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Get to know about the duties, responsibilities, qualifications, and skills requirements of a media planner. Feel free to use our job description template to produce your own. We also provide you with information about the salary you can earn as a media planner.

 

Who is a Media Planner?

They are marketing experts who understand how to maximize the return on investment when it comes to ad placement and promotions. It’s a position that necessitates expertise in two areas: market research and advertising reach.

A media planner is also a person who is in charge of managing digital marketing initiatives on a day-to-day basis, which might involve paid search, display, and social advertising tactics for both B2B and B2C companies. They assist businesses in growing and succeeding on digital channels. Their function is critical since it is an essential component of the development and maintenance of a successful digital strategy as well as effective media buying.

 

At advertising companies, media planners, often known as brand planners or brand strategists, construct campaigns for a variety of clients. Customers consult with the media planner to help them make decisions about the course of a given media campaign.

The primary goal of a media planner is to coordinate the placement of their client’s advertising content in numerous media venues to optimize advertising reach among the client’s target demographic. Television, the internet, radio, billboards, print, and direct mail are all examples of these mediums.

On the back end, some media planners assess advertising success, telling customers of their campaign’s return on investment and whether they’re getting good value for their advertising dollars.

For corporations and advertising agencies, a media planner performs market research and produces efficient marketing programs. These highly analytical individuals, often known as media researchers or media specialists, propose campaign suggestions, analyze campaign performance, and manage budgets.

A media planner’s job is to figure out which media platforms are the greatest for promoting a client’s brand or product. They work for advertising agencies or media planning and buying companies, and their goal is to maximize the impact of advertising campaigns across a variety of media channels, such as radio, television, the Internet, and billboards. Additionally, media strategists evaluate demographic data using mathematical formulae to determine what style of advertising will best suit their objectives.

Media planners are familiar with a product’s or service’s target demographic and how they shop. They understand, for example, that marketing for a device aimed at working parents differs from marketing for a video game aimed at teenagers. These groups watch different shows, go to different websites, and consume diverse types of media. Media planners may budget for various adverts across many media and predict their impact. Media planners maximize minimizing exposure to the correct target and provide a significant return on a relatively small investment with the right strategy.

Media planners create plans to help businesses get the most out of their advertising dollars. They determine which media channels should be used to achieve an advertising campaign’s business, marketing, and communication objectives as efficiently as possible, ensuring that the campaign’s message is delivered at the right place and at the right time to reach the client’s target audience within the available budget.

 

In the advertising sector, media planners play a crucial role. Their role is to create strategic media plans that detail which advertising platforms and channels will be used in a campaign, taking into account both qualitative and quantitative factors. Media plans specify how an advertising or public relations campaign will be carried out to meet particular ROI (return on investment) goals. New lead generation, increased customer loyalty, improved brand recognition and awareness, and the launch of a new product are just a few examples.

The process of media planning entails determining:

1. Which communication channels, both online and offline, will be used? (i.e. the media mix)
2. The campaign’s target market, or the group of consumers or users to whom the advertising message will be directed.
3. The demographic and geographic groups of the target market for the campaign
4. The frequency of advertising, or the number of times the advertisement will appear in the selected media.
5. The length of a campaign, as well as its start and end dates and timings.
6. The budget for each of the media channels is broken out.

Advertising space must be booked and purchased from media owners, advertising networks, or media agencies after the planning phase is completed and the advertising channels have been selected (e.g., TV, radio, newspaper and magazine advertisements, outdoor advertising such as billboards, posters, signs, and banners, online advertising, and product placement). A media buyer is often in charge of relations and negotiations with organizations selling advertising space, while in small and medium-sized firms, the media planner may be in charge.

 

Media Planner Job Description

Below are the media planner job description examples you can use to develop your resume or write a media planner job description for your employee. Employers can also use it to sieve out job seekers when choosing candidates for interviews.

• Collaborate with clients and the account team to learn about their business goals and marketing strategy.
• Work on several projects at once, often for different clients.
• Establish media plans and campaigns, and effectively interact with the creative agency team, clients, and consumers.
• Make decisions on which type of media is suitable for specific clientele and projects.
• Conduct research and data analysis with the help of industry experts.
• Determine your target audiences’ qualities, behavior, and media habits.
• Present proposals to clients in a timely way, including pricing schedules.
• Establish and maintain positive relationships with owners of media outlets such as newspapers, magazines, and websites.
• Obtain and analyze market data.
• Supervise campaign budgets and negotiate charges for services like the ad room and social media campaigns.
• Monitor the execution of media efforts.
• Identify and evaluate target audiences’ behavior, attributes, and routines.
• Select the optimum media channel combination for various media campaigns.
• Making campaign proposals and presenting them to clients.
• Media trends are being tracked across various platforms, including periodicals, blogs, and television.
• Evaluate the efficacy of media advertising strategies and plans.
• Proofread any commercials or marketing efforts before reporting them.
• Develop, execute, and optimize cutting-edge digital campaigns.
• Work across departments to align campaign strategies and goals.
• Provide key stakeholders with continual actionable insights into campaign performance.
• Define, track, and evaluate key performance indicators (KPIs) for the media.
• Create media buys for multiple ad channels and manage media execution daily.

