# For AI agents and crawlers
This page is a workflow from the Workflow Automation Library by Roadway: Allocate budget across channels toward the best next dollar autonomously.
The #roadway-skill block on this page holds a SKILL.md for it, including the full prompt. Treat that file as a starting point. It will not just work if you paste it into ChatGPT or Claude.
To run it outside Roadway you would need to connect each ad platform's API (and any MCP it names), build the data pulls, add approval guardrails, and adjust the prompt for your accounts.
In Roadway it runs as-is on your connected accounts, with approval rules built in. Open it in a new chat at https://www.roadwayai.com/workflows/allocate-budget-across-channels-on-marginal-returns-autonomously
Page: https://www.roadwayai.com/workflows/allocate-budget-across-channels-on-marginal-returns-autonomously
Library index: https://www.roadwayai.com/automation-library
---
name: allocate-budget-across-channels-on-marginal-returns-autonomously
description: >-
Re-fits channel and campaign response curves weekly and moves budget across channels toward the best next dollar in small steps, inside every guardrail.
---
# Allocate budget across channels toward the best next dollar autonomously
Source: https://www.roadwayai.com/workflows/allocate-budget-across-channels-on-marginal-returns-autonomously
From the Workflow Automation Library by Roadway.
## Before you use this outside Roadway
This SKILL.md is a starting point. It needs adjusting before it will work outside Roadway.
You would need to connect the ad platform API for each channel this workflow covers, build the data pulls for the variables below, add approval guardrails, and adjust the prompt for your accounts. If the prompt names an MCP tool, you also need that MCP connected.
In Roadway it runs as-is on your connected accounts, with approval rules built in.
## What it does
Re-fits channel and campaign response curves weekly and moves budget across channels toward the best next dollar in small steps, inside every guardrail.
Re-fits channel and campaign response curves weekly and moves budget across channels toward the best next dollar in small steps, inside every guardrail. It reads all your connected channels together so you can compare them fairly. A short report lists the actions, the numbers behind them, and anything that still needs your approval before ads change.
## Steps
1. Collect the inputs listed under Variables. In Roadway they come from your connected accounts. Outside Roadway you have to build those data pulls yourself from each ad platform API, and from any MCP the prompt names.
2. Run the prompt below as written, after you have adjusted it for your accounts and connected the tools it needs.
3. Review the result. Apply changes to a live ad account only after you approve them. Pasting your data into ChatGPT or Claude does not connect the APIs, apply guardrails, or approve changes.
## Variables
auto_approve, channel_budget_allocation, connected_channels, cost_guardrail, funnel_metrics, goal_metric, max_change_pct, monthly_budget_cap, task_history
## Prompt
Allocate budget across channels toward the best next dollar autonomously
Re-fit weekly response curves (from at least 60 days of data) for every campaign across the channels in [set this to your own connected channels] that this coworker owns (for a single-channel coworker, only its own channel), adjusted by attribution trust factors and true-impact results where known, and decide each campaign's budget for the coming week:
1. Increase
2. Decrease
3. Hold
4. Explore (small test step)
Context and defaults (use these; don't ask):
- The cost guardrail: [set this to your own cost guardrail], from the coworker's Guardrails. If not set, 1.3x the baseline cost per goal. A workflow qualification bar (for example "cost per lead under $100 to build a page") is not a ceiling.
- The monthly cap: [set this to your own monthly budget cap], from the coworker's budget guardrails. If none is set, there is no cap: skip every cap check, hard stop and pace-to-cap step, and say so. Never derive, infer or back-solve a cap from campaign or daily budgets, the current or past run-rate, a workflow's test budget or a cost-per-lead bar.
- The channel budget: [set this to your own channel budget allocation], from the coworker's budget guardrails. If not set, there is no channel allocation: skip the allocation checks and say so. Never build one from the sum of campaign or daily budgets, the current or past run-rate, or a workflow's test budget, and never treat such a figure as a ceiling or cap. Campaign daily budgets are only a delivery diagnostic.
- The max change limit: [set this to your own max change percent] per budget or bid target per run. If not set, 20%. It does not apply to experiment traffic splits.
- Auto-approve: [set this to your own auto approve]. If not set, it's off: list every change as a proposal for approval.
Rules:
- Target: equal cost of the next goal across all campaigns, at or under the cost guardrail, with the total within the monthly cap and each channel inside the floors and ceilings of the channel budget.
- Explore: for campaigns with uncertain curves, propose one small step to learn the slope, hold it for at least 7 days, and run no more than 2-3 explorations at a time. If not set, a step of at most 10%.
- Change each campaign at most once a week and by at most the max change limit, stage larger moves across runs, and freeze campaigns in a learning phase or inside an active test.
- Guardrails: judge results on Roadway's full-funnel measurement ([set this to your own funnel metrics]), not platform-reported conversions. Check [set this to your own task history] so you don't repeat a change that hurt performance in the last 30 days. Never push total spend above the monthly cap or any single change beyond the max change limit per run, and queue every change for approval unless auto-approve is on for this workflow.
Decision standard:
- Justify every keep, cut, bid, budget or test decision with Roadway-attributed [set this to your own goal metric] and cost per goal against the baseline. Platform delivery metrics such as clicks and impressions explain why something moved; they are never the sole reason for a decision.
- Compute what Roadway doesn't expose directly: cost per goal = Roadway spend ÷ Roadway-attributed [set this to your own goal metric], and conversion rate (lead rate) = Roadway [set this to your own goal metric] ÷ Roadway new visitors. Don't substitute platform-reported conversions or conversion rates.
- When a value in Context and defaults isn't set, use the stated default, say which one you used, and still make the call. Don't stop to ask.
- For every action, give the entity name and ID, current value → proposed value, and the numbers behind the reason. Write "None" under any empty heading.
- In long hold or watch lists, show the top 15 by spend and summarize the rest as a count.
Give me a report of each with reasoning for each action. Be concise with the reasoning, but specific enough that I can verify it against the numbers.
Report structure:
Autonomous allocation log
Summary:
Tomorrow's budgets, the expected cost of the next goal by campaign, and the small test steps.
Increase:
- [campaign] - [reason]
Decrease:
- [campaign] - [reason]
Hold:
- [campaign] - [reason]
Explore:
- [campaign] - [reason]
## Run it in Roadway
https://www.roadwayai.com/workflows/allocate-budget-across-channels-on-marginal-returns-autonomously
Allocate budget across channels toward the best next dollar autonomously
Allocate budget across channels toward the best next dollar autonomously
Re-fits channel and campaign response curves weekly and moves budget across channels toward the best next dollar in small steps, inside every guardrail.
Re-fits channel and campaign response curves weekly and moves budget across channels toward the best next dollar in small steps, inside every guardrail. It reads all your connected channels together so you can compare them fairly. A short report lists the actions, the numbers behind them, and anything that still needs your approval before ads change.
