IPA Excellence Diploma - Module 3 - Brands and Channels - Tom Darlington

8/3/2019 IPA Excellence Diploma - Module 3 - Brands and Channels - Tom Darlington

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Unit 3 Brands and Channels IPA Excellence Diploma Candidate # 3003

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IPA Excellence Diploma

Module 3

The media plan is dead, long live the media plan!

I believe the future of brands and channels requires a newmeans of visualising the media plan

Candidate # 3003October 2011


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The media plan is dead, long live the media plan! I believe the future of

brands and channels requires a new means of visualising the media

plan.

In 2006, I began working as a Planner in a Media agency. Fast-forward five years to

2011, and the world in which we operate is a totally different place the Internet has

matured, and digital is increasingly becoming the mode of carriage for all other

media (Shirky, How Social Media Can Make History, 2009). Facebook has gone

from being a small, cottage industry for American Ivy Leaguers to a global media

empire. Apples iPhone has, since launch in 2007, revolutionised the way we interact

with, and access, content.

The last 10 years have seen the greatest shift in the way people interact with media

in modern history (Fig.1). Despite the huge changes to the media landscape we

operate within, the document we use to represent our campaigns has remained

largely unchanged. I believe a new format of media plan must be created, one which

properly represents the connected, data driven, digital media world we now operate

in.

The media plan we use currently is a relic, designed in a different age. Agencies

must modernize this document in line with the new consumers we advertise to, and

must be based on the new communications tools we use. This change is vital to the

future of media agencies. Media agencies must help clients understand an

increasingly complex consumer landscape, if we fail, media agencies will cease to be

relevant.

The media plan

Despite there being a huge number of media agencies operating globally, the media

plan looks broadly the same wherever you are. It details two key pieces of


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information timing or phasing, and by specifics by channel such as coverage and

investment (Fig.2)

Fig.1. Media Fragmentation since 1700 media channels plotted on the y-axis, with timealong the x-axis. As we reach the present day, fragmentation and proliferation has

accelerated driven by growth of digital technology and broadband Internet access(MillwardBrown, 2007)

Media Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Spend

(000s)

Brand X

TV 400 TVRs 400 TVRs 400 TVRs 3,000

Press 80% @ 4 OTS 86% @ 7 OTS 1,500

Magazines 25% @ 3 OTS 250

Radio 45% @ 12 OTH 300

Digital Display 200m impressions 2,000

Fig2. Brand Xs H1 media plan demonstrating investment by media and audience coverage(Source: Author)


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This document has remained largely unchanged from the days of media being

presented in the last ten minutes of a creative presentation when media planning

was a function of a more holistic agency system (Bullmore, 2002).

In its current form it has many benefits - it is easy to understand and conveys

important information, such as investment and channel mix, quickly. It allows those

who use it to quickly see how media activity is phased across a period, and how

audience coverage builds. From a more practical point of view, it allows those

producing advertising to understand when material needs to be supplied to media

owners. It requires little specialist knowledge to understand and interpret it.

New media landscape, new media behavior

As digital technology has matured, the media landscape has changed we no longer

live in a world where interruptive, one way advertising that simply tells consumers

what to do, what to buy or what to think (PHD Worldwide, 2010, p. 11) is viable. This

is not to say that traditional spot advertising in peak time television is dead, but

instead that the dynamics of the media landscape have altered largely driven by

the proliferation of ubiquitous internet access and new electronic devices (Fig.3)

Fig.3. The number of internet enabled devices consumers own is growing. Post 2010 growthis driven by mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. (The Economist, 2011)


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The fast emergence of digital technology has changed the way that

Communications services work for consumers (Ofcom, 2011). Media is no longer

consumed at a set time it is consumed when, where, and in whatever way

consumers choose.

Media is now increasingly being combined, meaning that a greater and greater

percentage of peoples overall media time is spent multi-tasking. (Fig.4.)

Fig.4. Especially amongst younger audiences, people are increasingly meshing media timetogether, further changing dynamics of media landscape(Ofcom, 2011)

In addition to new devices on which to consume media, the rise of social now means

that advertising within media doesnt behave in the same way it used to it now has

a life beyond the original paid for spot or placement. People can share content that

they like, or criticise content they dont. Social media has gone from being a type of

platform to a function of all digital media, built in to the very DNA of the devices and

services we use. People are increasingly becoming the point where media intersects

Clay Shirky suggests, media is the connective tissue of society (Shirky, 2011), but


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in a culture of technological convergence it could be suggested society is also the

connective tissue of the media.

