Advertising

Media Planning
A Brand Management Approach
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THIRD EDITION

Larry D. Kelley
Donald W. Jugenheimer
and Kim Bartel Sheehan
 First published 2012 by M.E. Sharpe

Published 2015 by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

Copyright 2012 Taylor & Francis. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by

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any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,

including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Notices
No responsibility is assumed by the publisher for any injury and/or damage to
persons or property as a matter of products liability, negligence or otherwise,
or from any use of operation of any methods, products, instructions or ideas
contained in the material herein.

Practitioners and researchers must always rely on their own experience and
knowledge in evaluating and using any information, methods, compounds, or
experiments described herein. In using such information or methods they should
be mindful of their own safety and the safety of others, including parties for
whom they have a professional responsibility.

Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and

are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kelley, Larry D., 1955

Advertising media planning : a brand management approach / by Larry D. Kelley, Donald W.
Jugenheimer, and Kim Bartel Sheehan.3rd ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-7656-2635-6 (hardcover : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-7656-2636-3 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Advertising media planning. 2. Brand name products. 3. Marketing. I. Jugenheimer,
Donald W. II. Sheehan, Kim. III. Title.

HF5826.5.K45 2012
659.1'11dc22 2011012296

ISBN 13: 9780765626363 (pbk)

ISBN 13: 9780765626356 (hbk)
 Contents
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Preface vii

1. The Role of Communication in Advertising and Marketing:

Why Media Are Important 3
2. Outlining the Components of a Communication Plan 13
3. How Marketing Objectives Impact Communication Planning 18
4. Working with a Situation Analysis 25
5. Dening the Target Audience 29
6. Geographys Role in Planning 44
7. Seasonality and Timing 53
8. Competitive Analysis: Implications in Planning 60
9. Creative Strategy: Implications in Planning 69
10. Working with a Communication Budget 75
11. Setting Communications Objectives 79
12. Establishing Media Objectives and Tactics 88
13. Learning the Language of Media Planning 93
14. Learning about Media Costs 108
15. General Characteristics of Media 117
16. Broadcast Media 127
17. Print Media 135
18. Out-of-Home Media 148
19. Digital Media 152
20. Social Media 161
21. In-Store Media 168
22. Direct Response 174
23. Alternative Media 183
24. Ethnic Media 189
25. Sponsorships 195
26. Sales Promotion 202

v
 vi CONTENTS

27. Publicity 211

28. Preparing an Advertising Media Plan 217
29. Evaluating an Advertising Media Plan 224
30. Impact of Media Ownership on Advertising Execution 236
31. Developing Test Plans 249
32. Agency Compensation Structures 257

Appendix. How the Advertising Business Is Organized 267

Index 277
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About the Authors 289

 Preface
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This is the third edition of Advertising Media Planning: A Brand Manage-

ment Approach, a book that can be used by anyone making advertising and
promotional media decisions. Media planning is a crucial part of the adver-
tising processand ultimately of the brand management processyet little
has been written on how brand management can impact the media process.
Our goal with the rst two editions was to ll the void in the market and,
additionally, with the second edition, to show the media planning process
from the viewpoints of both the media planner and the brand manager. All
of the stakeholders of a media plan have input and control over various
aspects of its outcome.
This, the third edition, expands on these important concepts while continu-
ing to focus on media planning as a consumer engagement process. We have
provided new, detailed chapters on media planning for traditional broadcast,
print, and outdoor advertising. Todays media planners and brand managers
are involved in decision making beyond the traditional media realm, and so
we have included information on digital and social media, in-store media,
and direct response. You will also nd chapters on ethnic media and alter-
native media (coffee sleeve advertising, anyone?). We believe that media
planners and brand managers must think of medias place in the advertising
process more holistically, and so we have included chapters on sponsorships,
promotions, and publicity.
Because many who read this book might never work in a media depart-
ment but still want to understand how the agency and media businesses
work, we have included new information on the advertising agency business,
including chapters on effects of media ownership, agency organization, and
agency compensation.
Like our previous books, this edition of Advertising Media Planning ties
into the new, third edition of Advertising Media Workbook and Sourcebook,
also published by M.E. Sharpe. For students and instructors of media plan-
ning courses, the workbook offers a detailed perspective of each facet of
vii
 viii PREFACE

