This document discusses media planning and the media planning process. It begins by defining media planning and outlining the key steps in developing a media plan. These include analyzing the market, establishing media objectives, developing a media strategy, implementing the strategy, and evaluating performance. It then goes into more detail about each step, focusing on determining the target market and audience, setting objectives around reach, frequency, cost, and more. Finally, it discusses components of a media plan like media mix, geographic and target market coverage, scheduling, and budget considerations.

1. MODULE-III
MEDIA PLANNNG PROCESS

2. • Media planning is the process of designing a course of action that shows how advertising
space and time will be used to contribute to the achievement of the marketing and
advertising objectives.
• This analysis is followed by matching the audience characteristics of various media with the
consumer profile and by evaluating the adaptability of the physical format of the media to
copy requirements. Finally, through the exercise of judgment concerning dimensions of
coverage, reach, frequency, continuity, ad size... the media plan emerges. With all the
advertising decision making the ultimate responsibility for choosing media rests with the
advertising/ brand manager.
• The media plan is created by the media planner from information about the market and
prospective customers. Media decisions are primarily based on the creative strategy
established for the campaign and the characteristics of the target market. Through market
research, facts about the target market are accumulated and generalized into a consumer
profile. This along with the basic copy strategy and copy requirements is analyzed by the
media planner, taking into account the size of the advertising budget.

3. COMPONENTS OF MEDIA PLAN
1. Media mix: Media mix refers to the various advertising channels through which a company
communicates with its audience in order to fulfill a campaign as outlined in the media plan.
It includes radio, TV, print and online advertising endeavors. The media mix is the total
amount of advertising that an agency, advertising company or media buyer had budgeted for
a specific advertising strategy and media plan.
2. Target market coverage- It is a group of people, a selected segment of everyone. Selection is
needed to put effort only in those ads, which are going to reach only those people, who are
potential consumers of the marketed products or services. Segmentation can be done by :
age, sex, occupation, income, media consumption habits or educational levels etc.
3. Geographic coverage- Media strategy is based upon market coverage. Media planners do not
waste resources by advertising product in the regions in which it is not available. They have
to see how strong a product is in a particular geographical region and advertise more in high
potential areas.
4. Scheduling- scheduling refers to the pattern of advertising timing, represented as plots on a
yearly flowchart. Media scheduling decisions are the decisions about the timing, continuity
and size of the ads. We have to see when to advertise, for how long, and for what time
period. We have to see the size and placement of our ad.

4. 5. Reach versus frequency- Reach refers to the total number of different people or households
exposed, at least once, to a medium during a given period. Frequency refers to the number
of times the receiver is exposed to the media vehicle. There should be an attempt in the
media objectives to balance the reach and frequency. They must decide whether to have the
message be seen or heard by more people (reach) or by fewer more often (frequency).
6. Creative aspects and mood- Creative considerations such as the quality of reproduction, the
colour effect, special effects, have to be considered. Media decisions have to be made in
consultation with the creative team that has actually produced the ad. In developing a media
strategy, marketer must consider both creativity and mood factor.
7. Flexibility- the ability of the media to adapt to changing and specific needs of advertisers is
flexibility. Certain media allows such flexibility with respect to the advertised message, the
geographical coverage and the ad budget. If the plan has not build in some flexibility,
opportunity may be lost and/ or the company may not be able to address new threats.
8. Budget Considerations- A choice of media will depend to a large extent upon the size of the
advertising budget. Certain media types may be too expensive for the funds available. One of
the most important decisions in the development of media strategy is cost estimating. The
value of any strategy can be determined by how well it delivers the message to the audience
with the lowest cost and the least waste.

5. MEDIA PANNING PROCESS
Analyze the market
Establish Media Objectives
Develop Media Strategy
Implement Media Strategy
Evaluation of Performance

6. 1. ANALYZE THE MARKET
• Every media plan begins with the market analysis or environmental analysis. Complete review
of internal and external factors is required to be done. At this stage media planner try to
identify answers of the following questions:
• ▪ Who is the target audience?
• ▪ What internal and external factors may influence the media plan?
• ▪ Where and when to focus the advertising efforts?
• The target audience can be classified in terms of age, sex, income, occupation, and other
variables. The classification of target audience helps media planner to understand the media
consumption habit, and accordingly choose the most appropriate media or media mix.

