The Best Media Buying Strategy in 2020

Media Buying and Planning for Successful Ad Campaigns

Media buying is the process of placing ads on TV and radio, print media, and online. Its primary objective is to reach the most extensive target audience as cost-effectively as possible. A media buying agency knows how to negotiate for their customers. They are familiar with the media buying arena and the cost of prime advertising spots. A successful media buyer cultivates connections with niche representatives to make the best deals for their clients. 

Purchasing advertising from a media company consists of 3 stages:

• Pre-launching, where media buyers negotiate the best deals for their customers.
• Launching, where buyers ensure that advertisers perform their tasks.
• Post launching, where campaigns are evaluated for success and reports are generated. 

How Media Planning Differs from Media Buying

Media buying and planning are two sides of the same coin. Media planning involves choosing the best media buying platforms for a client’s brand or product. Media planners determine the best combination of media outlets to attract customers and boost sales. Although media planning is often outsourced, some media buying services do their planning in-house. 

A media planner makes detailed recommendations for the time, place, and frequency of ad placements. Their goal is to reach potential customers at the most opportune moment, to get the best results. Media planners must balance the advertising budget, to ensure that ad campaigns are profitable. 

Before buying media, planners examine the product, the audience, and the ad objectives. Buyers follow up by running the initial investment and enhancing the campaign’s effectiveness throughout the entire advertising. To ensure a successful workflow, both planning and buying are essential, although some agencies think that one is more useful than the other.  

Top 3 Tasks of Media Planners

Media planners lay the groundwork for an advertising campaign. They set up media buying strategies by scouting out the landscape to identify the best potential venues and locate the target audience. 

The main tasks of planners are:

• Identifying potential customers. A planner defines the audience that a campaign will target, and determines what share of that audience will be reached through specific spots. For instance, a planner might discover that your banking application ideally fits urban young adults with outstanding student loans who earn $40.000-60.000 annually.
• Determining the mix of channels. Planners do research to find the best places and ways to reach your potential customers. They define the exact time and frequency of ads, and where they will run.  
• Pricing. Planners negotiate the price of ad placement to make the best use of the client’s budget. They determine how the budget will be distributed, allocating a certain percentage for each advertising venue. 

Top 5 Tasks of Media Buyers

A media buyer places ads and negotiates the terms for each advertisement on marketing channels. They make sure all advertising inventory fits the campaign budget. The main objective is for ads to reach as many potential customers as possible. 

This is how they do it:

• Media planning. Identify top locations where a display ad will be shown. The plan includes an overall budget set by the client. The purchase of advertising from a media company requires accurate information about placement, cost, and objectives.
• Pricing. Buyers reach out to media representatives, build a rapport, conduct negotiations, and purchase media. They keep track of ad inventory and costs. Building relationships is a key part of media buying. 
• Negotiating. Buyers indicate how much they are ready to pay for each ad placement, beginning with a low bid to optimize the client’s budget.
• Monitoring. Advertising performance can be monitored with a computer application like Microsoft Excel. Large businesses may use spreadsheet-based tools like Mediatool to digitally monitor ad performance. Media buyers must track each ad purchased, and perform necessary bug fixing until the campaign reaches its closing date.
• Evaluating. Determine which ads and markets performed well, and which failed to meet the desired objectives, and use that information to create a new, better-performing campaign.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Programmatic Advertising

Marketing specialists note that AI can immediately understand consumer behavior by the following observations – gender, age, residence, likings, and other relevant information. What is more, AI can match local data and ad impressions. So, this technology detects at what time and place an exact ad is displayed, and what is the frequency of impressions. It helps AI to give the cue when to put an ad, at what place, and in what form. The capacity of this technology to understand consumer behavior clearly and put ads respectively improves general ad performance and reduces costs for attracting new leads. 

AI-powered chatbot IBM Watson is a QA system that is being constantly improved for best-automated advertising. Recently, programmatic media buying has attracted individuals and businesses substantially. Thereby, there is hope that AI will continue to have a positive effect on programmatic advertising.

Top 10 Most Important Media Buying Trends in 2020

• Programmatic advertising implies the artificial intelligence (AI) application to make media buying and selling automated. It helps to clearly define the target audience.
• Chatbots will keep on playing a decisive role in Internet marketing. Such computer programs use instant messaging (IM) to simulate live conversations with customers.
• Presently, individuals use audio content to find the information they need. Voice search helps to accomplish this.
• Conversational marketing promotes effective communication between marketing specialists and clients.
• Video is extensively used by individuals willing to know more about the desired goods or services. For this, video marketing has been another essential trend.
• Influencer marketing implies applying to market leaders to spread the necessary information to a larger audience.
• Personalized marketing implies customization of your goods or services, content, and other relevant details.
• Social messaging apps are valuable for sending direct messages to clients since they allow customization and improve customer experience.
• Social media stories vanish after a certain time. So, it is a good chance for marketing specialists to benefit from fear of missing out (FOMO).
• Social commerce & Shoppable posts. With online stores and social media both progressing substantially, it is clear companies are making use of these two to boost their sales.

What Future Holds for Media Buyers and Planners?

Media planners and buyers work together to devise the most profitable strategies for their customers. While media planning is often outsourced, it plays an essential role in making a media advertising campaign successful.

The media space has progressed together with digital space, and media experts need to keep pace with market trends. Although no one knows what to expect from the future, media planners and buyers should be ready to face abundant challenges ahead.