media, along with practical exercises offering students the opportunity to

put sometimes-abstract concepts into real-world situations.
Within this ever-changing eld of media, there are more reasons than
ever to have a go-to source that any level of media decision maker can use
to help make crucial decisions that affect a brands value. Brand managers
who have little formal training in advertising, students of advertising and
integrated marketing communications programs, and other practitioners such
as account supervisors and media salespeople can benet from this books
straightforward, hands-on approach to the business of advertising media.
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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Harry Briggs, our editor, Elizabeth Granda Parker,
our responsive and creative associate editor, and Stacey Victor, our produc-
tion editor. We also thank our spouses and families for all their support,
without which this project would not have been possible.
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Advertising
Media Planning
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 Chapter 1
The Role of Communication in
Advertising and Marketing:
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Why Media Are Important

Advertising involves communicating information. The communication is

often persuasive. The media are the conduits through which the advertising
is communicated to the members of the audience.
Communication is critical to advertising success. You may recall the four
Ps, the four components of the marketing mix: product, price, place, and
promotion. Advertising is communicated promotion.
Advertising is also part of marketing communications. Some marketers
break up the marketing mix into the four Cs: commodity, cost, channel, and
communication. These four elements are analogous to the four Ps, but this
view makes it even more obvious that communication is a critical process in
the success of advertising, which in turn is critical to marketing success.
Now lets say that you are a brand manager. You are responsible for the
marketing success of a product or service, or a brand, or maybe an entire
line of goods. Your personal and professional success depends on your
brands success. Perhaps you are an advertising account executive or account
supervisor, or even a top-level executive who wants the entire company or
corporation to do well. The success of your advertising is crucial to your
products welfare and success.
Whatever your job title, you are concerned with the sale of the product
or service that you are marketing. Sure, you are interested in the advertising
campaign strategy, and you review and approve all the advertising copy and
themes before they go to production. Nevertheless, the media portion of the
campaign may not really interest you. After all, it is detailed, it is somewhat
abstract, and it is invariably complicated. You may believe that the heart
of advertising is the message, so you probably concentrate on the theme,
headlines, visuals, and copy. You may give cursory review to the research
and to the media plan, but they are not your primary focus. Or maybe you
3
 4 CHAPTER 1

do not delve deeply into the media plan because you do not fully understand
the concepts and workings of advertising media.
So why should you be so interested in advertising media and the media
plans that underscore your campaign? There are several reasons why advertis-
ing media, the conduits that carry advertising communication, are important
to you and critical to the success of your advertising.

Media: Most of the Budget

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First, advertising media take up most of the advertising budget. Media time
and space are expensive: in a typical advertising campaign, the media costs
account for 80 to 85 percent of the advertising budget; the remaining 15 or
20 percent covers research, message, production, evaluation, and prots for
the advertising agency (see Exhibit 1.1).
If advertising media control the bulk of your advertising budget, you
should spend sufcient time and effort making sure that the media plans are
sensible and that the media selection and purchases are relevant and efcient.
In most situations, 20 percent of the effort produces 80 percent of the revenue.
You may be spending only 20 percent of your effort on the 80 percent of
the advertising campaign that will make or break your campaign success.
Anything that accounts for 80 percent of the monies and a large share of the
campaign success deserves a large share of your attention and effort.
Advertising media may seem complicated and somewhat arcane to you.
The purpose of this book is to give you the background and information
you need to be an informed and capable manager, one who understands
and administers the entire advertising effort, including the media planning,
selection, and buying.
So advertising media account for most of your advertising budget and are
therefore worthy of your attention and interest. But there are more reasons
why advertising media are important to you.