7. 2. ESTABLISHING MEDIA OBJECTIVE
• Media objectives are the goals for the media program and should be limited to those that can
be accomplished through media strategies. For example, selecting of broadcast media to
provide coverage of 80% of the target market over a six month period.
• Clearly worded statements that outline what the media plan should accomplish.
• (a) who is the target market? (b) what is the advertising message? (c) where are the market
priorities? (d) when is the best time to advertise? (e) how many, often, long?
• There are five major media objectives that a media planner has to consider- reach, frequency,
continuity, cost, and message weight and distribution.
(a) Reach: Reach refers to the number of people that will be exposed to a media vehicle at least
once during a given period of time.
(b) Frequency: Frequency refers to the average number of times an individual within target
audience is exposed to a media vehicle during a given period of time.

8. (c) Continuity: It refers to the pattern of advertisements in a media schedule. Continuity
alternatives are as follows;
(i) Continuous: Strategy of running campaign evenly over a period of time.
(ii) Pulsing: Strategy of running campaign steadily over a period of time with intermittent
increase in advertising at certain intervals, as during festivals or special occasion like
Olympics or World-cup.
(iii) Discontinuous: Strategy of advertising heavily only at certain intervals, and no advertising in
the interim period, as in case of seasonal products.
(d) Cost: It refers to the cost of selecting different media. The advertising costs include the
expense incurred on developing or preparing advertisements, designing the message and
selecting the media.
(e) Message weight: The sum of the reach number of specific media vehicles in a given media
plan gives the message weight. Message weight expressed I terms of gross impressions or
gross rating points (GRP). The total size of the audience for a set of ads or an entire
campaign.

9. • Message weight can be expressed as:
(i) Opportunity to see: The possible exposure of the advertising message to one audience member is
called an opportunity to see (OTS)
(ii) Gross Impression: It is the total number of potential exposures (audience size by the number of times
the ad message is used during a period). Gross impressions are a summation of exposures of the target
audience to media vehicles in a media plan. Each exposure is counted as one impression. Suppose an
advertiser puts advertisements on a programme of a TV channel viewed five times by 6000 people in a
target audience and seven times by 6000 people in a four week period. Also suppose during the same
for week period, the ad is put another programme of a second TV channel viewed 3 times by 3000
people in at the target audience, the gross impressions would be:
Gross impression = (6000x5) + (6000x7) + (3000x3)
= 81000
the first group receives 3000 impressions, the second group receives 42000 impressions and the third
group receives 9000 impressions. Thus in all 81000 impressions are received during a four week
period. As duplication is ignored between the media vehicles while summing up the impressions, we
use the term gross.

10. iii. Television households: Because gross impressions are often expressed in millions and are awkward to
handle, media planners prefer to use percentages- or a rating, for example, a rating of TV households
is the percentage of homes exposed to an ad medium. A rating of 20=20% of the households with TV
sets; televisions households, or (TVHH).
iv. Gross Rating Points (GRPs) or Gross Viewership Per Thousand (GVT) – The total weight of a specific
media schedule, computed by multiplying the reach, expressed as a percentage of the population, by
the average frequency. GRP is the combined measure of reach and frequency indicating the weight of
a media plan. GRP is a unit of audience measurement, commonly used in the audio-visual media,
based on reach or coverage of an ad. A single GRP, usually, represents 1 percent of the total audience
in a given region.
The simple formula to calculate GRPs:
Gross Ratings Points = Reach x Frequency
Print example
50 reach x 5 insertions = 250 GRPs
v. Message distribution : Message-distribution objectives define where, when, and how often advertising
should appear.

11. 3. DETERMINING MEDIA STRATEGIES
• Media strategy is the way we seek to realize our media objectives. Media strategy expects media planners to
be creative in using the media.
• The placement should be strategic.
• The ad should provoke readers to look at it more than once.
• Media strategy is determined considering the following:
(a) Media mix: from the wide variety of media vehicles, the advertiser can empty one vehicle or a mix suitable
vehicle.
(b) Target market: the media planner determines which target should receive the most media emphasis.
• Following are the factors affecting the choice of target market:
i. Demographic information- Demographic information is measurable information about individuals or groups
of individuals. While selling of product, the media planner should have demographic information for e.g. age,
gender, racial identity, size of household. Average income ranges of customers, education, typical
occupations, geographic location, family makeup, etc.
ii. Psychographics- Psychographics refers to personality and emotionally based behavior that is linked to an
individual’s purchase. One example would be whether customers are risk-takers or risk-avoiders.
iii. Geography- Media planner has to find out the target audience to their geographic area such as local,
national, international level for which they are situated.

