This article introduces deals and explains how they control the availability of content (assets) to end-users.
Read on, or use the links below to go straight to a specific section.
- What are deals, and how do they work?
- What's the difference between a deal and an offer?
- What is offerable content?
- How do I navigate the deal catalog?
- How do I set up a new deal?
- How do dates work on deals and offers?
- What are initial offers?
- How do I re-instantiate an offer?
Warning: Take care before attempting to make changes in this area. Deals are an advanced feature and we recommend that you don't modify them without relevant approval.
The diagram below illustrates how rules, assets, users, and user groups interlink. Here we're focussing on rules relating to deals.
We've also created an infographic that illustrates how the different rules come into play to give users access to content through their entitlements - be sure to take a look.
What are deals, and how do they work?
A deal acts as a container for managing the licensing terms agreed with the distributor (or ultimate owner) of your video assets, as well as playback rules and any offers inherited by the assets. Deals group together related content offered under similar terms - for example, those restricting certain types of transactions, or playback on particular devices.
You may have more than one deal with a distributor, e.g., a deal governing the license terms for new releases and a separate one for library content.
Every asset must be ingested against a deal to be published to end-users. Typically, all assets are ingested under a single deal with common rules, however they can be set up per-distributor or per-use case if required.
What's the difference between a deal and an offer?
Note: Deals and offers are usually set up on a per-project basis by our engineers, so they're automatically applied to assets during ingestion.
An offer defines when, where, and how an asset is offered to a specific user group. A deal, on the other hand, forms the outer boundary of these offers and is where the ownership rights of each offerable asset are configured. All offered assets need to be part of a deal.
For example, you may have content from Distributor A that:
- may not be played on Chromecast
- may not be offered past a specific date
- may only be offered for a subscription but not rental
By grouping all of Distributor A's assets into a deal at ingestion, you can be sure that none of them will be offered in a way that violates any of the deal's rules.
- Automatically from the deal that the asset is associated with during ingestion.
- Manually from custom offers, which are defined directly at asset-level.
- Manually from global offers referenced at asset-level.
These three ways in which assets obtain their offers are known as offer templates, a term we use to group offers.
Read our article to learn more about offers.
What is offerable content?
There are many asset types available in Presentation Manager, however not all are what we refer to as offerable. Whether or not content is offerable determines if or when it's visible to end-users (i.e., will appear in lists and search results) and can be viewed or purchased.
Standard entertainment and sports assets - movie, episode, show, competition, event, and so on - are offerable. Links, custom assets, and ratings, on the other hand, use a non-editable system deal/offer, ensuring their visibility to all users.
Configuring deals
The rules tab in Presentation Manager groups together three subsections; deals, global offers, and plans. By default, selecting rules from the top navigation automatically displays deals.
How do I navigate the deal catalog?
Deals are displayed within the deal catalog, and can be sorted by title, distributor, deal start and end, deal modified, and date created.
Select a deal from the catalog to view details.
- In the Details tab (selected by default), you can view/edit deal information.
- Select the Initial offers tab to view any offers inherited with the deal at the point of ingestion.
How do I set up a new deal?
If you've added a new distributor to your catalog, or agreed a new set of license terms with an existing one, you may need to add a new deal.
- In the deal catalog, select
.
Note: By default, the ownership is set to "subscription," and the delivery types are set to "stream."
2. Enter information into the relevant fields:
- Title (mandatory): Specify the deal title.
- Distributor (mandatory): The distributor that the deal applies to. Select an existing distributor or create a new one.
- Users (mandatory): The user group(s) that the deal applies to. Select from existing user groups (multiple selections possible).
- Ownership (mandatory): Select; free, subscription, EST, and/or rent (multiple selections possible). Selections made here determine the offer types for this deal.
- Delivery types (mandatory): Specify how assets included in the deal can be delivered to user devices. Select from download, progressive download, stream, and/or stream or download (multiple selections possible).
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Advanced options: select a checkbox to configure further details as required:
- Playback restrictions - If there are restrictions on playback or casting at specific resolutions on specific devices, these can be defined here. First, select a restricted device type, then specify cast type/s, file type/s, and an optional description for the restriction. The description will be displayed to the user in their app.
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- Minimum price for items:
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- Maximum price for items:
-
- Items are deemed NOT for individual sale.
- Deal period (mandatory): Specify the start and end date and the time period of the deal. See below for further information on dates.
Note: If you need to change the terms of the deal, you can extend the deal end date. Any offers within the same deal must then be re-instantiated to become active.
How do dates work on deals and offers?
The deal dates determine the availability of the asset. Offers will not be instantiated on an asset if their dates violate the deal period. Two types of date configuration are relevant here:
- A relative date (used by offers) is a period of time relative to the current date or another specified date, such as the date of ingestion. Add offsets of time to the relative date by weeks, days, hours, and minutes. For example, if the offer applies to a relative date of the deal start, with an offset of +2 days, this means the offer is active two days after the deal start date. If the deal start date is changed, the relative offer date is updated accordingly.
- An absolute date (used by deals and offers) is a fixed date and time, independent of any other set dates in the system.
3. To save, click the button.
4. The newly created deal is displayed.
What are initial offers?
Once you've created your deal, select the initial offers tab to view any offers inherited with the deal at the point of ingestion.
The ownership that you specify when configuring the deal (i.e., free, subscription, EST, and/or rent) determines the offer types. If no offers are inherited, or you wish to add another offer, you can do so on this page.
Example of a deal with inherited offers:
Below is an example of a deal with various automatically inherited offers. Select an offer to view/edit details.
Example of a deal without inherited offers:
Below is an example of a deal without any automatically inherited offers. In this view, add a new free, subscription, EST, rental, or coming soon offer to the deal.
How do I re-instantiate an offer?
Multiple offers can exist within a deal. These offers must respect the deal period (duration of the deal). When you make a change to offers, you must refresh - or re-instantiate - them so that the deal is updated to include the new offer changes.
To do this, follow these steps:
- Update the offers with your changes (on deals, assets, or global offers.)
- Trigger the re-instantiate offers action of the asset (to refresh asset offers.)
- Republish the asset (publishing uses the updated asset offers snapshot.)