact your account manager.

Follow-up Reading:
To view your newly created report you can visit this article.
Visit our other standard report section.