12. iv. Lifestyle : Marketer collect the information about target customer and their lifestyles. Lifestyle factor
refers to the choice of hobbies, interest, recreational activities, political beliefs, cultural practices
entertainment like movies, music, media, literature, etc of the target audience. This type of
information can help to media planner to make changes of product or service itself to better match of
customer’s needs. This information can also assist the media planner about how to reach customers
through advertising promotions, etc.
(c) Scheduling: It shows the number of advertisements, size of advertisements, and time on which the
advertisements to appear. This classic scheduling models Continuity, Flighting and Pulsing.
i. Continuity- this model is primarily for non-seasonal products, yet sometimes for seasonal products.
Advertising runs steadily with little variation over the campaign period.
ii. Flighting- In media scheduling for seasonal product categories, fighting involves intermittent and
irregular periods of advertising, alternating with shorter periods of no advertising at all.
iii. Pulsing- Pulsing combines flighting and continuous scheduling by using a low advertising level all year
and heavy advertising during peak selling periods. For example, under-arm deodorants, sell all year,
but more in summer months.

13. • The following six types of schedules are available.
 Seasonal pulse- seasonal products like cold creams follow this scheduling.
 Steady pulse- according to this scheduling one ad is shown over a period of time, say one ad per week
or one ad per month.
 Periodic pulse- a regular pattern is followed in such scheduling, as in case of consumer durable and non
durable.
 Erratic pulse- no regular pattern is followed inn such scheduling.
 Start-up pulse- such scheduling is followed during a new campaign or a launch of a new product.
 Promotional pulse- it is for short time, only for a promotional period.

14. d. Reach and frequency: To face heavy competitive campaign, we should have frequency to ensure the repetition
of the message. While advertising an innovation, a greater reach is preferred, to a greater frequency. It is also
important to have a large message weight.
e. Creative aspects- creativity in ad campaigns decides the success of the product, but to implement this
creativity firm must employ a media that supports such a strategy. Within the medium selected, decisions related
to unit buying, is also influenced by the creative team.
f. Flexibility- an effective media strategy requires a degree of flexibility. For example, the times of India group of
publication may offer advertisers the flexibility of placing ads in different editions of the pager.
g. Budget considerations- in determining media strategy cost must be estimated and budget must be considered.
Media planner gets into discussion with advertiser to arrive at budget decision. The advertiser applies certain
methods to estimate how much to spend on promotion. These methods are:
i. Affordable method: This method adopted by small companies. They cut down expenses from operational
activities and managerial activities and may used the saved money for promotion.
ii. % of sale method: Under this method decision of the promotional budget is based on % of current and
forecasted sale.
iii. Competitive parity method: Advertiser first analyze competitors spend on promotional activity and
accordingly determine it own promotional activity.
iv. Objective and task method: under this method company first set objective which is to be achieved through
promotion, secondly decide the various task to be undertaken to achieve objective and thirdly estimate the
cost for implementation of objective.

15. h. Media selection: Advertising media selection is the process of choosing the most cost-effective media
for advertising, to achieve the required coverage and number of exposures in a target audience.

16. 4. IMPLEMENTATION OF MEDIA PLAN
• The implementation of media plan requires media buying. Media buying refers to buying time and
space in the selected media.
a. Collection of information- media buying requires adequate information regarding nature of target
audience, nature of target market, etc.
b. Selection of media- considering the collected information and ad-budget, media mix is selected which
suits the requirements of both the target audience and advertiser.
c. Negotiation- price of media is negotiated to obtain media at the lowest possible price.
d. Issuing ad-copy to media- Ad-copy is issued to the media for broadcast or telecast.
e. Monitoring performance of media- advertiser has to monitor whether the telecast or broadcast of ad is
done properly as decided.
f. Payment- finally, it is the responsibility of advertiser to make payment of media bills on time.

17. 5. EVALUATION AND FOLLOW-UP
• Media plan evaluation is an important final step to check whether the planned media programme
comply with the objective or not.
• Evaluation is necessary to assess the performance of any activity.
• Two aspects are important in evaluation of media plan:
 How to accomplish the strategies in achieving media objectives?
 Was the media plan successful in achieving advertising objective?

