Media plan: main sections
Planning helps you control your work processes and personal affairs, set goals, and solve problems. It makes it possible to build your life in the right direction and rhythm, not relying on chance. And a clear algorithm of future actions works in different spheres, it demonstrates high efficiency for achieving marketing and advertising goals. Therefore, a media plan is one of the most important documents for marketing specialists.
Media planning is a process of making a list of actions of advertising campaigns, as well as finding the best options for advertising. As a result, specialists receive a document – a media plan that includes an algorithm for a certain period, for example, from 3 to 12 months. Thanks to this scheme it is possible to control the frequency of advertising, analyze information from different channels, to monitor timing and costs. In addition, the media plan also includes predictions about the effectiveness of a particular tool.
With this document, you can keep track of where your budget is going. In addition, the media plan allows you to see whether advertising promotion works, whether ads reach a specific audience. Marketers actively use this approach to structure activities, as well as the systematization of tasks and clarity of their implementation. The document shows the deadlines so that all actions will be carried out within the designated time frame.
A media plan is similar to a content plan, but it is more comprehensive. A content plan also has a schedule of publications, topics, and headings, but it does not contain information about promotion sites, budgets, and forecasts.
A media plan includes a huge amount of information of various kinds. It has four main sections:
Media brief. It describes the goals and objectives, as well as the results of previous campaigns. Thus, the client understands what the result should be achieved by the specialists, and specialists understand how to implement the tasks.
Media strategy. Includes the timing of the launch of the advertising campaign and the frequency of ads. This section also shows the optimal channels for promotion and fixes the amount of money required to broadcast messages.
The schedule for the publication of advertisements. It should be noted, for each individual site a different schedule is compiled, and it is created by day and even by the hour.
Summary table. It contains all the information on the submitted sections, and already on the basis of this information is created a promotion strategy. The table includes data on placement, timing, costs, and other important parameters.
When creating a media plan, you need to consider an analysis of the market, target audience, promotion goals, budget, and other factors. However, it should be understood that depending on the implementation of the points you will have to make amendments and adjust your actions to get the best results.