A Poor Media Plan Sabotages an Entire Campaign

Lets say you have a great advertising campaign plan. The theme is memo-
rable, the visuals are impressive, and the words are emphatic. What good is
it if those message elements do not reach the intended audience?
Suppose youre selling canned soup. The media team targets traditional
users of canned soupmothers of young childrenbut the copy team pre-
pares advertisements intended to encourage single people to use the soup
for a quick, wholesome meal. The message will not make much sense to the
media audience because the media and copy strategies do not match.
 THE ROLE OF COMMUNICATION IN ADVERTISING AND MARKETING 5

Exhibit 1.1

Typical Allocations for a Consumer Advertising Campaign

A typical advertising campaign budget is divided up for a variety

of needs and purposes. Here is a sample advertising budget from a
campaign to promote a consumer packaged good.

Budget item Budget allocation (%)

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Research, precampaign, and

postcampaign evaluation 36
Message development 58
Advertising media 8085
Production 47
Overhead, administration, agency prots 13

Source: Advertising Research Foundation.

A great advertising message in front of the wrong audience is a total

waste of time and effort. If you focus on the message strategies and ignore
the media strategies, you risk sabotaging the entire package: the campaign,
the budget, and everyones hard work.
That, of course, is where the advertising media plan plays its role. A solid
media plan with good media selection and media buying can ensure that the
message reaches the right people at the right time and in the right mood.
Based on solid research, a good media effort is what makes the rest of the
advertising campaign workor not work.

Media Are Least Understood

Most advertising campaigns are sold to the client advertiser based on the
message. If the message is good, the campaign is more likely to be adopted.
Thats because the message is inherently the most interesting part of the
advertising campaign. And it should be. The message is what is going to at-
tract, inform, entertain, promote, convince, and sell your service or product.
It is supposed to be attractive and interesting.
The advertising agency stresses the message, the advertiser client sees and
hears the message, and the prospective campaign is adopted based largely
on the message. Typically, the advertiser (the client) pays attention to mes-
sages and promotions, and maybe even to research, but not to the media
plan. To match the clients interests in a proposed advertising campaign, the
 6 CHAPTER 1

advertising agency presents more material dealing with the message and not
as much dealing with research, production, evaluation, or media.
So most proposed campaign presentations spend the most time on the
message strategies and relatively little on the media portion of the campaign.
The top executives may assume that the media plan is complete and logical,
but that is not always the case.
This is precisely why you need to pay attention to the media plan. Whereas
others might be apt to downplay or overlook it, you are the one responsible for
making sure that the media plan makes sense and can be accomplished ef-
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ciently and accurately for the complete success of the advertising campaign.

Media Are Critical to Success of the Brand

Obviously, then, advertising media are critical to advertising success. Ad-

vertising success brings with it the achievement of the marketing goals:
more sales, positive opinions, increased awareness, word-of-mouth recom-
mendations, competitive advantages, or whatever your goals may happen to
be. Accomplishing those goals makes your brand successful, and hanging
on that brand success is your success as a brand manager, or as an account
executive or supervisor or administrator.
Advertising media are critical to the success of the brand and thus criti-
cal to your success as a manager. As we have already seen, poor media
choices can waste an entire advertising campaign. On the other hand,
proper and efcient use of advertising media can ensure its success, and
it is up to you to be certain that the media contribute all they potentially
can to that end.

Client Exposure to the Advertising

Advertisers like to see their own advertising. Top executives know how much
is being spent on advertising, and they want to see and hear that advertis-
ing in the media. Top executives who know and approve total advertising
budgets are not likely to understand the nuances of advertising, including
media. They simply know they are spending large sums of money to promote
their products and services, and they want to see effective outcomes. These
outcomes will eventually be product sales and brand preference, but in the
meantime executives want to see their advertising running in the media.
You may not target media specically to reach those executives. You
may not even know which media the executives read, listen to, or watch.
But if your media plan reaches your industry and your prospects, you will
be reaching your own executives and supervisors as well.
 THE ROLE OF COMMUNICATION IN ADVERTISING AND MARKETING 7

Good media plans make sure that the advertisements appear in places
where they will be exposed to your rms executives. The only way to be
certain that will happen is if you are on top of advertising media in general,
and your specic advertising media plan in particular.

