Digital media platforms have become the go-to place for people not only to communicate or seek entertainment but also to learn about, compare and get access to the products that they want to consume. Around 59% of the world population are active internet users who spend several hours on digital media platforms on a daily basis. Considering this huge obsession with digital media, companies are now focussing more on digital media marketing than on traditional modes of promoting their brands. This has necessitated effective digital media planning.
Digital media planning and buying is an online method of bridging the gap between brands and their prospective consumers. It includes strategies through which companies aim to create brand awareness and expand customer base via digital media platforms. A well-structured digital media planning can prove quite beneficial in growing a company’s reputation and online reach.
Top digital media planning strategies
Nowadays, social media presence is highly important for brands to get noticed and fetch an increased number of customers. However, if you start promoting your brand haphazardly without any planning, it can affect the company’s reach drastically. To help brands frame effective digital media strategy and secure an ad space on digital media platforms, many media buying companies have come into existence. They have skilled digital media marketing agents who create customised online marketing plans for enhancing the brand’s visibility online.
Conduct market research
For excellent digital media planning, the first thing that you would need to do is study the market. For that, you need to identify the category of your product and brand. Then, you must analyse the competition among similar existing brands and keep track of the market trends. Having a thorough knowledge of the target market is extremely important for proceeding to the next step of framing digital media strategies. The better you understand the industry in which your brand fits, the better will be your digital media planning. Well-thought strategies based on market research and trends will go a long way in ensuring profitable returns from investment on digital media.
Create target audience persona
Once you have done your market research, you have to invest your time in identifying who the potential audience of your product are. You should practise social listening to get an idea about the target audience. You have to analyse and identify their behaviours, interests, problems and how your product can solve their existing problems. Considering your brand’s product, you must frame your target audience’s age group, their professional backgrounds, gender proportion, etc. creating a target consumer persona. You can do so by analysing their common demographic and psychological aspects is extremely necessary for ensuring that you frame a suitable strategy to reach that prospective audience group. You can contact the media buying companies to get thorough guidance in creating audience persona efficiently.
Map consumer online journeys
After you have understood who are your potential customers, you have to track their online lifestyle. With digital footprints left behind by internet users, you can analyse their data and conclude which media channels do most consumers visit on a regular basis, what are the trending searches online, etc. mapping such information about the way consumers use digital media will help you create campaigns that will capture audience’s attention and convince them to take actions in the way you desire.
Choose an effective media mix
Once you have tracked down your potential audience’s online history, you can select the suitable digital media platform which will help you expand your brand’s reach phenomenally. However, for surviving and excelling in an intensely competitive market, promoting your brand on one digital media platform won’t suffice. Knowing the popularity of various social media platforms, you must create contents and promote them on multiple media platforms to increase the brand’s social media presence. You can go for social media buying to ensure customer engagement on various digital media platforms every day.
Frame an audience-centric strategy
Since your product’s success depends on its popularity among consumers, it is imperative to give foremost importance to the audience’s interest while chalking digital media strategy. Nowadays, viewers can decide whether they want to skip or continue seeing an online ad. Thus, it is important for companies to make sure that they post ads that will be alluring and relatable to the audience. People no longer prefer sales ads boasting about the product’s benefits bluntly. Ads which empathises with the pain points of consumers and suggests suitable remedies through their product stays for long in people’s mind. Thus, if you want to be the talk-of-the-town brand, you must ensure that your digital media strategy is framed, keeping the target audience in mind. You can seek help from an online media buying agency to get a desirable space on digital media platforms for your brand’s contents.
Also, Read: DIGITAL MEDIA IN INDIA
Allocate your budget effectively
A core aspect of digital media planning and buying is assessing the budget and knowing how much to spend where. While executing digital media planning, it is important to stay within your budget. Identify your business goals and infer how much you would like to invest in promotion through digital media. Once you know your gross budget, start segregating the investment among different online media platforms. An effective digital media planning doesn’t only mean framing a strategy, ensuring lucrative profits. It must also ensure that you get good reach and return from the digital media strategy at a minimal investment.
Abide by your plan
In a fluctuating industry, oftentimes brands tend to reframe their digital media strategies frequently in the expectation of better returns. However, it affects the brand’s progress negatively. Mostly, getting profitable returns through digital media marketing takes time. If you change your long-term strategy overnight because of a temporary fall in business conversions, it is not likely to produce any desirable result. So, just focussing on sales and numbers might actually harm your profit returns in the long run. You can take assistance from an online media buying agency to frame an effective online media marketing strategy under any given market situation. Once you have a well-thought plan, you should focus on building the brand’s reputation through that plan and stick to it irrespective of market fluctuations.
If you execute these steps while figuring out the ideal digital media strategy for your brand, it is likely going to help your brand prosper and yield attractive returns on affordable investments. Social media buying through media buying agencies can also be helpful in getting the desired digital media presence for scaling up your company’s reach and profit margin.