The new media landscape we operate in, and the new behavior which it has created

means that a media agency today, needs to be doing so much more than just

media in its traditional sense, it needs to be a true communications agency.

Consumer behavior and digital technology has blurred the lines between media and

message agencies can no longer be solely interested in trading the media canvas

as a commodity we must take a more holistic view of all communication and

understand the relationship between each element of a clients communications mix.

Characteristics of the Old Media world Characteristics of New Media world

Consolidated audiences by channel Fragmented audiences by channel

Static media Fluid, portable and social media

Metrics reconciled retrospectively Metrics reconciled in real time digitally

Top down push model On demand, non linear pull model

Digital as emerging channel Post Digital Full integration into all media

Single media consumption Stacked multimedia consumption

Why the time for change is now

Whilst reflecting basic information such as coverage and timing, the media plan

actually is so much more than this. It is the bridge between client and agency. It

represents the culmination of hours of strategic and implementational thinking. As the

media landscape has become more complicated, this document has not changed in

step. We insist on fitting new media into a structure built for old media. The agency

model is only valid as long as agencies continue to add value to their client s


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business (Hook, 2011). In the brave new digital world of media, we, as a community

of agencies, must find ways to help our clients understand and buy ideas, ideas that

are now so much more complicated than they ever were before. In the modern age

we need a plan that demonstrates how campaigns will work across all elements of a

fragmented, digital landscape and makes it easy for clients to understand. If we

dont, agencies will cease to add value, and therefore be surplus to requirements.

Building the next generation of media plan

Fig.5 A media landscape requires a new type of plan(Source: Author)

Fig.5 demonstrates what I believe the new plan should look like. It covers each of the

three elements of a clients advertising or communications mix, with bought media in

blue, earned media in green, and owned media in red.


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The nodes of these sections relate to specific media activity, and are sized relative to

the coverage they generate against an audience, in any given time. The size of the

hubs acts as a sum of the activity within it and quickly represents the scale of any

area of the marketing mix.

This document is generated by a number of xml feeds from both the existing media

plan shown earlier, and other client data feeds.

Because the plan is generated via numerous different data feeds, the relationship

between individual media becomes explicit. In real time it demonstrates the

relationship between differing media activities, providing a more rounded picture of

the campaign. It would appear that after so long, the promise of real time data has

actually become manifest, and it makes sense for a new plan to be powered by the

torrents of information made available to us via digital technology (McKinsey Global

Institute, 2011). It will provide a more honest, accurate, and up to date version of

what is actually happening across the communications mix.

By animating the data points in flash, you are can see how the plan of activity grows

over time.

In the screen grab above, one phase of the plan is displayed, in this instance, a

week. The user is able, via this system, to look at individual phases, which they

specify a week, month, or year for example. The user is also able to see how

delivery of media progresses across phases.

In the appendix you will find a mocked up, working version of this plan

demonstrating how it could look in real conditions.


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Advantages of the new plan vs. the traditional format

The benefit of this style of media plan is that it presents all available consumer

interactions at one time, and weights them according to a metric such as coverage.

In the old style of plan, arbitrary blocks represent media activity, but scale is left out

of the equation.

Secondly, in an on demand world where there is no predictability of media

exposure (Elms, 2011) this version of the plan makes explicit the way consumers

interact with media at any one time and the transference of media exposure by

channel. Making the connection between TV ratings, for example, and online video

views, clear and easy to understand. Whilst the old plan does allow you to

understand phasing of a campaign, in an era when integration is highly desired by

clients, it does not make explicit the way media works together in generating

coverage (Fig.6.)

I also believe this format of plan will help those working in media and

communications agencies create better campaigns for their clients. Currently, when

media agency planners create post campaign reports for clients to help evaluate

successes and failures, original planned media metrics are compared to the final

version of the plan displaying differences in deliveries. Because of the way this new

format of plan is generated, via data and in real time, we can see what effect different

areas of the plan had on other sections. Providing greater texture to the learning we

derive from post campaign meetings and helping us to prioritise budget on future

campaigns.