Media Support Product Positioning

Perhaps the most crucial decisions you make involve positioning for the
product or service that you are marketing. Brand positioning plays a critical
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role in the success or failure of your marketing program. Once the position
has been determined, it must be translated into advertising; the positioning
is meaningless if it is not supported in the advertising.
One of the most sensible and direct ways of translating positioning into
advertising is through advertising media. The media reach those same custom-
ers whom you have selected as the target audience for the brand and its posi-
tion. There is no way that positioning will be successful if it is not supported
adequately and accurately through the media selections and placements.
So successful marketing depends on successful positioning. If you want
your positioning to be successful, you must select and utilize advertising
media effectively, efciently, and, above all, accurately. Advertising media
play an essential role in your brands success and, ultimately, in your own
success and progress.

The Ever-Changing World of Media

The basics of good marketing communications have remained constant over

the years, and positioning strategy has changed only slightly since the late
1980s. Still, advertising media have evolved rapidly over the past 10 years,
led principally by the digital media revolution.
We have certainly seen the rise of new kinds of advertising media over
the past decade. The Internet has led the way with a wide variety of media
such as search-engine marketing, rich media, and streaming audio and
video. Other media channels have come into play, including the iPod, cel-
lular phones, video games, and satellite radio. Existing media have evolved
as well. The area of point-of-sale advertising has been transformed in the
21st century, with opportunities appearing in seemingly every venue. Malls
now have digital signs that show television commercials. In some major
markets, buses contain television sets that are programmed to show a retail
ad within a block or two of the advertising establishment. Ads are popping
up in elevators, inside fortune cookies, and even on celebrity and wannabe-
celebrity body parts.
 8 CHAPTER 1

The rise of consumer-generated media is redening the media landscape

as well. Now, anyone with a video camera can shoot a commercial and post
it on the Internet. Blogs, which are personal journals posted on the Net, allow
everyone the freedom to comment on whatever they want. Fundamentally,
anything can become a medium these days for good or bad.
This digital revolution has changed the way that advertisers and marketers
approach media. Before the digital revolution, advertising pushed a message
out to consumers with little direct feedback. Today, consumers are provid-
ing feedback to marketers through their own media and by asking for deals
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from select advertisers. This type of marketing is dialogue-based rather than

push-based messaging.
The advertising industry has also undergone major structural changes.
At one time, media ownership was largely a mom-and-pop business. An
individual family owned a local newspaper, radio station, or television sta-
tion. Today, there has been massive consolidation of media outlets. There
were once hundreds of radio station owners; at one time Clear Channel
owned more than half of all radio stations in the United States. Time Warner
controls a host of mass and interpersonal media, from magazines to televi-
sion to Internet to motion pictures. Within the past 10 years, the power of
search-engine marketing companies such as Google has brought a new wave
of corporations to what used to be a very clubby business.
The jury is still out on the social and marketing impacts of this media
ownership consolidation. Many believe that news and information, because
it is controlled by just a few companies, has become stilted, or xed. Counter
to that argument, we have seen the rise of consumer-generated media as a
collective voice in many social circumstances. From a marketing viewpoint,
advertisers fear that media mergers will bring about higher advertising rates.
But with so many new media on the horizon this has also become moot.
What we are seeing is the rise of multimedia companies providing advertis-
ers with content that crosses a variety of platforms.