18. CRITERIA FOR SELECTING MEDIA-VEHICLE
1. Coverage- it is the specific area where the media vehicle has its coverage. In broadcast, coverage
usually describes the area to which the station’s signal extends.
• In print, coverage usually means the circulation area. It is the most important and powerful criterion for
evaluating vehicle media.
• In case of a newspaper, the coverage refers to the circulation of that particular newspaper.
2. Consumer trust- it is also an important criteria for evaluating the selection of a vehicle media.
• Consumer trust refers to the credibility of media in the mind of target customers.
• For example, a recent study in India revealed that newspapers and magazines are considered to be the
most credible of all media, scoring high on usefulness and information.

19. 3. Reach- reach as an evaluation criterion refers to the vehicles access to different homes or individuals
over a given period of time. In case of press media, it is indicated by readership which is arrived at by
multiplying circulation of the paper with the average number of readers per copy.
4. Cost- cost is also important criterion against which each media vehicle choice should be evaluated. Cost
refers to the money spent on using a particular vehicle media. Television, is very expensive, whereas,
radio is very economical.
5. timing- the last but also equally important criterion for evaluating vehicle media choice is the timing of
the advertisement. The reasons for the importance of the decision may be seasonal ability of product
sales. For example, if the advertising is aimed at school children, drawing their attention on fun
products around examination time is of no use. Similarly, if the product is targeted at the Indian rural
folks, the harvest season s their attention would be towards their crops.

20. MEDIA TIMING AND SCHEDULING
• Every advertiser want to advertised product for creating awareness of product among target customer
through advertisements and remind then to product or services provided by him.
• Media scheduling refers to decision regarding the number of advertisements that are to be given to
each media, frequency of ads etc.
• Media scheduling starts after selection of media mix.
• The advertiser will decide the number of advertisements to be given in a specified period of time in
each media.
• For example in case of TV advertisement advertiser will decide regarding the time duration of the ad for
10 minutes, ad for 15 minutes, or ad for 5 minute.

21. CONSTRUCTION OF MEDIA SCHEDULING
1. Large-level media scheduling: In large-level media scheduling, yearly advertisement budget is collected
different months depending upon the type of product. If the product is seasonal then more advertising
budget can be collected in on-season month and fewer amounts can be collected in off-season month.
On the other hand, if the product is constant demand throughout the year then reasonably equal
amount of total ad-budget is collected among different months.
2. Small-level scheduling: In small-level scheduling, it is decided that within a month what day and at
what time the advertisement will be displayed in media. Before deciding day and time, the advertiser
will make sure that advertisement will be shown on such day and time when target-audience are free
and can be negotiated by media most effectively.

22. ADVERTISING BUDGET METHODS

23. • Percentage of Sales: Under this method, the advertising budget is set as a percentage of either the past
sale or expected future sales. This method is usually used by small businesses.
• Competitive Parity: This method advocates that a company sets an advertising budget similar to the
one that is set up by its competitor to yield similar results.
• Objective and Task: This method is based on the advertising objectives under this method. Once the
objectives are decided, the cost is estimated to complete those objectives, and accordingly, a marketing
budget is set.
• Market Share: In this method, the advertising budget is based on the market share of a company. For a
higher market share, less marketing budget is set.
• All available Funds: This is a very aggressive method under which all available profits are allocated
towards advertising activities. This method can be used by start-up businesses that need
advertisements to attract customers.
• Unit Sales: Under this method, the cost of advertisement per article is calculated, and based on the
total number of articles, it is set.
• Affordable: As the name suggested, the company sets its budget based on how much it can afford to
spend.

24. • Scheduling Criteria
• The timing of advertisements and the duration of an advertising campaign are two crucial factors in
designing a successful campaign. There are three methods generally used by advertisers in scheduling
advertising. Each is listed below with a brief explanation.
• Continuity—This type of scheduling spreads advertising at a steady level over the entire planning
period (often month or year, rarely week), and is most often used when demand for a product is
relatively even.
• Flighting—This type of scheduling is used when there are peaks and valleys in product demand. To
match this uneven demand a stop-and-go advertising pace is used. Notice that, unlike "massed"
scheduling, "flighting" continues to advertise over the entire planning period, but at different levels.
Another kind of flighting is the pulse method, which is essentially tied to the pulse or quick spurts
experienced in otherwise consistent purchasing trends.
• Pulsing—This type of scheduling places advertising only during specific periods, and is most often
used when demand is seasonal, such as at Christmas or Halloween.

