September 2026: Plan Campaigns (Fund Management)

Overview

Plan Campaigns now includes a complete Fund Management module, covering everything from how a brand sets up and distributes budgets to how local teams spend them and how everyone tracks what's left.

Fund Management is built directly around co-op. Co-op marketing is when a brand, such as a manufacturer or franchisor, shares the cost of local marketing with its network: dealerships, franchisees or regional teams. The brand allocates a budget, the local business runs a campaign or promotion, and the brand reimburses an agreed share of the cost, usually after reviewing what was actually spent. It's a model that depends entirely on financial control and visibility, on both sides.

That's what this module delivers. Admins set up funds and distribute them to local business owners. Local teams get full financial control over their own budget before they submit a request. And everyone, from a single dealership to a regional or HQ finance team, can see exactly where the money stands, without leaving Plan Campaigns.

Setting Up and Distributing Funds

Admins define funds directly in Plan Campaigns, no separate finance tool required.

• Create time-limited funds (for a defined budget period) or rolling funds (balance carries over indefinitely), each in the currency that fits the market
• Distribute budgets to local units in one go with an Excel upload, matched automatically against your organisational structure
• Top up or adjust an individual local unit's allocation at any time, without re-uploading the whole file
• Every fund keeps a full history of what was injected, when, and by whom

Benefit: A single, always up to date source of truth for what's been allocated to whom, replacing spreadsheets and one-off finance requests.

Budgets Inside Every Campaign

A Fund overview widget brings live budget data straight into the campaign, so local teams know their position before they submit anything.

• See total budget, remaining balance and the value of the current request, updated in real time as it's filled in
• A dedicated approval status (Pending review, Needs change, Approved, Rejected) runs alongside the campaign's own status, so financial sign-off stays separate from content approval
• Approving a request deducts it from the fund automatically; reversing a decision credits it straight back
• A request that would exceed the remaining balance is automatically flagged as Pending available funds instead of being deducted, so nothing is overspent by accident

Benefit: Local teams submit with full financial control over their own budget, and approvers see exactly what a request will cost the fund before they sign off.

Utilisation Reporting

A live utilisation report shows how every fund is being used, aggregated up through the organisation.

• One row per local unit, rolling up from a single dealership or franchisee to country and region level
• Shows total budget, payments made, remaining balance and utilisation for every level of the hierarchy
• Exports to Excel for finance reviews and audits, with the export always matching what the person exporting is permitted to see

Benefit: Finance and area managers get one live view of utilisation across the entire network, instead of chasing numbers from individual dealerships.

Fund Dashboards

The newest addition puts that same visibility in the hands of the people actually spending the money, not just admins.

• Every user with access to Plan Campaigns can now open a Fund dashboard scoped to their own local unit, with no extra setup or permission needed
• One row per fund shows what's allocated, approved, pending and remaining, plus a utilisation bar at a glance
• A time-limited fund with unspent money nearing its end date shows a clear expiry warning, so budget doesn't go to waste
• A detail view breaks down campaign status by fund and shows how the budget has moved over time
• Area managers responsible for several local units can switch between them and compare utilisation across their whole network

Benefit: Every dealership, franchisee and area manager gets the same budget visibility admins have always had, so they can plan campaigns with confidence and follow up on stalled requests themselves.