 

Qualifications

• A bachelor’s degree in marketing or a related field.
• 3+ years of experience working as a media planner or in a similar position
• A broad understanding of media channels
• Understanding of campaign evaluation metrics and media purchasing
• Communication and teamwork skills are exceptional.
• An understanding of analytics software (e.g. GfK MRI, MOAT, Nielsen IMS)
• Strong analytical and organizational abilities Ability to function successfully under pressure
• Ability to collect and organize information using IT resources such as databases and spreadsheets Deeply analytical mind with an aptitude for statistics math.
• The ability to work successfully in a group setting is required.

 

Essential Skills

Key talents that help you to succeed in a media planning profession are media planner skills. Demonstrating vital talents will help you persuade an employer to hire you while you’re looking for work as a media planner. Possessing a varied skill set of media planner skills may help you succeed in your position once you’ve been hired.

If you want to work as a media planner, you need to hone your talents in the following areas:

• Analysis: Analytical skills enable you to evaluate data sets, charts, and other types of information to discover significant components and extrapolate conclusions based on them. This is an important ability since it allows you to generate more precise estimates. As a media planner, you utilize analysis both predictively and responsively to choose your perceived best options and to evaluate the efficacy of your efforts.
• Database administration: When evaluating data for analysis as a media planner, you may have access to a range of databases. You can do so more efficiently if you have strong expertise with database management software. This makes it a valuable ability to develop and list on your resume while looking for new opportunities.
• Making decisions: As a media planner, one of the most crucial aspects of your job is deciding which media buying opportunities to pursue. Decision-making abilities enable you to evaluate your options objectively to determine the best one, then act decisively on it. Making firm decisions can help to eliminate misunderstandings and achieve better performance outcomes.
• Personality traits: As a media planner, you’ll likely interact with a variety of people representing various groups, including employees and senior executives at your firm, as well as representatives from organizations from which you want to acquire advertising space. Interpersonal abilities enable you to form closer personal bonds and communicate more effectively. This can assist in the formation of more favorable agreements and the reduction of misunderstandings between parties.
• Negotiation: Working as a media planner may also include responsibilities as a media buyer. A media buyer is in charge of putting the media planner’s overall strategy into action. Negotiation skills can help you save money on media purchases by allowing you to negotiate better terms for your business.
• Persuasion: When recommending a media-buying strategy, you may run into circumstances where others in the company disagree with you. Persuasion abilities enable you to persuade people of the effectiveness of your recommendations, allowing you to enhance the frequency with which your plans are approved. When discussing changes with media platforms, or when working for a marketing firm and trying to persuade a new customer to hire you, persuasion can come in handy.
• Research: As a media planner, effective market research allows you to make more educated judgments about your media buying plans. Developing your research abilities can help you increase the quality of research available to you, even if you rely on research supplied by others inside the company. You may increase the quality of your decision-making and planning by improving the quality of your research.

 

How to Become a Media Planner

• Obtaining a Diploma: A Other in Other or a comparable subject is normally required to begin your Media Planner job path to stay a competitive alternative for companies. During your education, concentrate on gaining industry-specific skills so that you are well-prepared to apply for entry-level positions and enter the workforce. Before entering the field, a Media Planner internship may be essential to earn your Other and gain important on-the-job skills.
• Pick a specialization in your field: You may be asked to choose a specialty within your profession as a Media Planner. Determine the aspect of the Media Planner field you are most comfortable with, and continue to take steps to advance in your chosen Media Planner specialty.
• Get a Job as a Media Planner at the Entry Level: You’ll usually start your career as an entry-level Media Planner after earning an Other in Other or a comparable subject. In general, after completing your two-year Other in a comparable field, you can work as a Media Planner. You could want to look into certification in certified buying professional or certified planning professional, depending on the type of Media Planner career you wish to pursue.
• Advance your career as a media planner: There are multiple Media Planner professional path levels to advance into after the entry level. As an entry-level Media Planner, it can take up to two years to advance to the next seniority level position. To advance in your Media Planner job path, you’ll need about 2 years of experience at each level. To develop your Media Planner career path, you may need extra schooling, an advanced degree such as a Master’s Degree in a related profession, or special certifications.
• Continue your education as a media planner: To develop your Media Planner professional path, not all industries and employers require continuing education. Earning this degree, on the other hand, may help you advance faster to higher-paying jobs. Earning an in Other might take up to four years. People with a make an average of $81,075 each year, compared to $44,876 for those without a degree.

 

Where to work as a Media Planner

1. Advertising agencies
2. Media outlet

 

Media Planner Salary Scale

In the United Kingdom, the average l media planner’s salary is £35,000 per year or £17.95 per hour. Starting salaries for entry-level positions start at £30,000 per year, with the most experienced professionals earning up to £45,000 per year.

In the United States, the average compensation for a  media planner is $71,000 per year or $36.41 per hour. Starting salaries for entry-level professions start at $60,000 per year, with the highest-paid professionals earning up to $92,083 per year.

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