25. ADVERTISING BUDGETING PROCESS

26. • Step-I:
• Preparation of Budget:
• It is generally prepared by advertising manager in consultation with marketing manager. The advertising
budget made is based on inputs provided by marketing research people. The budget is generally made
on annual basis. Primary input would depend upon type of product, new or established one, target
market, demography composition, advertising copy and media selection etc.
• Step-II:
• Presentation and approval of Budget:
• After the budget is made, it is presented to top management for the approval of the budget.
• Step-III:
• Execution of the Budget:
• After the budget is approved by the top management, it is executed. Various channels and media for
budget allocation are considered. The task of preparing advertising messages and acquiring advertising
time and space is given to advertising agency.

27. • Step-IV:
• Control of Budget:
• After the budget is executed, the results come out. If control of budgets involve comparing the desired
advertising objectives and actual advertising objectives The purpose is to know the effectiveness of
advertising in-terms of money allocated to advertising If it is found that the allocated budget is on the
higher side or on the lower side the appropriate corrective action can be taken.

28. CIRCUMSTANCES AFFECTING ADVERTISING BUDGET
1. Area of market
2. Steps of product life cycle
3. Advertising strategy
4. Product distinction
5. Changes in price
6. Competitor’s advertising expenditure
7. Type of product
8. Approaches of advertising
9. Financial resources
10. Economic condition

29. 1. Area of market- If the market is national and international areas then advertiser require more fund on
the other hand if the market is regional and local area then advertiser require less fund. On the other
hand the advertising expenditure in national and international area is more because it is incurred for
wide market coverage.
2. Steps of product life cycle- Product life cycle divided into four steps they are: Introduction, Growth,
Maturity, Decline. Under introduction and growth stage of product requires massive advertisement
with higher advertising budget. If the product is at the stage of maturity then sale promotion works
more than advertising. Advertising expenditure decrease under maturity stage. Less advertising in
maturity stage.
3. Advertising Strategy- There are three types of advertising strategy: establishing strategy, holding
strategy and accumulating strategy. Under establishing strategy marketer need more budget for
increasing market share and for development market plan. So the advertising expenses increases as
compared to last year. In holding strategy the continuous advertising is done under developed market
area with same level of advertising budget as conducted in previous year. In accumulating strategy
advertiser reduce advertising expenses in order to acquire higher short term profit by saving
advertising expenditure and get benefit from advertising done in earlier year.

30. 4. Product distinction- If product has unique characteristics, qualitative, utilities and benefits then such
type of product require less advertisement or advertisement budget and such type of unique product is
different from competing product and customers are also influence to this type of product because of
its uniqueness.
5. Changes in price- the companies who change high price on product as compare the competitor’s
product then such type of product require more advertisement and high advertisement budget. This
type of product creates special image and status in the market and customers are also influence to
such type of product because of most effective and attractive advertisement. This type of product is
called as high status product. For e.g. Fair & Lovely beauty cream.
6. Competitors advertising expenditure- If competitors are spending more on advertising then we have to
spend more amount on advertising to save reputation, goodwill in the market and also maintain brand
awareness or preferences in the market. On the other hand if the competitors are spending less on
advertising then we have to spend less amount on advertising to continue in the market with less
advertisement budget. It means our advertising budget is depends upon competitors ad budget.

31. 7. Type of product- for consumer goods requires more advertisement budget as compare to industrial
goods. In case, of consumer goods requires more effective advertising messages, emotional appeal,
better means of communication which helps to influence the customer to purchase the product. In
case of industrial goods require less advertising budget as compared to consumer goods. Companies do
not spend more on advertising for industrial goods.
8. Approaches of advertising- Advertising budget is depends upon different approaches of advertising. For
short term investment advertiser spend lesser amount on advertising and for long term investment
advertiser spend more on advertising.
9. Financial resources- Advertising is depends upon availability of fund. If advertiser has more financial
resources then he can able to spend more in advertising and if advertiser has less financial resources
then he spend less according to the availability of fund.
10. Economic condition- Economic condition is also affects on advertisement budget. Economy may passes
through boom or depression. During boom condition, company spend more on advertising because in
this period company get higher profit, more sale, increase the demand of product and also increase
market share and goodwill of the company. On the other hand during depression period company
spend less on advertising because general demand level is low.