For every successful campaign it is important to have right set of media select to reach the target audiences. The trickiest question is, which medium to choose and most importantly which not to? This is where most of the campaigns fail to achieve the desired results. Each communication message designed has a set of media best suited for the campaign. But this media management needs a well strategized plan. This is where media planning comes in the picture.
Media planning involves strategic planning while selecting the apt media for a campaign. With media planning what follows is media buying. Media buying is a sub function of media management. The main task of media buying lies within the negotiation of price and placement to ensure the best possible value can be secured.
While planning, the media planner must consider the factors like, target audience, their psychographics and demographics, geographic and also the budget of the campaign to be executed. The plan also depends on the product and its features. The products catering to the corporate clients do not include the media that appeals to the masses and the products catering the masses are less likely to be included in the media plan that appeals only to the corporate. A media plan is justified to be apt when it involves right place, right time, right medium and right communication message.
The media planning also involves frequency. How frequently a message should appear to serve the advertising objective? Frequency is important because it takes a while to build up awareness and break through the consumer’s selection process. People are always screening out messages they’re not interested in, picking up only on those things that are important to them. Repetition is the key word here. For frequency, it’s much better to advertise regularly. This will help in accelerating the process of reinforcing a creative message and might try to persuade the audiences in favor of the brand been advertised.
Hence for every successful campaign a proper media management, media planning and media buying is important.