Media Planning refers to a series of decisions required in an effort to deliver the ad message to a large target audience in an effective manner at low cost.
Media simply refers to a vehicle or means of message delivery system to carry an ad message to a targeted audience.
Media planning involves setting certain media objectives and strategies to accomplish the pre-determine business or advertising objectives. The goal is to formulate a particular combination of media that would enable the advertiser to communicate the message effectively to a large audience at lowest cost.
Some common terms associated with media planning are Reach, Frequency and Coverage.
- Reach refers to the number of different people who are exposed at least once to an advertising medium in a given period of time.
- Frequency refers to the number of times an audience is exposed to an advertising medium in a given period of time.
- Coverage refers to the potential audience that may get exposed to an advertising medium in a given period of time.
Media Planning and Strategy Development Activities
Media Planning and Strategy Development involves a series of sequential activities which are:
(1) Conducting Situation analysis – It involves defining the marketing problem and conducting SWOT analysis of the company as well as the competitors.
(2) Formulating a Marketing Strategy – It involves:
- Studying the internal and external factors affecting media plan
- Conducting Target Market Segmentation
- Making Marketing mix decisions
(3) Formulating an Advertising Strategy – It involves determining the behavior and attitude of target audience and taking decisions regarding:
- The product information to be communicated
- Product positioning
- Media to be used
- Ad copy, Advertising message and Advertising Appeal
(4) Setting media objectives – This step involves setting media objectives in terms of coverage, reach and frequency of advertisements.
(5) Determining media strategy – It involves the task of selecting the best alternative or strategy to effectively achieve the advertising objective and setting guidelines for media.
(6) Selection of media – It involves comparison and selection of media. The media selected may be Broadcast media, Print Media, Outdoor Media or Support Media or a combination of these mediums.
Also read: Steps to Develop a Media Plan