Your Opponent’s TV Buy Is Public Record. Are You Reading It?
Weekly competitive TV intelligence for political campaigns, independent expenditure groups, and consultants. Broadcast, cable, and digital — sourced from federal disclosure records, verified by a 24-year broadcast media veteran, delivered every Monday.
The Problem
Every political TV order placed at every station and cable system in America must be posted to federal public records within one business day. The schedule. The rates. The flight dates. The dayparts.
Your opponent’s entire television strategy is sitting in a public file right now.
Almost nobody reads it.
The campaigns that do — or that pay enterprise data firms five and six figures for the privilege — see attack ads coming weeks before they air. They know when an IE group drops $200,000 into their race the day the order is placed. They know whether the other side is buying smart or burning money on wasted reach.
The campaigns that don’t find out when the ad airs. By then, the response window is gone.
The Service
Competitive Air War Intelligence is a weekly briefing covering every political TV dollar committed in your race:
Newly Booked This Week. Every order your opponents and outside groups placed during the week — including buys that won’t air for weeks. This is your early warning system.
On Air This Week. What actually ran: which stations, which programs, which dayparts, how many spots, at what rates.
The Forward Book. Every dollar already committed between today and Election Day, broken out week by week. You see the air war that’s coming before it arrives.
Cable Zone Efficiency. Our proprietary analysis of whether each buyer’s cable dollars are actually reaching your district’s voters — or spilling into neighborhoods that can’t vote in your race. We’ve seen campaigns waste 80% of their cable budget this way. You’ll know if your opponent is one of them.
Why Cool Brand Media
This isn’t a software dashboard built by people who’ve never sold a spot schedule.
Julia McDonald spent 24 years inside DFW broadcast television — NBC 5, FOX 4, and Telemundo 39 — placing, pricing, and reconciling the exact order forms this service analyzes. She ran every invoice like a sworn affidavit, because at NBC, it was one.
That standard — the Affidavit Standard — is the product. Every number in your weekly briefing is sourced from a federal disclosure document, read by a professional who has written thousands of them.
Cool Brand Media is a HUB-certified, Dallas-based full-service agency.
Pricing
| Tier | Price | What’s Included |
|---|---|---|
| RECON | $1,250/month | Weekly data digest (spreadsheet format) · All broadcast + cable orders in your race · Newly booked, on air, and forward book views · Email delivery every Monday · For campaigns with in-house analysts who want raw intelligence |
| COMMAND ⭐ MOST POPULAR | $2,250/month | Everything in Recon, plus: Full written intelligence briefing (PDF, client-ready) · Cable zone efficiency analysis · Share-of-voice tracking week over week · Tactical read: what the buys reveal about opponent strategy · For campaign managers and consultants who need the analysis, not just the data |
| WAR ROOM | $3,500/month | Everything in Command, plus: Same-day alert when any order over $25,000 posts in your race · Digital monitoring layer: Meta Ad Library + Google Ads Transparency tracking · Mid-week update during the final 3 weeks before Election Day · Direct phone/text access for “what does this mean” questions · For competitive races where hours matter |
All tiers: One-time race setup fee of $950 (covers market mapping: station universe, cable system identification, and district zone analysis for your specific race).
No long-term contract. Month to month. Cancel when your race ends.
How It Works
- Tell us your race. Complete the intake form below — district, candidates, election date.
- We map your market. Within 3 business days, we build your race’s tracking universe: every station, every cable system, every zone relevant to your district.
- Your first briefing arrives Monday. And every Monday after, through Election Day.
- Billing is automatic. Card on file, billed monthly, cancel anytime.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does the data come from?
Federal disclosure records that every broadcast station and cable system is legally required to maintain. Every political order must be posted within one business day of placement. We read these files weekly, extract every order in your race, and verify totals against the source documents.
Is this legal?
Completely. These are public records mandated by federal law, accessible to anyone. Our value is reading them systematically, accurately, and turning them into actionable intelligence — every week, without fail.
Does this include streaming/OTT (Hulu, YouTube TV, Roku)?
Broadcast and cable are covered by federal disclosure rules; streaming platforms are not, and no public record of streaming buys exists. Our War Room tier includes the closest available proxies: Meta and Google’s political ad transparency databases, which capture significant digital and YouTube/CTV activity.
How fast will I know about a new opponent buy?
Orders post to public files within one business day of placement. Recon and Command clients see everything in Monday’s briefing. War Room clients get same-day alerts on orders over $25,000.
Can you track multiple races or IE activity?
Yes. Each race is a separate engagement with its own setup. IE and super PAC orders in your race are included in every tier automatically — they file in the same public records.
What markets do you cover?
Any U.S. media market. The setup fee covers building the tracking universe for your specific race, wherever it is.
Is invoice billing available?
Invoice billing available for committee treasurers on request.