The Changing Nature of Media Effectiveness

Media plans and media buys have long been judged on their efciency. Today,
new emphasis is on how consumers use media, how media impact the creative
content, and when consumers are most susceptible to the message.
Lets tackle the area of susceptibility rst. Psychologists have long debated
whether primacy or recency is more important in advertising. Does it help
more to be the rst advertisement seen or heard in your product category, or is
it better to be the last advertisement seen or heard before the consumer makes
a purchase decision? The current trend is for recency, which affects both
 THE ROLE OF COMMUNICATION IN ADVERTISING AND MARKETING 9

the frequency and placement of advertising. For example, if you know that
most consumers make a meal decision an hour or two before they eat, then
you may want to load up your advertising to intercept them at that moment.
Looking at the media world through the consumers eyes is an evolving area
in media studies. In the past, media planners traditionally used syndicated
research to determine what consumers watch, read, or listen to. They then
constructed media plans that were the most efcient combination of those
elements. Today, media planners continue to look at syndicated data, but they
are more likely to conduct their own consumer research. They may observe
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how consumers use media, or how various media inuence consumers deci-
sions about a brand. For example, a recent study showed marked differences
in consumers views of media for impulse items versus planned purchases.
So effectiveness in a particular case might mean nding the medium that ts
best with, say, an impulse-purchase decision. This type of thinking is much
more in line with consumer behavior theory than media theory and has led
to a number of studies regarding the role of media in the creative message.
For example, if a brands success is based on a high degree of trust, would
you be better off placing it on the nightly news or during a soap opera? This
study found that there is a signicant copy-recall benet for such a brand if
it is on the nightly news rather than during a soap opera. Media effectiveness
is certainly an evolving aspect of the media landscape.
Media are also looked at from a return-on-investment perspective. In fact,
media are sales channels for many brands. Retailers may have stores, website
sales, catalogs, and kiosks. They may know exactly what a particular Sunday
insert does for their business. Most service brands track the source of their
leads, whether through the Yellow Pages, local search-engine marketing, or
word-of-mouth. Brand marketers conduct rigorous analyses to determine
the lift that each medium and vehicle gives to incremental brand sales. And
business-to-business brand managers are using media to sell merchandise
directly. The PC company Dell is a primary example of this type of advertis-
ing, where each sale is coded to a particular media and message source.
All these recent changes and future developments make it mandatory that
everyone who works with advertisingand especially brand managershas
a working knowledge of how advertising media operate and the role they
play in the overall advertising and marketing efforts.

Good Media Planning Increases Efciency

As we have said, media efciency is a primary goal of advertising media

planning and buying. Efciency, though, does not always mean getting the
lowest price. In this case, we look at efciency in terms of having the op-
 10 CHAPTER 1

timum amount of advertising to do the job. No rm wants to waste money,

and that includes not wasting the advertising budget.
Too much media overlap is inefcient. If the selected media and vehicles
all reach the same audience, advertisers risk losing out on a broader audience
that could help build market breadth.
Too much frequency is also inefcient. You want to advertise enough
so that your customers do what you want them to do: switch brands, think
favorably of your brand, know your products attributes, or simply buy your
product. You want your advertising to reach them enough times to accomplish
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those goals. More than that may be unnecessary.

To be efcient, your advertising should reach genuine prospects.
Advertising that does not focus on those who are genuine prospects is
wasteful.
A solid advertising media plan can avoid the inefciencies of excessive
overlap, frequency, and waste. Certainly, some media overlap is desirable
to reinforce the message in a variety of ways and from a variety of sources.
Frequency of exposure is also important: an advertising message that is
seen or heard only once is unlikely to work. Similarly, it is impossible to
reach all your prospects and only your prospects; some coverage will go to
nonprospects. A golf equipment campaign that uses both Golf Digest and
Sports Illustrated will nd that some audience members read both publica-
tions; that is not necessarily bad, but make sure that you count the double
exposure in your calculations of total audience impressions to minimize the
possibility of wasteful overlap. For a bread account, an average exposure
level of 20 times a week is probably excessive; frequency is important, but
overdoing it wastes money. If you sell dog food, it may not be possible to
reach dog owners and only dog owners; still, you do not want too much of
your advertising to appear before those who do not have dogs and are not
likely to buy your dog food. Knowledge of advertising media and media
planning will help you avoid these excessive and wasteful practices, which
will lead to yet another benet.