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Fig.6 In this example we see the direct correlation between paid for media in week 1 and the

effect it has on earned media in the social space in week 2. (Source: Author)


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By using the information stored within this plan, it would be possible to create

scenario plans using information such from econometric and brand studies. This

would allow media planners to optimise the balance between paid media activity and

earned, as you begin to gather data about the casual relationship between the two.

The plan becomes a plan in the purest sense, but also a prediction tool for future

campaigns.

Finally, and most importantly I believe this type of plan will help us, as media

agencies, sell our ideas. Instead of the same old 400 TVR campaign that so often

gets bought instead of better rounded, integrated, modern solutions, this plan will

help simply, and effectively, visualise the way in which new media campaigns will

work powered by real data to prove what were saying. In these times of change,

our clients rely on us yet so often we are unable to explain our ideas properly, and

this, I believe, is a means to make it easy for our clients to buy our work. In doing so,

our clients will become more progressive as advertisers, beginning to enjoy the

advantages of our new media world, rather than simply worrying about its dangers.

This new format is ultimately not about media, it is about creating a visual

representation of all the communications the target audience can interact with at any

one time, making explicit the dynamic relationship with each touchpoint and allowing

agencies and clients to understand this relationship better.

Long live the new media plan

As the media landscape we operate in has become more complex we have failed to

keep pace. The most important document that media agencies have has been stuck

in a time warp, and as a result it is no longer fit to properly communicate the

information agencies require it to. To properly help ourselves, and our clients

understand the ever-changing world we live in, we need a new media plan. The new


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plan must be easy to understand, accurately represent how media works together

and be as accurate as possible. By using digital technology to ouradvantage we can

achieve this. By creating a new model we can help our clients make more

progressive choices, and in doing so secure the position of media agencies and

communications experts rather than simple commodity brokers.

The media plan is dead. Long live the new media plan.


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Appendix

On the accompanying CD, you will find a demonstration of how this plan could

work for a real client. If youre reading the pdf version, the file should

accompany this document.

The data that has been inputted is arbitrary, but based on coverage or reach

levels by channel in any given period. It is designed to show how a real

clients communications plan would be displayed over a 16 week period.

The flexibility of this system would allow other data sets to be incorporated or

removed as needed, and this is by no means meant to be a definite article.

As with all good digital projects, this is still in beta, and I will be testing this on

real clients in my day to day role shortly, aiming to refine and improve as I go.


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BibliographyBullmore, J. (2002). Last word on the future. In J. Myerson, & G. Vickers, Rewind:

Forty Years of Design and Advertising. London: Phaidon.

Elms, S. (2011, Aprill). Intergrated Planning:Cloud Thinking.Admap.

Hook, U. (2011, October 18). Is The Agency Model About To Expire?Retrieved

October 24, 2011, from MediaBiz Bloggers:

http://www.mediabizbloggers.com/uwe-hook/The-Agency-Model-

About-to-Expire---Uwe-Hook.html

McKinsey Global Institute. (2011, May). The challengeand opportunityof bigdata. Retrieved October 22, 2011, from McKinsey Quarterly:

https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/The_challenge_and_opportunity_of

_big_data_2806

Millward Brown. (2007). Media Evolution: The Long View. Retrieved October 17,

2011, from Slideshare: www.slideshare.net/adliterate/media-

fragmentation

Ofcom. (2011). Ofcom: Communications Market Report UK. London: Ofcom.PHD Worldwide. (2010). Fluid: PHD on Harnessing The Rising Speed of Influence.

London: PHD.

Shirky, C. (2009, June 1). How Social Media Can Make History. Retrieved October

13, 2011, from TED:

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/clay_shirky_how_cellphones_twitte

r_facebook_can_make_history.html

Shirky, C. (2011). Cognitive Surplus . London: Penguin.

The Economist. (2011, October 8). Beyond The PC. Retrieved October 18, 2011,

from The Economist:

http://www.economist.com/node/21531109?frsc=dg|a

Word Count (Excl. captions, titles, tables, bibliography) 1,986

IPA Excellence Diploma - Module 3 - Brands and Channels - Tom Darlington

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