Media Efciency Provides Budget Flexibility

If you reduce waste, you save money. Saving money means that your budget
will go further, you will have money left over for other uses, and you can
afford to underwrite additional promotions.
Your knowledge and understanding of advertising media planning can
help you avoid the excesses of overlap, frequency, and waste, achieving
the correct levels of exposure without going beyond them. In turn, you
will then have more money left in your budget. Leftover monies mean
 THE ROLE OF COMMUNICATION IN ADVERTISING AND MARKETING 11

Table 1.1

Media Expenditures in the United States (in %)

Television 45.4
Network TV 18.6
Cable TV 13.2
Spot TV 10.6
Syndicated TV 3.0
Magazines 20.0
Newspapers 17.6
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Internet 6.8
Radio 6.6
Outdoor 2.7
Other media 0.9
Source: Figures compiled from industry sources by In-Telligence, Inc. Used by
permission.

greater exibility; more advertising and promotions; increased product

awareness, knowledge, and sales; and quicker and greater brand success.
And those are your goals. Efciency in your use of advertising media
helps you have more funds to achieve all your goals, making you and
your brand successful.
If your automotive service campaign reduces excessive media overlap,
cuts frequency of advertising closer to the minimal effective level, and
avoids reaching audiences who do not own cars, you may be able to save
enough money from your advertising budget to run additional promotions,
to introduce a new add-on service, to promote dollars-off or coupon offers,
or perhaps to start a special selling effort aimed at getting competitors cus-
tomers to switch to your service. These new additions are certain to increase
your chances of higher sales and more revenue.
Gaining efciency makes sense, whether to save money or to provide
remainder funds for new efforts.
Here at the beginning of your study of advertising media, it may be use-
ful to understand what the overall media business looks like in advertising.
Look at Table 1.1, which shows the share of total advertising revenue that
each of the major advertising media receives in the United States. You will
see that although television captures the bulk of advertising investments by
far, its share is somewhat static. It is even in a bit of a decline. This is partly
because of the economy, partly because of the huge expense of advertising
in television, and partly because other media, such as the Internet and social
media, are growing rapidly, taking away from some of the more established
mediawhat we call the traditional media.
 12 CHAPTER 1

The shares held by print media, newspapers, and magazines have been
shrinking in recent years. Some individual publications have been doing quite
well, but the numbers of magazines and newspapers have been falling, and
many of the remaining publications are attracting fewer advertising dollars
and certainly a smaller share of the advertising investment total.
To use advertising media effectively, it is useful to have an overall per-
spective of the size of the advertising marketplace.
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 Chapter 2
Outlining the Components of a
Communication Plan
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Every communication plan should begin with an outline. Outlining what is

contained in the plan is an efcient way to begin the communication plan-
ning project. Of course all plans are unique depending upon the advertiser,
but there are some fundamentals that should be part of any communication
plan.
Exhibit 2.1 contains an outline for a communication plan. There are ten
broad areas that are covered. They begin from an executive summary to
how you would measure the results of your plan. Other than the executive
summary, each component of the plan builds on the prior component. For
example, marketing objectives/strategies lead into the role that communica-
tion plays in solving the marketing challenge. This leads to communication
objectives which then lead to communication strategies and tactics. Each
communication plan is not unlike a book. It tells a story. In this case, the
story is how you plan to solve the brands marketing challenge.

Communication Plan versus Media Plan

A communication plan and a media plan have very similar components. The
difference between a communication plan and a media plan is the approach
to solving the marketing problem. In an advertising media plan, it is assumed
that advertising is the solution to the marketing problem. Therefore, a paid
media plan is necessary to convey the advertising message to the appropri-
ate target market.
In a communication plan, advertising is one of a myriad of alternatives
to solve the marketing challenge. It may be the solution or not. Or advertis-
ing may be a part of the solution in combination with other communication
alternatives. A communication plan then assesses advertising, promotions,
publicity, direct response, and any other form of communication. The com-
13
 14 CHAPTER 2

Exhibit 2.1

Components of a Communication Plan

1. Executive Summary
a. Summary of marketing objectives/strategies
b. Summary of communication objectives/strategies
c. Budget summary
2. Situation Analysis
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a. Marketing
b. Communication
c. SWOT
3. Marketing Objectives/Strategies
a. Business
b. Brand
4. Role of Communication
a. Message
5. Communication Objectives
a. Target segment
b. Geography
c. Seasonal/Timing
d. Reach/Frequency/Continuity
6. Communication Strategies
a. Mix
b. Scheduling
7. Communication Tactics
a. Vehicle
b. Rationale
c. Costs
d. Impressions
8. Communication Budget
a. Dollars by communication channel
b. Dollars by month
9. Communication Flowchart
a. Weekly schedule
b. Recap of dollars
c. Recap of impressions
d. Reach/Frequency
10. Testing and Evaluation
a. Test programs
b. Evaluation methods
 OUTLINING THE COMPONENTS OF A COMMUNICATION PLAN 15

munication plan should be strategy neutral. It doesnt assume that one method
of communication is better than another going into the planning process.

Components of a Communication Plan

There are ten components to the communication plan, as highlighted in

Exhibit 2.1. The following are brief descriptions of what is contained in
each of these elements.
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1. Executive Summary

An executive summary focuses management on the link between the mar-

keting objectives and strategies and the communication objectives and
strategies. From a management viewpoint, it is crucial to understand how
communication is tied to the business goals of the brand. Management will
also want to understand the strategic nature of the plan and the budget neces-
sary to implement it. All of that is contained in the executive summary.

2. Situation Analysis

The situation analysis forms the context for the plan. It should contain
a marketing analysis as well as a communication analysis. A marketing
analysis contains a review of pricing, distribution, resources, and product
differentiation compared with competing brands in the category. Com-
munication analysis contains message, copy, and communication channel
comparisons to competing brands in the category. Both should roll up into
a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats summary. This is called
a SWOT analysis.

3. Marketing Objectives/Strategies

All communication plans derive from a marketing strategy. It is paramount

to recap the marketing objectives and strategies. These objectives and strate-
gies should have two aspects. One is business objectives, typically dened
by number of customers and sales. The second is brand aspects, which may
be dened by specic brand attributes such as quality or value.

4. Role of Communication

The role of communication denes how communication is going to solve the

marketing challenge or meet the objectives. The role of communication is how
 16 CHAPTER 2

the brand is going to communicate with its consumers. Some typical roles of
communication are to increase awareness, change perceptions, announce new
news, and associate the brand with quality perception. Within this section
should be the role that communication plays as well as the creative message
strategy. This is the foundation for the communication plan.

5. Communication Objectives

Communication objectives include whom you are going to target with the mes-
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sage, where you are targeting, when you are targeting, and how much pressure
you plan to provide the message. The Big Four communication objectives are
target market, geography, seasonal/timing, and reach/frequency/continuity.

6. Communication Strategies

Communication strategies are the ways you plan to achieve the objectives. Each
objective should have a corresponding strategy. There are two major strategies
for a communication plan. The rst is the communication mix. This is the mix
of communication channels you plan to use to achieve the objectives. The
second is scheduling, that is, when you plan on deploying each channel.

7. Communication Tactics

Communication tactics reect the details of the strategies. For example, if a

strategy to support a specic local market contains print and radio, then the tactics
would be what print vehicles and radio formats or stations to recommend. Tactics
are the specics of the plan. They should address each vehicle recommended,
the creative unit, costs, and the impressions that the vehicle will deliver.

8. Communication Budget

Communication budget is a recap of the dollars allocated to each commu-

nication channel and not to the specic vehicle. For example, funds would
be allocated to magazines as a category, that is, the communication channel,
not Vanity Fair, Wired, and GQ individually. Communication budgets include
dollars by channel and also a recap of dollars by month.

9. Communication Flowchart

A communication owchart is a schematic of the plan on a single page. It

contains a weekly schedule of activity, a recap of dollars by vehicle and